Alchymist

Part One: Phynadr

One

The mud was made from earth and blood, organs and entrails, for the battle had raged back and forth until the dead carpeted the ground. It was the most ghastly sight Irisis Stirm had ever seen, and after a day and a night she was still stuck in the middle of it. The flower of humanity's youth was being slaughtered outside the walls of Snizort, and there was nothing anyone could do.

Dropping her broken sword in the mire, Irisis took up a sound one. There were plenty to choose from. 'Scrutator,' she said as they climbed a little knoll, boots skidding in the wet. The rising sun picked out red eyes in their dirty faces. 'What are we going to do?'

'Die' Xervish Flydd grimaced. 'This marks the end of civilisation, of everything I've fought for all my life.'

'I won't give up, surr.'

'Very noble of you, Irisis.'

'There's got to be a way.'

'There isn't. There's too many of them and they're killing us twice as fast as we're killing them.'

Irisis looked around. 'Let's try and get to the command post. It's not far now.' It stood on a flat-topped hill away to their right, and the Council flag still fluttered there. 'At least we'll be able to see what's going on.'

'Where's Ullii?' said Flydd, very belatedly.

'Hiding, I expect.'

'Then she's got more sense than the rest of us. What about Pilot Hila?'

'She was killed in the first attack yesterday morning, not long after the air-floater crashed. You stood over her, holding the enemy off, until she died.'

Flydd shook his grizzled head. 'I don't remember. I can hardly remember anything about the past day.'

'I remember every minute,' said Irisis, 'and I wish I didn't. Come on.'

A lyrinx staggered out of the wallow to their left. The creature stood head and shoulders over Irisis, who was a tall woman, and its great mouth could have bitten her leg off. One leathery wing dragged in the bloody muck; a mighty arm had been severed at the elbow. It slashed feebly at the scrutator, who swayed backwards then lunged, plunging his sword between the armoured skin plates and into its heart.

The creature fell into the red mud, splattering it all over them. Flydd did not even look down.

'Where did you learn such swordsmanship, Xervish?' said Irisis. The scrutator was a small, scrawny man, past middle age. She had seen him fight before, but never with such deadly efficiency as in the past day.

'The scrutators have the best of everything, so I was taught by an expert. Even so, that move wouldn't have worked on an able-bodied lyrinx.'

They passed between two clankers – eight-legged mechanical monsters big enough to carry ten soldiers and all their supplies. The one on the left looked intact, though a headless man lay on the shooter's platform up top, slumped over his javelard, a spear-throwing device like a giant crossbow. Another body was sprawled on the catapult cranks. Once the node had been destroyed its field vanished, and the clankers became useless, immobile metal.

A lone shooter stood behind the loaded javelard of the right-hand machine, training his weapon back and forth across the battlefield. He fired, and the heavy spear was gone too quickly to trace, taking a distant lyrinx full in the chest.

'Nice shooting,' said the scrutator, squelching by.

The soldier shook his head. 'Not good enough to save us, sum' He jumped down. 'It was my last spear.'

'Where's your operator?'

'Dead!'

'What are you like on the ground?'

The soldier turned out the inside of his jerkin. Irisis caught a flash of silver.

The scrutator stopped dead. 'You earned that with a sword?'

'And a long knife, surr. At the battle for Plimes, two years ago.'

'I need a good man with a blade. Find yourself a weapon and come with us.'

Irisis was astounded. The scrutator was known for decisiveness, but to select a stranger so quickly was unprecedented. 'I hope you're a good judge of character,' she said out of the corner of her mouth as they slogged through the bloody mire.

'I chose you, didn't I?'

'That's what I mean.' She grinned. Irisis, with her yellow hair and that long, ripe figure, was a beautiful woman, even covered in mud and gore.

'You didn't see, did you?'

'The badge? No.'

'That was no badge. It was the Star of Valour, and it falls to few living men to wear their own.'

They angled across the field towards the command-post hill, skirting a wallow in which lay the head of a soldier like a single flower in a brown bowl. The eyes stared right at them. Irisis looked the other way. They'd seen a thousand such sights in the past day but still it made her stomach roil.

'Your name would be Flangers, would it not?' said the scrutator.

'That's right, surr/ said the soldier. 'How did you know?'

'It's my business to know the names of heroes. Do you know who I am?'

'Of course. You're the People's Scrutator.'

'Where did that name come from?' Flydd exclaimed.

'I can't say, surr,' said Flangers. 'The soldiers have always called you that.'

Disrespectful louts,' growled Flydd. 'I'll have a detachment or two whipped, and then we'll see if they dare such cheek.' There was a twinkle in his eye, though, and the soldier saw it.

Irisis chuckled. Flydd liked to be in control and to know everything; it was a rare sight to see him surprised. 'I'm Irisis.' She offered Flangers her hand.

'You're not from these parts, Flangers?' the scrutator went on as they began to climb the hill.

Flangers shook his head. He was grey eyed and fair haired, with neat, sunburnt features set off by a jutting jaw. Though not overly tall or muscular, he was lean and strong. 'I'm a Thurkad man,' he said, staring blankly at a pair of bodies that lay side by side without a mark on them. The swarming flies were already doing their work.

'Refugee?' asked Flydd. Thurkad, the greatest and oldest city in the west, had fallen two years before, ending the resistance on the great island of Meldorin.

'No. I joined up when I turned fifteen. Six years ago.'

'Did you see much fighting before Plimes?'

Flangers named half a dozen battlefields. 'More than I care to remember.'

'You must be a fine shooter,' said Irisis, 'to have survived all those.'

'Or a lucky one,' said Flydd, slipping in the mud. 'I could use a bit of that now.'

Flangers helped him up. 'It ran out today. I've not lost an operator before.' He was not bitter about it, though many a man might have been. 'We're done, surr. It's over.'

'You're a hero, Flangers. You can't talk like that.'

'I've seen whole nations wiped out, surr. The ancient wonders of my homeland are no more, the millions who dwelt there dead or scattered across the globe. Even Thurkad, the greatest city the world has ever seen, lies empty and in ruins. There's no hope left. The enemy will eat us all.' He gave a little shudder of horror. 'Even our little children.'

'You know the penalty for despairing talk, soldier?'

'For many of the common folk, death at the hands of the scrutators is preferable to being torn apart and eaten.'

'Yet despite your despair you fight on.'

'Duty is everything to me, surr,' said Flangers.

'Then may you take comfort from doing your duty. Give me a hand up here, would you?1

Taking the scrutator by the elbow, Flangers helped him through the steep pinch to the top of the hill. At the edge, Flydd took Irisis's arm and moved away. Tell me, Irisis, do you despair as well?'

'No.'

'Why not?'

'I know you'll find a way to save us.'

'Be careful where you put your faith. I'm just a man. I can fail, or be brought down as easily as any other man.'

'But you won't. I know you'll see us through, surr.' He did not reply. 'Surr, what is it?' she went on.

'Flangers has shaken me, Irisis. The people now see death as their only escape. Despair will bring us down more quickly than a horde of the enemy, and how can I counter that?'

'With a bold strike; a miraculous victory.'

'It would take a mighty miracle to save us now.'

'Then you'd better think of a way,' she retorted, 'We're counting on you, surr, and you can't let us down.'

On top of the hill was an oval of cleared land, almost as flat as a tabletop, containing a large command tent in the centre and clusters of smaller ones to either side. A wall of guards lowered their spears to let them through. Inside, a line of crossbowmen held weapons at the ready. The lyrinx always attacked the command post first, if they could get to it.

Flydd nodded to the captain of the guard, then turned to look over the battlefield. A shadow passed across his face and he made for the command tent.

General Tham, a bouncing ball of muscle topped by a shiny bald head, met him at the flap. 'Scrutator Flydd! We'd given up hope of seeing you -'

'Where's General Grism?' Flydd interrupted. 'He's not dead?'

'He's over the far side. Shall I call him?' 'You'll do. What's our situation?'

Tham plucked at an ear the shape and colour of a dried peach. 'We've lost fourteen thousand men, dead, and another six thousand will never fight again. The Aachim have lost six thousand and, even with their grudging aid, we're failing fast.'

'Grudging aid?' Flydd said sharply.

'I – I'd hesitate to call our allies cowards, surr, but…'

'Spit it out, General.'

'Even before the field went down, the Aachim never gave what we asked of them. They always hung back. And since then, I've seen only defence of their own lines. When we counterattack, they never come with us…'

'It's a long time since they've fought to the bitter end,' Flydd mused, 'knowing that, if they lost, all would be lost. Their noble exterior, it seems, conceals a rotten core. More than once they've failed in the uttermost hour, when the difference between victory and defeat was simply the courage to fight on, no matter what the odds. Even so, the Histories tell us that the Aachim have more often fallen through treachery than military might. Well, General, if that's the kind of allies we have, we must fight all the harder.'

And die all the sooner. I beg you, Scrutator, allow me to sound the retreat or by dawn there won't be a man left.'

'Sound it,' said Flydd, 'though if the enemy truly want to destroy us, that will give them the chance to do the job by nightfall.'

'You doubt that they do?'

'It's doesn't seem to be their main objective,' said Flydd.

'Then what are they really here for?' Tham exclaimed.

'That's what we'd all like to know.'

Tham gave orders to his signaller, who ran to the edge of the hill. Horns began to sound. Irisis watched the scrutator from the corner of her eye as he paced back and forth, looking sick. Nothing had gone right since they'd come to Snizort. The Council of Scrutators had ordered him to destroy the lyrinx node-drainer, for similar devices at other vital nodes had immobilised clankers and led to the destruction of the armies they escorted.

Flydd and Irisis, aided by the seeker, Ullii, had stolen into the underground maze of Snizort. Ullii had led them through the tar saturated tunnels to the uncanny chamber of the node-drainer, and Flydd had succeeded in destroying it. Unfortunately that had caused the destruction of the node itself, in a catastrophic explosion. All the fields, weak as well as strong, had vanished, rendering clankers and constructs useless, and leaving the army of sixty thousand men, plus twenty thousand Aachim, unprotected.

Such a force should have been a match for twenty-five thousand lyrinx on an open battlefield, but Snizort was surrounded by a maze of tar bogs, mine pits, windrows made from cleared woodland, traps and ancient tar runs that the enemy had set alight. And when the lyrinx emerged from their underground labyrinth they were far more numerous than expected – near to thirty-five thousand. The soldiers, lacking the armour of the clankers, had been slaughtered.

Flangers stood guard outside the command tent as Flydd and Tham went in. Irisis stalked the rim of the hill, looking down at the battlefields but seeing nothing. After all their work, and all their agony down in the tar pits, the result was worse than if they had done nothing.

Yet she'd had a personal triumph in Snizort. Under extreme duress, and with Ullii's help, Irisis had recovered the talent that had been hidden, or suppressed, since her fourth birthday. Her ability to draw power from the field was back. Irisis was no longer a fraud, but a true crafter at last.

All her life she'd obsessed about getting her talent back but, now she had it, it gave her no joy. Why was that? Was she incapable of taking pleasure in her own achievements? Or was it that nothing would ever come of it?

A shiver passed up her spine. Her life's dream, after the war was over, was to be a jeweller. Irisis had a rare gift for that craft and had been making jewellery in her spare time since she was a child. Once the war ended, and controller artisans were no longer required, she planned to follow her dream. However, from the moment they'd escaped the tar pits, Irisis had been troubled by intimations of mortality. She felt doomed.

Despite her earlier talk, today or tomorrow must see the end of them. Not even the scrutator, wily dog that he undoubtedly was, could get them out of this fiasco. There was no hope of escape in the air-floater, for it had been damaged in the explosion of the node and would take days to repair, assuming it had survived the battle at all.

Discovering that she had returned to her starting point, Irisis sat down on the edge of the hill, to the rear of the tents, trying to get a picture of what was going on. Everywhere she looked, desperate men fought and died. A lyrinx could take on two human soldiers at once and win, and often, three or four.

There were few enemy in the air, though that was not surprising. Many lyrinx could fly, but on this heavy world they had to supplement their wings by using the Secret Art, if they had a talent for it. Even then, flight took so much out of them that they could do little else at the same time. But to fly here, they would have to draw on a distant node, and only the most powerful mancers of all could do that.

Irisis saw a pair directly above, riding the noonday thermals, conserving their strength. They were watching the formations on the battlefield and relaying simple messages to their brethren on the ground.

Scanning the sky, Irisis caught sight of an oddly-shaped speck just above the eastern horizon. It did not look like a lyrinx. Another speck appeared to the left of the first, and a third to the right. The air was hazy; she could not quite make them out. Squinting until her eyes watered, she saw that the specks were slightly elongated, with a smaller mark beneath each.

More specks appeared, until there were a dozen. Irisis ran to the command tent. 'Scrutator! Scrutator!'

He looked up from the map table where he and Tham were moving pointers, planning the retreat. Scribes were taking down the orders and passing them to a stream of messengers outside.

'Go away, Crafter' he snapped. 'This can't wait for anything.'

'Come outside, quickly! You won't believe it.'

Flydd peered at her from beneath an eyebrow that snaked from one side of his forehead to the other. At the look on her face he dropped his marker and hurried, in that crab-lurch of his, to the entrance.

She drew him around the back of the tent. 'Look!' Irisis threw out her arm.

The shapes were unmistakable now. 'Air-floaters!' said Flydd. 'Twelve of them, and coming fast. So that's what the Council was up to.'

'Any reinforcement is welcome,' said Tham, pushing between them, 'though a dozen air-floaters can do precious little to help us now.'

'Let's wait and see,' said Flydd. 'Can you rustle up some breakfast, Irisis?'

In twenty minutes the air-floaters were overhead, flying in perfect formation, four wide and three high. They made a circle over the top of the battlefield and the fighting broke off as humans, Aachim and lyrinx stood by to see what their intentions were. Being so light, air-floaters could be driven by a distant field.

'They seem to be working to a plan,' said Irisis, wolfing down a gritty hunk of black bread. It was tasteless army fare, but she was too hungry to care.

The machines had maintained formation all the way around the circuit. 'It's almost… It's as if they're all controlled by one mind.' Flydd carved slivers off a distinctly green cheese and popped them into his mouth, two at a time. 'Though I know that's not possible.'

Flangers came up beside them, one hand resting on the hilt of his sheathed sword. 'They'd better look out!'

The two lyrinx sentries were now converging on the ranked air-floaters. One corkscrewed down to the left side, the other plummeted directly towards the top-right machine. The attack was co-ordinated so they would reach their targets at the same time. And air-floaters were vulnerable. One slash of a lyrinx's claws could tear the gasbag right open. Moreover, an attack from directly above was difficult to defend against.

The air-floaters shifted slightly out of line. Just before the higher lyrinx reached its target there came a flash that lit up the creature. Its wings folded up and it fell out of the air. Rotating slowly, it disappeared behind a boulder-topped hill. 'What was that?' said Irisis. 'I don't know,' the scrutator replied.

The corkscrewing lynnx beat its great wings, coming out of the dive right beside the gasbag of the air-floater. It gave a measured slash but, before its claws could part the fabric, it too was hit by a flash of light. The lyrinx's wings churned, it somersaulted backwards and fell, upside down. Halfway to the ground it seemed to recover, flapped several times and almost broke its fall, but lost it and plunged into the bloody mud of the battlefield at a speed that must have pulverised every bone in its great body.

'I don't sense the Art,' said Flydd, puzzled. 'What are the scrutators up to?'

The battle had not resumed. The air-floaters pulled back into that perfect formation, now hanging motionless above the battlefield, their rotors turning just enough to counteract the gentle motion of the air.

'I wonder…?' said Flydd. 'Who on the Council has the boldness for this kind of venture, and the foresight to know that it would be needed?'

Irisis had a fair idea, but she would just wait and see. From the topmost middle air-floater, rods extended to either side, all the way to the neighbouring machines, which latched on. A roll of shimmering fabric fell, was caught as it passed in front of the middle row of machines, and again at the bottom.

'What on earth are they doing?' said Tham.

No one answered. The air-floaters moved ever so slightly this way and that, bending the rods and pulling the fabric into a gentle concavity. It took a long time, for the slightest change in the breeze tended to drift the machines apart, and much manoeuvring was required to get them aligned again.

'It's a mirror,' said Irisis. But what is it for?'

'They're not using the An at all' Flydd replied. They simply hit the flying lyrinx with a dazzling beam. Lyrinx have poorer eyesight than we do, and their eyes are sensitive to bright light. They only fight in the middle of the day if they have to. The beam disrupted the An they were using to keep aloft, and they were too close to the ground to recover.'

'They're moving,' said Flangers.

The twelve air-floaters wheeled in perfect formation. The sun flashed off the mirror, the beam lighting up a strip of ground some twenty spans long.

The beam crept across the battlefield, to play on a group of lyrinx attacking a line of soldiers. Irisis focussed on the scene with a spyglass. The lyrinx threw up their arms, trying to shield themselves from the boiling glare, then broke and ran, staggering from side to side. One bold soldier attacked from behind, felling his quarry with a sword thrust between the back plates, but the others escaped.

The beam stepped to another group of lyrinx, who broke like the first. As it tracked across the ground, the mud began to steam gently. The next detachment, some fifty lyrinx, resisted longer than the others, but within a minute they too had fled.

'With a lens, anyone can focus the sun's rays so as to set paper or cloth alight,' said Irisis, 'though I don't think that's their aim here.'

'The beam isn't tightly focussed,' said Flydd, putting down his spyglass, 'but it's enough to dazzle and confuse. And blind too, should you look directly at it.'

The general had a calculating look in his eye. 'Shall I order the counterattack, surr?'

'Wait,' said Flydd. 'If the mirror tears in the wind, or the lyrinx make a determined attack on it, we'll be more exposed than we are now.'

The enemy now attacked desperately, but the beam stopped each onslaught. Within an hour the lyrinx began to fall back en masse, whereupon the beam moved towards the ranks of enemy surrounding the walled perimeter of Snizort.

Suddenly half a dozen lyrinx took to the air, well apart, rising into the path of the air-floaters. This'll be interesting,' said Tham. "They'll never move the mirror quickly enough.'

The air-floaters did not attempt to. The first lyrinx to approach took many crossbow bolts to the head and chest. It tumbled over and over, wings cracking in the wind, before slamming into the ground down the slope behind the command tent. The second suffered a similar fate, for the air-floaters were packed with archers. The other lyrinx flapped away. In the air they were too vulnerable. The mirror beam continued its inexorable progress.

'Something's happening,' said Irisis in the early afternoon. She was watching enemy movements inside the southern wall of Snizort. Lyrinx were running backwards and forwards through the drifting smoke. 'Looks like they're sending out reinforcements.'

'I don't think so,' said the scrutator.

Flangers said quietly, 'They're carrying boxes and bags.'

'Where's my spyglass?' Flydd demanded.

'You left it by the tent,' Irisis replied, passing him her glass. He focussed it and said, 'You've got good eyes, soldier.'

'That's why I was chosen as shooter.'

'What are they doing?' Irisis and Tham asked together.

'A group of.., perhaps one hundred have formed up behind the southern wall,' said Flydd. 'They've all got big packs on, which is unusual, and they're carrying what appear to be boxes, or cases. Or coffins!'

'The same thing happened yesterday morning,' said a sentry standing nearby. 'Even before the node exploded their fliers were heading south-west, carrying huge packages.'

'Is that so?' said Flydd. 'How odd.'

"The tar's burning underground,' said Irisis, 'and it would be the very devil to put out. They'd have to abandon Snizort, whatever the result of the battle.'

'I wonder if those cases contain flesh-formed creatures?' Flydd gave Irisis a keen glance. 'If we could only…'

'I hope I'm wrong about what you're thinking' said Irisis.

'Regretfully,' said Flydd, 'you're not. They're weapons we don't know how to deal with, but if we had one or two little ones to study, we might be able to find a defence against them.'

The mirror beam now carved across the eastern wall, towards the enemy ranks on the other side. It was not causing as much confusion as before, but the lyrinx were still retreating from it.

Fighting broke out near the northern wall. A band of some twenty lyrinx had advanced in a rush that took them right through a line of human soldiers. The beam did not shift to counter this new threat, but kept moving back and forth across the ranks of the enemy, on the far side of Snizort.

'That was just a diversion,' cried Irisis. 'They're retreating.'

The group of lyrinx carrying the baggage rose into the air together then spread apart, holding low to the ground until they crossed the southern wall, where there was little fighting. There they climbed rapidly, disappearing into the smoky haze that hung over the fortress.

'They're mighty mancers' said Flydd, 'to fly under these conditions. Whatever they're carrying, it's more important than winning the battle.'

There was no way to bring them down; the lyrinx were out of range of the catapults and javelards, and the fleet of air-floaters did not seem to have noticed. The flying lyrinx reappeared out of the haze, flew into a pall drifting from the molten remains of the node, and vanished.

The scrutator shook his head. 'I think we're going to regret that.'

Two

Inside Snizort, the remaining lyrinx began to swarm over the western and southern walls. Fighting their way through the few human defenders nearby, they headed south-west down the tar-crusted valley. One by one the detachments outside the walls turned to follow them. Those lyrinx not yet called to the orderly retreat fought on.

The air-floaters turned together, drifting closer so as to direct the beam at a skirmish on the northern wall. The lyrinx must have been waiting for that, for three catapults fired at once and their balls of stone went through the mirror sail, tearing gashes which spread until the fabric hung down in tatters. It was released, the shreds winking in the air like tinsel. Each machine produced many smaller mirrors, the size of large shields, which the soldiers aimed individually. The effect was not as dramatic, but the lyrinx still broke when the beams struck them.

Eiryn Muss, Flydd's personal prober, or spy, came up beside him, whispering in his ear. Flydd looked surprised. He whispered back and Muss, an entirely nondescript fellow in his present disguise, slid away.

'What was that about?' said Irisis.

'Scrutators' business,' he "replied tersely.

The air-floaters continued their work for another hour, until, suddenly, it was all over.

'The last of the lyrinx are retreating,' said Flydd. 'We've survived – at least until nightfall.'

'So you think they'll come back?'

'You can't always tell with lyrinx. Since they've had to abandon Snizort, they may not. But then again, the opportunity to destroy our army in the dark may be too tempting to resist.'

The air-floaters were rotoring towards the command hill, but they did not all make it. A squad of lyrinx catapult operators had remained in position, camouflaged, waiting for just that moment.

A ball went right through the cabin of the lowest air-floater, shattering it into splinters and sending at least a dozen people to their deaths. Another missile struck the ovoid bag of a second machine, deflating it instantly. Fortunately it was, by then, only a few spans above the flank of the hill. The crash made a loud noise, though the machine did not seem to be damaged further. The other ten air-floaters made it to the ground a safe distance from the catapults.

'The lead one's flying the Council flag,' said Flydd, squinting through his spyglass again. I wonder who can be in command? Surely not Ghorr. The chief scrutator would never do anything to risk his mangy hide.'

'We'll soon find out,' said Irisis.

'I'd better go to meet them.'

Again Irisis felt that foreboding. She was following the scrutator when he turned and said, coolly, 'You won't be needed, Crafter. Wait here for my orders. If you would be so good as to ask Fyn-Mah to come down?'

The sudden, cold formality was like a slap in the face. He kept going so she headed back to the tents, found Perquisitor Fyn-Mah and gave her the message, then resumed her pacing around the hill.

Flydd did not hurry, for he also had an uncomfortable premonition. Despite their truly heroic efforts, the mission to destroy the node-drainer had been a failure, doomed before it began. The device the Council had given him had been faulty, perhaps deliberately so. Because of that, a third of the army had been lost. Flydd could not avoid the blame, nor would he, had he been able to. The soldiers lives had been in his hands, and he had failed them. Though inured to war, and hardened by it, every death weighed on him.

But another leader might have won this battle, he thought, despite the loss of the node. Another leader might have seen that the mission to the node-drainer was fatally flawed. Another leader might have done a hundred things to avert this disaster. Having done none of them, he could only feel culpable. If duty required him to pay, he would do so.

Nonetheless, his heart lurched when he saw who was getting out of the air-floater that had crash-landed. A tall, deep chested man, apparenthr in hale middle age, he was broad shouldered, dark haired, full bearded and of noble good looks, except when his smile revealed those vulpine teeth. It was Ghorr, the chief scrutator, and his temper looked fouler than usual. Behind him were ranked the ten other members of the Council of Scrutators, four women and six men. All were bruised, dishevelled and furiously angry.

Though Flydd was still a scrutator, he was no longer on the Council. He ran down to help Ghorr over the side, but the big man smacked his hand away. Blood droplets clustered on his left eyebrow from a gash at his hairline.

'I'm glad you've come,' said Flydd, putting out his hand. 'Your mirror is a fine innovation, though it'll only work once. The next time we meet the enemy they'll have a tactic to neutralise it.'

The chief scrutator ignored the gesture. 'I should never have allowed you back!'

'You should have led by example,' said Flydd, 'and done the job yourself. But that was never your way, was it, Ghorr?'

Ghorr brushed General Tham's hand aside, too, and panted to the top of the hill, where he paused to survey the battlefield. It was a pose, of course – he'd had hours to study the scene from the air-floater.

The other scrutators followed, and not even Flydd's former friend, Halie, the dark little scrutator, had a sympathetic glance for her former colleague. Flydd had expected no less. Though few knew it, the scrutators answered to a higher power – the shadowy Numinator. Someone must take the blame and he was the man responsible.

Ghorr was about to speak when the last of the air-floaters edged up over the hill, to settle directly in front of the command tent. A small man climbed over the side, rather awkwardly, for he had only one arm. Flydd gave an involuntary gasp. If there was one person he had not expected to see, it was this man.

As the air-floater lifted off and headed down the slope, the man turned and the sun caught a gleaming platinum mask that covered the left side of his face. Twin metal bands encircled his head like a helmet, and the hole in the cheek plate of the mask had been repaired. The single eye had the glare of a deranged man.

'You won't get away with it this time, Scrutator Flydd,' said Acting Scrutator Jal-Nish Hlar.

Irisis was catching a moment's rest in the shade behind a tent when Perquisitor Fyn-Mah shook her awake. Fyn-Mah was petite, black of hair and eye, with a stern, frozen beauty that deterred rather than attracted. The perquisitor normally exuded dignity, but now she was flushed as if she had run a long race.

'Get your artisan's pliance and your sword, and follow me, Crafter.'

'I have them,' said Irisis tersely. They did not like each other; moreover, Irisis's sharp tongue had once done Fyn-Mah a wrong and she did not know how to repair it.

'Now!' rapped the perquisitor. 'Scrutator's orders, Crafter.'

Irisis knew better than to question her. A perquisitor, the rank below scrutator, could give orders to the master of a city and expect them to be obeyed without question. Besides, Irisis knew why Flydd wanted her out of the way. Ghorr would not have forgotten her escape from Nennifer, and he still wanted to know how she'd killed Jal-Nish's mancer up on the aqueduct at the manufactory. It was a secret that threatened all mancers.

Fyn-Mah reappeared carrying a small pack and they slipped through the guards and over the edge of the hill into a shrubby gully which ran away from the battlefield. Flangers was standing in the shadows halfway down. He nodded to Fyn-Mah, then fell in beside Irisis.

'What's going on?' she said in a low voice. 'I'm to assist you to the limit of my ability,' he said, which was no help at all.

Fyn-Mah kept to the centre of the gully, where the cover was densest, and after ten minutes they reached the foot of the hill. One of the air-floaters was tethered only a stone's throw away. She headed for it.

'Act as if we own it; Fyn-Mah said over her shoulder. They emerged from the scrub directly behind the machine. Fyn-Mah stood up and rapped on the side. The vessel suspended from the airbag was about eight spans long and three wide, shaped like a round-ended boat, but flimsy, being made from stretched rope, canvas and light framing timbers. The deck was canvas, the sides just rope netting that served to stop people from falling overboard, while a central cabin about four spans by two provided shelter, sleeping space and a tiny separate galley. It was also made of canvas framed with timber, with a light timber door suspended on leather hinges.

The air-floater was a different design to the one Flydd had brought from the east. A ten-bladed rotor, shielded at the front by a wire grid, was mounted on a stanchion at the stern of the craft. The rotor could be swung on a steering arm, making the big machine quite manoeuvrable. The controller was fixed to the steering arm. Above the rotor, mounted on a bracket, sat a complex mechanism in a metal housing, with a small water barrel on top. A pipe ran from the mechanism up to the airbag, and another out to the rear. It appeared to be a device to create floater gas, which, Irisis thought, was a considerable improvement on having to fly all the way to a suitable mine to replenish it.

A soldier, lounging against the rail, let out a squawk. He leapt for his spear, let it fall when he saw the perquisitor's badge, and snapped to attention.

Fyn-Mah climbed through the rope mesh and nodded to the captain of the guard. Irisis and Flangers followed. There were ten soldiers on board, counting the captain of the guard.

'We're going to take a look inside the wall of Snizort,' Fyn-Mah said. 'What's your name, Pilot?'

The pilot was a young woman with hair the bright yellow of a daffodil, freckles all over her thin face, and a charming gap between her front teeth. She was small and slender; all pilots were, for the weight mattered.

'Inouye, surr' The pilot bowed her head, unwilling to look the perquisitor in the face, but cast a pleading glance sideways at the captain of the guard. A young man with sunburnt cheeks and a thin, pointed nose, he would not look at Fyn-Mah either but inflated his cheeks and frowned. He did not want to deny a perquisitor, but he answered to another master. 'We're ordered to wait here,' he said, studying the canvas floor.

'By whom?'

'Acting Scrutator Jal-Nish Hlar. This is his air-floater.'

'My orders come from Scrutator Xervish Flydd, the com-mander-in-chief of all the forces here.' Fyn-Mah showed him a parchment which contained the scrutator's seal.

The captain gulped, nodded and gave the word to the pilot. Inouye slipped an open helm of crystals and wires over her head, took hold of the controller and screwed up her face as she sought for a distant, usable field. The rotor began to spin. The soldiers cast off the tethers and the air-floater rose out of the grass.

'Stay low,' said Fyn-Mah, checking an instrument concealed in her hand. 'Head that way, keeping just above the enemy's catapult height.' She held out her arm, directing the pilot.

The air-floater rotored gently towards the northern wall of Snizort, crossing over a number of smaller tar seeps where the hard resource had been mined down in benched cones, then a valley that had once been full of the same material. Now only black patches remained, some still smoking, for the lyrinx had fired the tar runs at the beginning of the battle. They saw no sign of the enemy.

'You're taking a risk, aren't you?' Irisis said quietly to Fyn-Mah. They were standing up the front by themselves.

'The scrutator has given me a valid instruction,' the perquisitor said stiffly, then, thawing a little, 'Besides, I am incurably identified with Xervish Flydd. If he falls, so must I.'

'You could change allegiances,' Irisis said slyly, to see how Fyn-Mah would respond.

'Change once and you are forever tainted, your word worthless. I have sworn to my scrutator and will not break my oath, whatever it costs me.'

'There are many who would not be so noble.' She spoke without thinking.

'I'll watch my back.' Fyn-Mah said icily. Especially when you're behind me, was the implication.

Irisis had not meant her words the way they were taken, but it was too late to withdraw them.

The wall of Snizort was four spans high and equally thick, topped with thorn bushes scarred here and there by fire, and torn and smashed by catapult balls. The wall had been breached in five places and was unmanned.

They cruised along inside. The breaches, and the smashed gate, were piled with the bodies of the dead, lyrinx and human. Other dead were scattered across the enclosed space. Irisis saw no sign of live enemy, though from a high point she could see columns of lyrinx streaming away to the south-west in the direction of the Sea of Thurkad. Their withdrawal had been astonishingly swift.

Smoke issued from a tarry bog and several of the pits, which would make access to the underground city difficult. The ground above the node-drainer, which had risen up in a red-hot dome just before the node exploded, was now a fractured, fuming hole. Further off, though still inside the walls, the Great Seep formed a bottomless cauldron of tar about a league across. The source of the tar at Snizort, it was steaming gently. The exploded node lay some leagues to the north, and underground, but it was too smoky to see that far.

The sun touched the western horizon. Irisis looked the other way, back towards the command hill. The scrutators must be inside the tent, with Flydd. She turned towards Snizort again. 'There can't be any creature left alive underground,' she muttered. 'The whole place is on fire.'

'That's where you're wrong.' Fyn-Mah replied. "Tar burns hot, but it burns slowly. Most of the city will yet be untouched. Let's go.'

'In there? We'll choke before we've gone a dozen spans.'

'The fire draws air to it. Away from the burning core, the air should be fresh. Our orders are to get inside, if we can, and recover any of the flesh-formed creatures left alive.'

'We may get in,' said Irisis, 'though I doubt we'll ever get out again.' She said it fatalistically. Having expected to die for so long now, in so many hideous ways, she was no longer moved by the thought of danger. She indicated the largest pit. 'That's where the scrutator and I entered last time. Though.., we had the seeker to find the way for us.'

Irisis wished Ullii were here now. Objects powered by the Secret Art appeared in the little seeker's mental lattice, which was how they'd located the node-drainer. Ullii could also see people with a talent for the Art, and most lyrinx. If she were here now, they would be able to avoid any enemy who remained inside, and quickly find the flesh-formed creatures that were their target. But Ullii had disappeared.

'Go down into that pit, Pilot Inouye,' said Fyn-Mah, pointing towards the largest, which contained only a haze of smoke. 'Soldiers, ready your weapons.'

Inouye's green eyes widened, but she nodded stiffly. The air-floater drifted towards the pit, just a spear-cast above the ground. The soldiers pointed their crossbows over the side while Irisis scanned the black, lifeless terrain. Nothing moved; with luck, all the lyrinx were gone.

They floated over the pit, a conical excavation in tar-saturated sandstone, with a ledge path spiralling down. Inouye vented floater gas. The air-floater lurched, steadied and began to descend through a rising trail of smoke.

'Where do we go from here?' asked Fyn-Mah, at her elbow.

Irisis did not answer at once. The black rock was featureless and it was taking her eyes some time to adjust. Tunnels began to appear, extending off the path. There were a dozen, at least, and smoke oozed from several. How could she possibly tell? It had been dark when she had come down previously, the night before last.

'We went down 741 steps,' she said, counting them aloud. Fyn-Mah did the same and checked her instrument again. 'There!' She pointed to a runnel near the base of the pit. 'Take us to that point, Pilot.'

The whirring of the rotor died to a gentle tick as they descended into the black pit. The reek, hanging heavier than air at the bottom, stung their eyes. They came alongside the tunnel and the soldiers tossed out grappling hooks, pulling the air-floater up against the steps.

'We're going in,' Fyn-Mah said to the captain. 'Bring five of your men. Scrutator Flydd has ordered me to recover certain.., items from inside. The remaining four soldiers will guard the air-floater.'

The captain shuffled his feet. He looked about fifteen years old and Irisis felt sorry for him. 'I have orders to remain at my post.'

'Those orders are superseded.' She stared him down. 'This mission is for the good of the war, soldier, and we can't do it alone.'

He regarded his boots, glanced up at her, then nodded. 'So you won't mind giving your orders in writing.'

Fyn-Mah took a small piece of paper from her chest pack, scribbled something on it and stamped it with her personal seal. The captain read the document and put it in his wallet.

'Wait here,' Fyn-Mah said to Pilot Inouye. 'If there's danger, go up out of range and keep watch.'

'What if you don't come back?'

'Wait until dawn. If we haven't returned by then, you are released back to your master.'

The underground had a different feeling from Irisis's previous visit. Then it had been a vibrant, working city, still occupied by the lyrinx. Now it was a black, reeking hell where the ceilings had collapsed into heaps of rubble, the floors into fuming sink-holes and dead lyrinx lay everywhere. Fumes wisped down the tunnels like black spectres: sudden winds blew hot and cold; and, always in the distance, was the seething, bubbling crackle of burning tar.

They struggled through into a less damaged area, where they sought for the flesh-formed creature pens for hours without success. Fyn-Mah called out each turn and intersection as they passed it, Irisis noting them down so they could find the way out again. The air here was relatively clean, apart from drifting wisps of fume. Some of the tunnels were still lit by lanterns fuelled with distilled tar spirit, giving the air an oily tang, but they were guttering now.

Fyn-Mah stopped where the tunnel split into four. Consulting directions on a scrap of paper, she scowled. 'We must've taken a wrong turn. Do you recognise this place, Irisis?'

Irisis shook her head. 'The tunnels all look the same.'

'You're not much use, are you?'

'Ullii was leading us the other night,' said Irisis. 'It was dark, as I told you.'

'I can find my way around in the dark,' said Flangers. 'You get used to that, up on the shooter's platform. What if I were to take a few soldiers and go that way?' He pointed to the right. 'You could check the other tunnels.'

Fyn-Mah frowned. 'I don't want to split up, but I suppose there's no alternative. Irisis, take Flangers and him,' she indicated a soldier so young that he had no trace of beard, 'and go that way. We'll follow this tunnel. If you don't find anything in half an hour, come back to this point.' She scratched a zigzag mark into the wall with her sword. 'Don't get lost.'

'Let's have a look through this door,' Irisis said to Flangers. They'd searched dozens of chambers but had found nothing.

He gestured over his shoulder to the young soldier, a pink cheeked, frightened lad called Ivar. Irisis pushed the door open. Inside, in a damp, mist-laden space, stood three rows of objects that resembled chest-high pumpkins connected by grey vinelike cords.

'What do you suppose they're for?' asked Flangers.

'Something to do with flesh-forming. I expect; said Irisis.

He swallowed. That dark Art was beyond the comprehension of the greatest hero.

Other rooms contained similar objects, all with a vaguely organic appearance, all equally inexplicable. They passed out into a round chamber with a series of five closed doors on the far side.

'What a warren!' Flangers wiped sweat from his brow.

He opened the door on the left and uttered a low whistle. The room held ten cages, well separated, and inside each was a creature unlike anything he had ever seen: all horns, spines, teeth and armour plating. Each was different, and all were dead, killed by blows to the skull.

Irisis clutched the bars of the first cage, staring at the flesh-formed monstrosity inside. The grey-green, coated teeth were like shards of glass. 'Imagine that beast sticking its teeth into your leg while you're trying to fight the enemy.'

'It could bite straight through bone,' said Flangers. 'And it looks fast. It'd be hard to attack, too.'

'Doubtless they're breeding thousands of them. Ivar/ Irisis said to the young soldier, whose eyes were sticking out like boiled eggs, 'run and tell the perquisitor we've found them. Can you find your way back to the place where we separated?'

'Yes, Crafter.' Ivar ran off, glad to be going.

Irisis continued around the room. She was examining a beast whose maw was half the length of its body when Flangers called out, 'Irisis! This one's still alive.'

The creature, a heavy-headed monster with as many teeth as a crocodile and a row of yellow-tipped spines all the way down its backbone, lay on its side, its head half-covered in blood. The mouth was open and a trickle of grey matter oozed from one rimmed nostril. The chest did not move. As Irisis approached, the yellow and black eye shifted slightly, then the warty lid came down over it.

'It's dead now. We'll leave Fyn-Mah to check them,' said Irisis. 'Let's try the next room.'

It proved much the same as the first, and all the flesh-formed creatures were dead. Irisis shuddered and headed to the third room. Here the beasts were smaller, still spined and fanged but less armoured, more fleet-footed and with larger brain cases.

'These look smarter than the others,' she said, studying a creature the length of a large dog. Even dead, it made her feel uneasy.

'They've not long been killed,' said Flangers.

'They're thick-skulled. It could take them quite a while to die. Let's try the doors on the far side.'

They took the door furthest to the right. It was dark inside, but as soon as she entered Irisis could tell that this was different. There was no smell of blood, and the stench of fresh ordure was strong.

She motioned Flangers to hold up his lantern. The room had the same layout as the others but the creatures were alive. They were smaller still – the size of small dogs – and as the light fell on them they clawed at the bars.

'We'll take one or two back,' Irisis said, walking along the row. She was wondering how they could carry the cages without the beasts inside striking at them.

As she reached the other end of the room, an unseen door opened and a lyrinx stepped in. It was almost as startled as she was.

Irisis took a step backwards, overcome by panic. The lyrinx, a tall female, carried a bloodstained club. For an instant it stared at her, then swung the club. Irisis cried, 'Flangers, look out!' and threw herself behind one of the cages.

Letting out a deafening bellow, the lyrinx swatted the cage out of the way. Irisis scuttled between two more, knowing she was not going to make it. The lyrinx was too strong and fast. It sprang onto the cages, lifting the club high. The blow would not just cave in her skull, it would splatter her brains halfway across the room.

The bars bent under the weight, one foot slipped through and the fanged creature inside sank its teeth in. The lyrinx tried to jerk free, stumbled and came crashing down on a pair of cages.

One was crushed flat, along with the creature inside. The other burst open, liberating its occupant, which darted into the darkness behind the cages.

Irisis scuttled out of the way as the lyrinx struggled to get up. The little creature was savaging its foot, snarling with bloodlust. The lyrinx roared, found its feet and, with a mighty swing, sent the cage and its attacker creature flying across the room to smash into the wall. It turned in her direction, limping badly. She drew her weapon.

Flangers appeared by her side, sword out. She had never been so glad to see anyone.

'Are you any good with that?' he panted.

'Not much. I normally use a crossbow.' Irisis had done sword training, and had a natural aptitude, but little combat experience.

'Stay to my left, one step back. Keep the point up.'

She moved into position. 'What if we were to smash open a few more cages?' Already she was deferring to his greater experience, a rare thing for her. 'A few of these creatures would give even a lyrinx something to think about.' She had heard tales of the flesh-formed nylatl that had so terrorised Tiaan, and later, Nish.

'We'd want to be sure the beasts would attack the lyrinx, and not us,' Flangers said.

The lyrinx was only half a dozen steps away, advancing slowly. It was a big one, head and shoulders above them, with scars on its right cheek and across its breast plates.

'Looks as though it's seen a fight or two,' she said.

'And won them. It would be handy if Fyn-Mah turned up about now,' he said dryly.

The lyrinx kept coming. With its size and reach, there was no need for subtlety or fancy footwork.

'What's the plan?' Irisis hissed.

'Fight for our bloody lives!'

The lyrinx moved to within striking distance, lunged and slashed with one arm. Irisis barely saw it move, nor the flash of Flangers's sword, but blood spurted from the palm of its hand. It jerked away. The cut was deep, though not incapacitating. They had an instant's respite before the mighty thighs bunched and it hurled itself at him, arms going like scythes.

Flangers threw himself to his right; Irisis went the other way. It ignored her and pursued the soldier, the claws of its bloody hand raking him from shoulder to elbow. Another blow tore the seat out of his pants and four gouges across his buttocks.

Flangers fell to his knees and the sword clanged on the floor. He dived for it. The lyrinx went after him, leaving bloody footprints. Flangers could not reach the sword in time; the lyrinx was going to slaughter him.

Irisis went up on tiptoes, crossed the distance with two strides and thrust at the lyrinx's exposed side. The sword went between two plates, slid between the ribs and jammed. She heaved but could not pull it out. The lyrinx bellowed, spun around and sprang at her, the sword quivering with every movement.

She dived over a small cage, lifted it and in one movement hurled it at the lyrinx's face. It batted it aside like a ball, then tore the sword out and flung it at her. She ducked and scampered up between the rows, not knowing what she was doing, only that she was defenceless. As she approached the rear door, a second lyrinx burst through it. And after it, a third.

Three

Xervish Flydd knuckled puffy eyes as he prepared to face his tormentors. The Council of Scrutators occupied four sides of the makeshift table in the command tent. He was seated at one corner, which meant that he could not see the whole group at one time. It was a particular disadvantage at an inquisition. And, not having slept for two nights, he was in no condition to match wits with Ghorr.

All eleven members of the Council were present. Their late intervention had only saved the disaster from becoming a catastrophe and it would be a sorry remnant of the army that left here, abandoning thousands of precious, useless clankers. To protect themselves, the Council had to have a scalp. The scrutators looked as though they relished the duty.

Jal-Nish, being only an acting scrutator, was not permitted to sit at the table; though, having an interest in the proceedings, he had been allowed to attend as an observer. His chair was placed directly behind Flydd's, who could not see him without turning his head. He dared not. To look away from the inquisition would be a sign of weakness, Flydd could feel that single, malevolent eye boring into his back.

'Scrutator Flydd,1 began Ghorr, without doing Flydd the courtesy of standing or even looking in his direction. It was another bad sign. 'You stand accused of dereliction of duty, fraudulent misrepresentation of your abilities, gross incompetence occasioning a military disaster, exceeding your authority in negotiating with an alien race, corruptly making concessions to that race, contempt of the Council, harbouring a fugitive, wilful assault on the person of an acting scrutator while suspended from the Council, knowingly causing the death of a mancer in the legitimate pursuit of her duties, failure to adequately protect a mine and manufactory under your command…'

Flydd's mind wandered. He knew it was a deadly thing to do, but the list of charges made it dear there was no way out. When the Council genuinely wanted to discipline a scrutator, the charges were brief and specific. When they wanted to destroy one, they put down everything they could come up with.

He felt so very tired. He could have laid his head on the table and slept. Was there any point in defending himself? Might it not be better to remain silent, even though that would be taken as an admission of guilt? They might just execute him.

The errant thought made him grimace. The Council would not allow him the luxury of death until they'd wrung such torment from him that sensitives would be having nightmares for fifty leagues around. He knew how they operated. After all, he'd been one of them for decades, and suffered at their hands before.

Besides, he would not be the only one to fall. Ghorr would destroy everyone associated with him – dear Irisis, little Ullii and her unborn child, Eiryn Muss, Fyn-Mah, and all his soldiers, advisers, friends and relatives. When the scrutators made an example of their own it was worthy of a whole page in the Histories.

What could he do to save them, or himself? What defence was there when the Council had covered every eventuality? Xervish Flydd could think of none.

Scrutator Ghorr finished his iteration of the charges, shuffled the papers and turned to his left. 'Scrutator Fusshte?'

Fusshte, acting as recorder, was a meagre, ill-made man. Pallid baldness made a cruciform shape through oily black hair. His eyes were reptilian, while the jutting teeth gave him a feral look. He made a mark on a document, nodded and passed it to Ghorr.

Ghorr cleared his throat and finally met the eyes of the man he was trying. 'How do you plead, Scrutator Flydd? Be swift! Humanity stands in very peril of its survival.'

'In that case,' snapped Flydd, whose only defence was to attack, 'why are you wasting time on farcical blame-shifting? The Council knows I followed my orders to the letter. Your instructions were faulty. You should be on trial, not I.' 'The tiredest ploy in the world,' yawned Fusshte. Flydd rotated in his chair and locked gazes with the secretary. The game of intimidating an opponent was one every scrutator knew, but Flydd was more skilled at it than most. He'd always detested Fusshte, and had voted against his elevation to scrutator. Moreover, Fusshte had a dirty little secret and Flydd knew it. Its revelation would not be enough to destroy the secretary, but it would taint him in the eyes of his fellows.

Neither could draw on the field here, of course, but scrutators had at hand older, subtler powers, ways of weakening an enemy's will. Flydd used them all. Fusshte's snake eyes defied him. It won't do you any good, Flydd thought. I despise you too much to ever give in to you.

He smiled, grimly at first, but as he saw the first flicker of uncertainty in the eyes of his opponent, Flydd gave a savage grin. The man was weakening. Flydd snorted in disdain and suddenly the secretary broke. Choking back a gasp, Fusshte looked down at his papers and the battle was over.

Such a little thing, but the atmosphere of the room changed subtly. Flydd was not defeated yet. He turned back to the chief scrutator.

'I have a countercharge against Ghorr!' Flydd said flatly.

'We'll hear it after your trial is done,' said Chief Scrutator Ghorr.

'I'll not fall for that one. Once you convict me, as you plan to, I'll have no right to put a countercharge.'

'You were charged first,' said Ghorr. 'The procedure can't be changed.'

'My entire case depends on my countercharge.'

'How unfortunate.'

'I appeal to the Council to set aside your decision.'

'On what grounds?' asked a diminutive dark woman whose cheeks were painted with red wax: Scrutator Halie.

Flydd was pleased to discover that she was the appointed appeals scrutator. Halie had been an ally of his previously in difficult times; he could rely on her to be impartial. 'On the ground that a failure on the part of one or more members of the Council led to the destruction of the node.'

'How so?' said Halie in a dangerous voice.

'My first countercharge is that Chief Scrutator Ghorr provided me with a defective device to destroy the lyrinx node-drainer, and that device failed in use. My second countercharge is this: in commissioning that device, Chief Scrutator Ghorr negligently failed to appreciate that it was likely to cause the destruction of the node itself.'

'These are serious charges, Scrutator Flydd,' said Halie.

'And I intend to prove them.' He held her gaze as rigidly as if she had been his most bitter enemy, then broke it before it became a contest.

'I shall set aside Chief Scrutator Ghorr's ruling for the moment. The Council will hear your charges first. Present them with dispatch, Flydd.'

'Thank you,' said Flydd. He stood up and met their eyes, one by one. 'You have heard my first two countercharges, which relate solely to the destruction of the node. Ghorr's other charges are frivolous and motivated by mischief. He's happy to waste the Council's time, even at this desperate hour, so long as he can bring me down.' He turned eyes like lighthouse beams on the chief scrutator. 'That is my third countercharge.'

'I did not formulate the charges,' growled Ghorr, glancing at the secretary.

'But you gave them your authority.'

'Make your case, Flydd, if you have one.'

'Putting it simply, the device you gave me was defective.'

'On what evidence?'

'It failed when I used it, and led to the destruction of the node.'

'That proves only that you used it incompetently,' said Ghorr.

'Also an assertion that must be proved,' Flydd retorted. 'It's up to the accused to prove his innocence.' 'And I'm accusing you.' Flydd flung out his arm. The chief scrutator smiled thinly. 'Very theatrical! You were charged first. Your claims are countercharges.'

'Ah,' said Flydd, making a desperate gamble without knowing what the answer was. 'But my countercharges are being heard first, and therefore you must prove your innocence. Is that not so, Appeals Scrutator?'

Halie looked dubious, but reached below the table, brought up a bound volume and began flicking through the pages. After some minutes she put it down again and went into a huddle with three other scrutators. When it broke up, all the scrutators, apart from Flydd and Ghorr, went to the other end of the tent, speaking in low tones with much glancing back at their chief. Ghorr grew purple in the face. Finally they returned to the table.

'Though this question is unprecedented,' said Halie, 'we have reached agreement. Confirm that you have, members of the Council.'

Each of the scrutators affirmed that they agreed. Halie continued. 'We have voted, by a margin of six votes to three, that the countercharges must be defended first.'

'Be damned!' roared the chief scrutator.

'Due process -' began Halie.

Ghorr stood up, and he was a huge, dominating man. 'We've lost a third of our finest army. We may yet lose the war because of it. Flydd led them to disaster and now you call on the evil of democracy to let him off!' He spat the word out as if it were heresy, which it was.

'That is the prescribed process, Chief Scrutator!' said Halie. 'Would you care to retire for a few minutes to prepare your case?'

'With the greatest pleasure,' said Ghorr, back in control. He strode out, robes flapping.

The other scrutators gathered at the corner of the tent, talking in low voices. Jal-Nish remained where he was. Flydd moved his chair so he could see the acting scrutator. 'Nice day for it,' he said conversationally.

Jal-Nish shifted in his seat, as venomous and deadly as a nylatl. 'I'll be dancing on your flayed corpse by sundown.'

Flydd felt the touch of fear and was careful not to look into Jal-Nish's eye – it was the one contest he could not win. The man was determined to destroy him, whatever the cost. He could not afford to show his disquiet – not the least trace. Summoning all his strength, Flydd yawned in Jal-Nish's face. 'And you want to replace me, of course.'

'I'll have your place on the Council and crush the lyrinx too.'

'Really?' said Flydd, without bothering to correct him. 'What next? Abolish famine, pestilence, death?'

'You won't be sneering when the torturers have their disembowelling hooks in you.' Jal-Nish stormed out.

I've got to him, Flydd thought. Impossible to resist, but was it wise?

After half an hour, Ghorr came through the flap of the tent, accompanied by Jal-Nish and three people in robes. The first was a thin-faced, sallow fellow, the second a grey-haired woman wearing shoulder pads that squared off her stout figure; the last was a sawn-off, good-looking man with regular features, brilliant blue eyes and a leonine head of brown hair, swept back in waves. He had the rolling gait of a sailor and was only half a span tall. Flydd knew him – Klarm, the dwarf scrutator, an honest man, as scrutators went, but as ruthless as any.

Klarm nodded cheerfully to Flydd, who waved back. The other two newcomers, mancers both, did not acknowledge him. Jal-Nish resumed his seat.

'I present my witnesses,' said Ghorr. 'Mancer Vydale and Mancer Lubis.'

The sallow-faced man bowed formally, as did the stout woman.

'You all know Klarm, of course,' Ghorr went on. There were a few nods around the table. 'Vydale and Lubis, you designed the device that was given to Scrutator Flydd in Nennifer, did you not?'

'We did,' said Vydale.

'Each must answer the question, if you please,' said Halie.

'We did,' said Mancer Lubis.

'And you supervised the team of artisans who built it?' said Ghorr.

They both affirmed that they had.

'Was the device tested?' asked Ghorr.

'It was,' each said in turn.

Flydd sat up, surprised, though he should not have been. The scrutators were notoriously thorough.

Ghorr smiled thinly. 'Who supervised the testing?'

'I did!' said Scrutator Klarm.

'How was the device tested?' Flydd asked. 'With an operating node-drainer?'

'How else could it be tested?' said Klarm. 'We rotored to a node in the mountains that had gone dead, located the enemy's node-drainer and fitted the device to it. After some adjustment by the artisans, the node-drainer collapsed and failed.'

Flydd felt his last hope die. 'What about the node?'

'Its field returned to normal the following day.'

Flydd knew that Klarm was telling the truth, and there was no doubt that he would have done his work competently. Flydd's counterattack had been destroyed.

'Mancers Vydale and Lubis,' he said, 'can you confirm what Klarm has told us?'

They averred that they could.

'Any further questions, Flydd?' said Ghorr.

Flydd had none, for he believed them too. Nonetheless, the breaker had been tampered with. But how, and by whom?

'Only one. When I began to use the device, it became clear that it was faulty. Someone must have -'

'I saw it sealed in its box,' said Klarm. 'It never left my custody until it was placed in your air-floater, just before you left Nennifer. Were the seals broken when you opened the box?'

"They were not,' said Flydd. 'And no one but myself and my trusted prober, Eiryn Muss, ever had charge of it: 'Then it can't have been tampered with. No one but a scrutator has the Art to break those seals. They were made with scrutator magic.'

'So if it was tampered with,' Ghorr said relentlessly, 'it happened while you had charge of it. Again, the negligence is yours.' He dismissed his three witnesses. 'We'll take a vote on the countercharges. Yea if they are proven, nay if disproved.'

There were eleven nays.

'And my first principal charge, that Flydd's incompetence led to the destruction of the node?'

Nine yeas and two nays.

'My second principal charge, that Flydd's negligence after the destruction of the node lost a third of our army?'

Seven yeas and four nays.

'It is enough,' said Ghorr. 'The charges are proven. Now, scrutators, we must agree on penalties.'

The scrutators dismissed Flydd ignominiously from his position and broke him to a common citizen. However, after half an hour of acrimonious debate, during which time Ghorr became ever colder, they could not agree on a penalty for the second charge.

'I'll take no more of this!' cried Ghorr. 'The enemy could counterattack at any time. I make the Declaration of Emergency. All rights are suspended, and all privileges, that conflict with my duties.'

He stared around the table. All broke under his stare, even Flydd, though he strove mightily against the chief scrutator. Ghorr had played the unbeatable card. Later he would have to justify the declaration but for the moment he was unassailable. Ghorr could punish him in any way he saw fit.

'I beg leave to address the Council,' came Jal-Nish's voice from behind Flydd.

'The matter is closed,' Ghorr said frostily.

'I do not wish to speak about that.' Jal-Nish glanced idly at Flydd, then away, as if he were of no significance. 'Fault and blame are irrelevant now. Rather would I speak about the war. And how we might still win it:

'Go on,' said Ghorr, showing his canines.

'The enemy have abandoned Snizort in haste, leaving behind everything, including their flesh-formed abominations. They must be dreadfully demoralised by the destruction of the node as well as the loss of their great city. The Histories tell us they are slow to recover from their rare defeats. And they have suffered terrible casualties: twelve thousand dead and half as many unable to fight.'

'Our losses are worse,' snapped Ghorr, 'for we've lost all our clankers as well. It'll take years to replace them.'

'Were we to pursue the enemy now,' said Jal-Nish, 'with our clankers and the constructs of the Aachim, they would be hard put to save themselves. The lyrinx are obscenities that flesh-form their own young in the womb. We must eradicate them to the last child!' He looked as though he would enjoy the slaughter.

'The node is exploded, you fool! The field is dead, our clankers useless metal.'

'I can save them,' said Jal-Nish.

Now he had their attention. 'How?' said Ghorr.

'I would bring in bullock teams,' said Jal-Nish. 'And teams of horses, buffalo and men. I'd put the clankers on skids and haul them to the nearest node field, north-west of here. It's only seven leagues away, I'm told. Then I'd go after the enemy with all our strength and strike them down before they have a chance to recover. From this defeat we can yet snatch victory, and what a sweet victory it will be. It could turn the tide of the war, Chief Scrutator.'

Flydd's voice dropped into the following silence. 'This is folly! The lyrinx are at no disadvantage at all. They don't need supplies – they've enough of our good soldiers in their bellies to do them a week.'

Ghorr turned on him. 'We'll hear no more of your cowardly words, Flydd. As of now I strip you of all rights. You are a non-citizen, and the meanest person in the world may strike you down without penalty. Guards!'

Two burly guards burst through the entrance Take Non-Citizen Flydd to the punishment pen. Guard him well and await my further instructions.'

The guards hauled Flydd off, his legs dragging.

Ghorr turned back to the table.' Jal-Nish, take Flydd's place at the table. We would hear more of your proposal, though I don't see how it can be done. To move five thousand clankers that distance would take a hundred thousand men, and even then it would be the most spine-cracking labour.'

'We have forty thousand hale troops,' said Jal-Nish, 'plus many thousands of camp followers. And we can conscript half as many again from the towns and villages to the east and south. Adding their beasts of burden, we'll have sufficient, if we drive them hard enough.'

There was silence around the table while the idea was considered.

'I don't see how it can be done before our supplies fail,' said Ghorr. And who could pull together such an unwieldy force in the time?'

'I can do it,' said Jal-Nish boldly. 'You know my record, surr.'

Ghorr looked doubtful. 'You have never held such high command.'

'No scrutator has, surr.' Excepting Flydd, but Jal-Nish was not going to mention him, in case the Council had second thoughts about the man. 'We must have courage, Chief Scrutator. We must dare the impossible. What have we to lose? And…'

'Yes?' snapped Ghorr, nettled that a mere acting scrutator should lecture him.

'If the enemy should get over their fright and come back, they'll annihilate us.'

That's my main concern. Very well. I will give you the command, Acting Scrutator. But remember, I'll be watching you…'

Jal-Nish went still. 'Acting Scrutator, surr? But.., you told me to take Flydd's place on the Council.'

'Flydd was dismissed from this Council months ago. I said take his place at the table. The test for scrutator is a stern one. Prove that you are deserving, Jal-Nish, and I will promote you. I may even admit you to the Council, should a vacancy occur. Fail and you may share the rack with Non-Citizen Flydd.'

'I won't fail,' said Jal-Nish with such black-eyed intensity that one or two of the Council members, hardened though they were, shuddered.

They worked for an hour before breaking up with a plan. Then they ran, each to their own duties. It fell to Jal-Nish to visit the guards at the punishment pen, a cage made from stakes hammered into the side of the hill.

'Rouse out the slaves,' he said with a liquid chuckle.

Xervish Flydd lifted his head. His face was bruised all over, for the other prisoners had welcomed the fallen into their company.

'What do you want with us?' he said.

'We don't have enough bullock teams, so men must make up the difference. You're going in the first team, to serve as an example to all. The lash will teach you to do your simple duty, Slave Flydd.'

Four

Flames blasted from a fissure in front of Tiaan. Liquid tar, hot enough to sting, dripped from the roof onto her head and shoulders; fumes burned tracks up her nostrils. A red glow lit up the tunnel behind her, for she was trapped in her walker, deep underground in Snizort. Though the lyrinx had repaired her severed spine with their flesh-forming Art, her legs were still too weak to stand on.

There was no field here, and the node was no longer visible. She reached down and felt the amplimet. It was still cool to the touch, thankfully, for heat could destroy such crystals.

The amplimet was powerful enough to draw on a more distant node, so she still had a chance. Tiaan tried to remember where other nodes might lie. In her long flight here in the thapter she had used many, and should have been able to recall them all, those memories were gone.

Everything was strange here; the ethyr was clotted with warpings the like of which she had never seen before. The amplimet seemed different, too. She wasn't sure how, but it was harder to use, almost as if it had grown stronger since the node exploded, or more wakeful and watchful. She did not like the feeling. Fighting down panic, Tiaan sought for a field and, at the very limit of her senses, detected a faint aura.

So far from the node that generated it, the field was tenuous, weak, fragile. She drew power into the controller. One leg twitched feebly but the walker did not move.

Dismayed, Tiaan made another attempt. That was better; she actually got one leg to take a step, though a wobbly, lurching one. She took another. Better still – she was remembering how to manage it.

Ahead, through cracks in the tunnel wall, the flames roared as if pumped by a distant bellows. They died away for the count of nineteen before roaring forth again. If she misjudged the timing, or went too slowly, she would be roasted alive.

Creeping as close as she could get, Tiaan waited for the next exhalation. It was sweltering here. She put her hand over the amplimet to protect it. The cracks flamed, then died to wisps. Now! She lurched the walker forwards and they flamed again, right at the controller. The impulse to jerk her hand away was overwhelming. She fought it, enduring the pain as she tried to make the machine go backwards. It shuddered but did not move.

The flames stopped. She tried to move forwards but that did not work either. Blisters were rising on the back of her hand. 'Move!' she screamed. The walker gave only a spastic twitch. Its front feet were stuck in tar which had softened in the heat.

Hot tar ribboned onto her shoulders. She bent the four legs as far as they would go, then straightened them all at the same time. Three legs pulled free, the other did not, and the machine began to topple. Tiaan threw her weight the other way and managed to save it, though it left her directly in front of the cracks. The next blast would burn her to a crisp. She could hear it coming, a breathy roar.

Flexing the legs again, she gave a mighty heave. The stuck leg pulled free and the walker shot forwards and up as the flames roared by. Tiaan felt the heat on her backside.

Further on, she went down into a hollow where heavy black fumes had pooled on the floor. As the walker crabbed through it lifted inky tendrils as high as her head. Eyes stinging, she lurched down the corridor, having no idea where she was going. Since the explosion, Tiaan could not remember Merryl's directions, and most of the wall lamps had gone out. She just kept moving because she could not remain where she was.

Creeping along, breathing through her sleeve, she thought she heard human voices coming from one of the branching tunnels ahead. 'Hello!' she yelled.

No answer. She moved to the intersection. Definitely voices, from the middle tunnel. She crept up through the gloom, turned a corner into a wider tunnel lit by a single lantern on a pole, and stopped.

Half a dozen people had their backs to her, staring at something that she could not make out. They looked like the human slaves the lynnx had kept here. The walker's legs clacked and they turned, squinting into the dark. She moved forwards and, with wild cries, they broke and ran. What was the matter? Tiaan realised, belatedly, that she must have made a terrifying sight, half human and half machine, and coated with droppings of tar.

'Wait,' someone yelled from around the corner. 'That's just Tiaan.'

The voice was familiar. 'Merryl?'

He appeared, carrying a lantern. She was so glad to see him. 'The tunnel's on fire, Merryl. I couldn't get through.'

'This passage leads to an exit but there's a construct stuck in the tar and we can't get past it.'

'A construct?' Tiaan edged forward curiously.

He caught her arm. 'Careful. The tar's sticky over there. I've sent people to pull shelves out of a storeroom, to stand on. We may be able to climb over the top.'

'Is there anyone inside it?'

'I don't know.'

The construct, which was just like her own thapter, though only half the size, was two-thirds buried in sticky tar. The former slaves, four men and two women, came panting up, carrying long planks, and began to lay them across the tar. The timber ran out just before the construct; they hurried off for more.

When planks had been laid all the way, they began to scrape the tar off with shovels and mattocks so they could climb over. Being unable to help, Tiaan waited where the tar was firm, working her wasted leg muscles until they hurt.

She had to be able to walk unaided. The planks were too narrow for her walker and she was wondering how she would get across when someone hissed, 'What's that?'

The work stopped. Tap, tap, tap came clearly from inside the construct.

Tiaan felt a spasm of fear. The Aachim had chased her halfway across Lauralin. If the ones inside were freed, they would come after her and these unarmed slaves could not stop them.

'Don't let -' Tiaan broke off. She couldn't condemn those inside to suffocation.

'What's the matter?' called Merryl, who was stripped to the waist and covered in sweat. It was growing hotter all the time.

'Oh, nothing.' In her condition, Tiaan was afraid to trust anyone.

She watched as the tar was scraped off the top of the construct. It took ages, for it clung to the tools and they had to be cleaned every minute or two. Someone climbed up, holding the lantern aloft.

"Tunnel's collapsed further along,' the man announced. 'We'll have to find another way out.'

'All the other passages run back in the direction of the fire,' said Merryl.

The hatch of the construct was forced up, tearing the coating of tar into clinging strands. A head appeared in the opening. Tiaan edged back into the shadows, hoping it was some obscure Aachim who had never seen her.

It was Minis. Her heart began to hammer. She had sworn revenge on him and all the Aachim kind, but what was the point of that if they were all going to die?

Another Aachim climbed up beside Minis. Tiaan recognised her too, despite her haggard look. Tirior had also been in on the betrayal. Minis climbed down onto the boards and Tirior followed. A third person emerged, a short, stocky young man with a cap of dark hair that clung to the contours of his skull. Cryl-Nish Hlar, Nish. Her nemesis. If there was any man in the world she loathed as much as the Aachim, it was him.

Tiaan sprang the walker backwards, colliding with the wall. She covered her face, peering through her fingers at Minis, and tears sprang to her eyes. She had invested all her foolish, youthful dreams in him, and he had cast her aside. She had to get away before he saw her. Whirling the walker around in its tracks she set off the other way, into her personal darkness. Towards the fire.

'Tiaan!' yelled Merryl.

She increased her speed, for his cry had given her away.

'Tiaan,' he yelled, pounding after her.

She could not move quickly in the gloom and Merryl caught her around the bend. 'Tiaan, what is it?'

'Those three are my enemies.'

He took her arm. 'You can't get out that way. Can't you smell the fumes?'

Just enough light came around the corner, now that her eyes had adjusted, to illuminate a dark, noxious cloud creeping along the floor. An odd tendril or two escaped upwards. One caught in the back of her throat and her lungs contracted.

All right,' she said hoarsely. 'But don't tell them my back has been repaired. Please.'

'I'll say nothing,' said Merryl. 'I know nothing.'

At the corner she almost ran into a racing Minis. 'Tiaan? Is it truly you?' He stopped abruptly, staring at the walker. His eyes lifted to her face. 'Tiaan,' he whispered. 'What happened?'

Her back was throbbing. She couldn't deal with Minis. All she could do was keep him at bay with words. 'My back was broken when the construct crashed,1 she said harshly. After your father attacked me without provocation.'

'I'm sorry. I tried to stop him…'

'Spare me your lies! I had enough of them in Tirthrax.' She ground the words out, then went past in silence. Tirior stared at her. Nish gaped. Tiaan did not acknowledge either of them.

In the open area, she said to Merryl, 'Is there any other way out?'

He pointed to the left, where another small tunnel yawned. 'It may be possible that way. If not, we're trapped and will die here.'

'Is the way the construct came in completely blocked?'

'It seems so.'

'Then we have no choice. Shall we scout this passage out?'

They had gone only a hundred paces up the small tunnel when they encountered a rivulet of molten tar oozing along the floor.

'I was afraid of that,' said Merryl. 'It seems we're doomed to end our lives here, Tiaan.'

Tiaan said nothing. They went back to the construct.

Tirior examined the walker shrewdly. 'An ingenious device. Did you make it?'

'What's the matter with your machine?' said Tiaan, ignoring the question.

'The node has gone dead and taken all the fields with it.' Tirior was watching Tiaan, head tipped to one side, no doubt wondering how the walker could still move. It would not take her long to work it out.

'Merryl' Tiaan said quietly. 'Order your people to take the Aachim, before they attack us.'

Tirior's hand darted for the pack she wore on her chest. Tiaan hurled the walker backwards, slamming painfully into the wall.

'Take them,' roared Merryl, throwing his handless arm across Tirior's throat and twisting her other arm up behind her back. The freed slaves did the same with Minis.

'Him as well' Tiaan shouted, pointing to Nish.

'You misjudge us' Tirior said softly, but under her breath she was muttering in an Aachim dialect Tiaan did not recognise.

Tiaan felt power flow from her controller and the walker's legs slowly splayed. Had Tirior not been exhausted from the mancery that had got her into Snizort, she might have succeeded.

'Stop her mouth!' Tiaan cried.

One of the slaves wound a strip of cloth three times around Tirior's head and pulled it tight. Tiaan felt the flow ease. Her heart was beating irregularly and she felt faint. So close.

'You taught me the value of your word, Tirior.' Tiaan wrenched open the pack, Tirior had been reaching for a small glass tube, capped in gold, with a scintillating powder inside. Tiaan tossed it into the tar and pressed it down with one of the walker's feet. 'Bind them, please. Merryl.'

Cord was found in a storeroom and the three prisoners' hands bound behind their backs.

'I'm not your enemy, Tiaan,' said Nish. I was wrong about you before. I'm sorry.'

He seemed different to the Nish Tiaan had known. He was more sure of himself, less angry, and made no attempt to fight those who held him. But Tiaan could not forgive so easily. 'Every time I've met you I've regretted it, Nish,' she said wearily.

'We were looking for you, to bring you out of here.'

Tiaan activated the walker and moved away. 'I have a plan,' she whispered to Merryl.

'I thought you must.'

'I think, with my crystal, that I may be able to operate the construct. If you can direct me to the way out, it will carry us through the fumes. For a while, at least.'

'I know every tunnel/ he said.

'Lift me into the construct and I'll see what I can do. The tar around it will have to be cleared away.'

'I'll have it done.'

Taking the amplimet from the walker, Tiaan put it in her pocket, undid the straps and lifted herself on her arms. Merryl carried her across. 'I'm not too heavy, am I?'

He smiled. 'You're no burden at all.'

He boosted her up the side and she slid her legs in. As her feet struck the floor Tiaan's knees buckled. Her muscles might have been made from cloth. Pulling out the operator's seat she sat down hurriedly.

The layout was much the same as in her thapter. She pressed the small recessed button and a hexagonal tube sprang out. Flipping the cap open, she removed the crystal, which was pale blue and striated down the sides. She had never seen one like it. Slipping it into her pocket, she put the amplimet in its place. In her own construct, or thapter as she had called it after learning how to make it fly, she'd made a special device to reduce power.

Tlaan hoped that would not he necessary here, since she was drawing from such a distant node. In any case, she had nothing to build it with.

She pressed the hexagonal tube in and closed the cap. After a long moment, a faint whine came from below, and a subtle tremor. It was working!

It took hours to remove the great gouts of sticky tar, and the work was so exhausting that the slaves had to rest after every few strokes. The job had just been completed when Merryl cried, Tiaan, look out!'

She got the hatch down just in time, as an even bigger clot buried the construct completely. By the time that had been removed, the air inside was stale. A day had gone by since her escape from the patterner.

The black miasma, which had advanced and retreated a number of times, was now flowing steadily across the floor. It would be up to their knees within minutes.

'Better bring the prisoners on board,' she said to Merryl, who was anxiously watching the fumes. Tiaan popped the amplimet out and pocketed it, just in case. There was no room for trust; the whole world seemed to be against her.

The prisoners were brought in and taken below. Minis gazed sorrowfully at her, like a dog that had been kicked. Nish, who looked as though he hadn't slept in days, simply lay down, pillowed his head on his arms and went to sleep. Tirior showed no expression at all. She was the one to watch.

Everyone came aboard save the two who were mattocking away at the sticky tar on the right-hand side. When the black fog was at the level of their thighs, Tiaan called them in. Should a sudden surge overwhelm the construct now, it would be impossible to get out.

Merryl set guards on the Aachim and Nish. The remaining slaves went below, leaving just her and Merryl in the operator's compartment. It would be very cramped down there, with nine passengers. Tiaan reinserted the amplimet and took hold of the trumpet-shaped lever. The whine rose in pitch but the construct did not move.

'It's still stuck in the tar,' said Merryl. ' I don't think -'

'I'll try to work it free.'

He peered anxiously ahead. A billow of black mist was rolling towards them. Tiaan pulled down the hatch and fastened it. It became dark inside, except for the subtle glow from the plate in front of her. The front panel thinned to transparency. The outside was dimly lit by glowing globes that shone intermittently through the fog.

She wiggled the lever back and forth, ever so gently. The whine rose and fell. With a delicate shudder the construct pulled free and rose in the air until its base was at the level of the black fog. Tiaan edged it forwards.

'Straight ahead or to the left?' she said, after they'd been travelling a while.

'The way out into the main pit is straight ahead, but we may not be able to get through that way…' Merryl was looking at her expectantly. 'Is something the matter?'

She realised that she was frowning. I originally came here looking for Gilhaelith. He's a strange, unlikeable fellow, but he was good to me.' Even though he'd cared more for the amplimet than about her safety, Tiaan had to know that he was safe.

'He's an important man,' said Merryl. 'Surely the lyrinx will have taken him with them.'

'I was important to them, yet they panicked and left me behind. They may have abandoned him as well. Do you know where Gilhaelith was working?'

'In a tunnel excavated into the Great Seep.'

A tunnel in liquid tar? How can that be?'

'They froze it first.'

'How?' said Tiaan curiously.

'One of their Arts.'

'If he was left behind, can he possibly still be alive?' she said to herself.

'Not if he's still in the seep.' He looked through the front. 'But, perhaps, in the tunnels near it… We can go that way. It's not much further.'

Merryl was a man of the same heart as Tiaan. She thanked him, silently. 'He treated me kindly. I have to know.'

'Then go straight on.'

They came to a high point in the tunnel where the heavy black mist had not reached. Merryl cracked the hatch open to let in fresh air, but it stank so badly that he quickly closed it again. The construct went down sharply, plunging into fumes which the globes could not penetrate. Tiaan had to creep along, and even then was continually bumping into the sticky, gritty walls.

They turned a sharp bend, then another that formed the other half of an 'S', and the black fog thinned. Ahead, two tunnels diverged at a shallow angle.

'Which way?' said Tiaan.

Merryl was staring blankly through the screen. 'I'm.., not sure. The fog has confused me. Have we missed an intersection?'

'We could have missed fifty for all I could see.'

'Take the left. I think:

After a few minutes, Tiaan felt the right-hand side scrape on the sandy wall. Shortly afterwards the other side did the same and the construct shuddered to a stop.

'It's the wrong way, said Merryl. 'Better go back.'

'I hope we can,' Tiaan muttered.

After much jerking and heaving the construct began to move backwards. They had been heading down the other tunnel for some minutes when Tiaan saw a red glow in a cross-tunnel to their left.

'We're running out of options,' said Merryl. 'Can you go faster?'

She increased speed as much as she dared, following a zigzag path away from the burning area until they hit a broad tunnel that ran straight. There were no fumes in it and they made good time. The walls and roof here were yellow sandstone, hardly tar stained at all. After ten minutes they came abruptly into blackened rock and then, where the tunnel opened out, into solid tar. The tunnel kept on.

'Is this where Gilhaelith was?' Tiaan did not like the feel of the place.

'He would have been some way ahead. We're close to the outer edge of the Great Seep – the solid edge. In a few spans it becomes soft and beyond that it's liquid tar for a league.'

'How did they tunnel it? And why?'

Merryl spoke to the huddled slaves in a language Tiaan did not know. A woman answered in the same tongue.

'They used devices powered by phynadrs,' said Merryl, 'to draw the heat out and freeze the tar hard. Why, I cannot say, only that it was mighty important to them. Matriarch Gyrull worked there every day, and a matriarch does not risk her life needlessly.'

They crept on. Objects were strewn here and there as if discarded in flight – rotting, tar-stained remnants of clothing, a small wooden chest. Further on was a distinctly human-looking body.

Tiaan caught her breath. Not Gilhaelith, surely? She drew the construct alongside, opened the hatch and looked down.

The body was small, female, and tar-impregnated. 'It has a.., withered look; Tiaan said. 'As if long dead.'

'Many people, and many animals, must have become stuck in the tar over the aeons, and been carried down into the depths. I saw a number of them over my time here, all perfectly preserved. You need shed no tear for her, Tiaan. She's been dead hundreds of years, at the very least.'

'I'll go on, just in case…' She edged the construct down the tunnel. I thought you said they tunnelled in a long way.'

About a hundred spans, I heard.'

'We're only in twenty and I can see the end,' said Tiaan.

She lifted herself up on the side, the better to see. The end of the tunnel was but spans away, a smooth, shining black bulge dotted with fragments of wood and cloth. 'It's moving!' Warm tar was creeping towards them like molasses squeezed through a hole. The tunnel had collapsed, 'If Gilhaelith was in there, he's dead.'

Five

Merryl gripped her shoulder. 'Was he special to you, Tiaan?' 'I wouldn't say that we were friends, for he had none. Gilhaelith was quite the strangest man I've ever met, and totally absorbed in himself. Yet he was good to me and I can't forget it. We'd better go, if we're to get out.'

Reversing the little construct, Tiaan turned it about and went back the way they had come. At the first intersection, Merryl said, 'Go left.'

She headed that way but was soon confronted by a baleful glow and another creeping fume.

'There's fire ahead, Tiaan. Try the other way.'

To the right they encountered a cave-in that completely blocked the tunnel. There was no hope of clearing it, for the fumes were knee high and rising. They turned back to the junction and took the middle path, their last hope.

'Fire,' Merryl said dully, after they had moved less than a hundred spans.

Tiaan kept going until it was certain there was no way past. 'What now?'

'Resign ourselves to death.'

It was hot here. Tiaan went back to the entrance to the tar tunnel. She could not resign herself to dying. Turning the construct again, she stared at the oozing face of the tar.

'Tell me about the Great Seep, Merryl.'

'It's a good league across, and hundreds of spans deep. Some say it's bottomless. Things, and creatures trapped in it, sink down and sometimes appear again, countless years later, with the wheeling of the slow currents in its depths.'

'If we remain here,' she said absently. 'We'll be dead within the hour.'

'I'd-say so.'

'How long would the air in the construct last with the hatch down, and all of us inside?'

'I don't know. Two hours? Three? Four, possibly.'

'Then let's live those extra hours. Let's risk it.' Tiaan slammed the hatch, took a deep breath and moved the construct gently forwards until it met the convex face of the tar.

Merryl's eyes met hers. Tiaan's eyes were alive for the first time since he'd met her. 'What have we got to lose?'

The construct met resistance and stalled. Tiaan moved the controls, just a tickle. The skinned tar broke and the machine surged into treacly material that smeared across the screen. Everything went black.

'Are we even moving?' whispered Tiaan. 'I can't tell.'

Merryl looked through the rear screen. 'We're going about two spans a minute. The tar's coming over the top. I can't see anything now.'

She nudged the trumpet-shaped lever. There was no sense of motion. 'It's not fast enough. It'll take an hour to get to the end and we've still got to go up to the top of the seep. How far below ground are we?'

He shrugged. 'More than a hundred spans, but less than two hundred.'

'That's another hour, probably two. Can we make it before we breathe all our air?'

'I don't know.'

'I'll have to go faster.'

'Go too fast and it may tear the construct apart.'

'Too slowly and it won't matter' she retorted.

The minutes ticked by. Occasionally they came up against an object that scraped along the skin of the construct. It was hot inside now.

'How hot is the tar in the Great Seep, Merryl?'

'I wouldn't know. It's warm on top, so it must be warmer inside.'

'Hot enough to cook us?'

'I couldn't say.'

'Do you think we're at the end of the tar tunnel yet?' Tiaan asked.

'Once the node failed, the walk of the tunnel would soon have gone liquid. We'd be in the swirl of the Great Seep right now.'

'We're too slow,' she fretted. And we're not going up. I've got to do something.'

She knew what to do but was reluctant to do it, since that would give away the secret of making thapters-constructs that could fly. But if they were going to die anyway…

'Could you have the prisoners blindfolded, please, Merry!7 And ask the slaves to turn their backs. I've got to do something to the construct and I don't want anyone to see.'

He went down. Tiaan unpacked the set of pink diamonds -powerful hedrons – and the strands of black whiskers, fifty-four of each, weighing them in her hands. So much from so little.

'It's done,' called Merryl.

She lowered herself down the ladder by her hands and Merryl caught her at the bottom. Tiaan exercised her legs at every opportunity but it was going to take weeks before she could walk properly.

Opening a hatch in the floor at the front, she identified a black box among the tangle of parts inside, and prised the lid off. Inserting the diamond hedrons into their sockets, she fed the black threads up to the back of the amplimet cavity, checking everything carefully as she worked. There would be no time to do it again.

As soon as it was done, Merryl lifted her up the ladder. How quickly she had come to rely on him. Tiaan took hold of the controls. The amplimet meshed with her snugly now, not opposing her at all. It wanted to escape as much as she did. The whine rose in pitch as she pulled up on the flight knob but nothing seemed to happen. She could not tell if they were moving upwards.

'Is it working, Merryl?'

He thought for a moment. 'You know how, when you carry a bowl of water, it moves with your motion?'

'Yes! What a clever idea.'

He found a broad metal dish among the bits and pieces in one ot the storage compartments, half filled it with water and sat it on the top of the binnacle. With a pointed instrument he scored marks around the dish, at the water level.

'That will show movement from side to side, or back and forth.'

'But not up, which is what I most need to know.' She wiped her brow. Sweat was running down her neck and her shirt was saturated. The air was getting stuffy, too.

'But if we had something springy…'

He was away half an hour of their precious time, before returning with thin strips of green material. 'I found a diaphragm in one of the drawers. It's a kind of rubber.'

Tying one strip from the ceiling, above the binnacle, Merryl knotted a small coin into the other end, one-handed. 'I've carried this copper nyd for twenty years,' he said with a hint of a smile, 'for luck – not that it's brought me any.' Merryl scored a line across the screen at the lowest edge of the coin and stood back. 'Try again.'

She moved the controller lever slightly. The water in the dish moved back a fraction. 'It works!' She gave him a triumphant grin, then a tentative hug. 'Let's try the other' Taking hold of the flying knob, she pulled it up. The rubbery strip lengthened perceptibly before oscillating around its original position.

'How fast do you think we're rising?' she said.

'Haven't a clue.'

She pulled the knob up further until the machine began to shudder, then backed it off a little. 'If we're only rising at a few spans an hour… I suppose it'll be an easy death, if we run out of air.'

He did not answer.

Tiaan settled back in her seat. 'How did the enemy come to capture you, Merryl?'

'We lost an unimportant little battle near Gosport, way over on the east coast; he said. 'We were fighting for a village you'd never have heard of. I don't remember its name. On the march we went through so many places that after a while no one could tell the difference.'

She wiped her dripping brow. Were you in the army a long time?'

'Only a few months. There was an emergency, and after a week of training we went to the front. I say 'the front", though there wasn't one. The lyrinx prefer to fight in small bands, or even alone. Most of my friends died in ambushes and isolated skirmishes. Afterwards, no one knew where; no one survived to write their Histories. The cursed war!'

There was a bang on the roof of the construct, followed by a scraping down the back.

'What was that?' said Tiaan.

'Something in the seep. Perhaps a piece of wood, or a large bone.' Merryl was staring straight ahead, as if to pierce the black tar.

'What did you do before you went into the army, Merryl?'

'I was a translator, like my parents,' he said softly. 'But that's so long ago it doesn't seem like me at all. I can hardly imagine it now.'

They sat in silence, listening to the whine of the construct, the occasional thunk of some object or other striking the top of the machine, the creak and rattle of the metal skin. If we were going really slowly, she thought, the impacts wouldn't make any noise.

It grew hotter. Tiaan's clothes were sodden; Merryl's too. She could hear his hoarse breathing. Hers was the same. Surely they did not have much air left. Time seemed to be going very slowly.

'What about you, Tiaan? Tell me about yourself.'

She was equally reticent. 'There's not much to tell. I was chosen to become an artisan. I have a talent of thinking in pictures. I -'

Down below, someone groaned and began to thrash their legs. Merryl swung himself down the ladder. 'They're not looking good,' he called.

She poked her head down until she could see. Three of the seven slaves were asleep, or unconscious. The others sprawled limply on the floor, eyes closed, lungs heaving. Tirior and Minis were in better shape, though they looked worse than she felt. Nish lay curled up on a pull-out bunk, halfway up the wall. He had worked his blindfold off but his eyes were shut.

'The air's really bad down there,' Merryl said as he returned to her side. 'They won't last much longer.'

She pulled the knob up until the machine began to shudder. The rubber strip elongated. Everything began to vibrate, including her teeth. The construct squealed as if its metal carapace were being wrenched one way and then the other.

'I don't like the sound of that,' she said.

'Doesn't matter much, either way.'

'No.'

A while later she said, 'How fast now?' forgetting that she'd asked that before.

'I couldn't say, Tiaan.'

It was too much of an effort to talk. She leaned back against the seat, panting. Her head drooped.

The hatch above their heads squealed and a ribbon of tar jetted in from one side, festooning her arm and shoulder with coiling black bands. She tried to brush it off but the hot stuff stuck to her fingers and burned. Tiaan yelped and with her free hand pulled the flight knob down until the shuddering stopped.

Merryl tightened the hatch and sat on the floor, resting his head back against the wall. Tiaan set the controls and scraped the tar off. She felt so very tired; her head nodded. She hauled herself up, hanging onto the binnacle. If she sat down, she would go to sleep, which would swiftly be followed by unconsciousness, and death for everyone.

Something struck the construct hard, sending a shiver through the bowl of water. The hatch scraped as if the machine were sliding along the underside of something large and hard.

Tiaan could not think clearly. She pushed the controller forwards, the squeal became a shriek of tormented metal then, to her horror, the hatch was prised up a finger's width and thick tar began to ribbon in.

The noise stopped. They were free of the obstruction. Tiaan tilted the front of the construct up. The bowl of water slid off the binnacle, pouring its contents down the ladder. Pulling the flight knob up as far as it would go, she prayed.

The machine shuddered, the tar boiled beneath it and with a roar the construct hurled itself vertically. A surge of hot tar coated the wall at her back. The sound was indescribable. Tiaan felt sure the machine was going to tear itself apart.

Then the shuddering ceased, so abruptly that she did not understand what had happened. Had they stopped? No, for the mechanism down below was still screaming. She'd done it. The construct was free, in the open air, and going up like a skyrocket.

Tiaan threw open the hatch and, gasping lungfuls of sweet, pure air, let the machine fly where it would. There were groans and cries as the passengers were flung from one side to the other, but they were alive, at least. She did not look down. Tiaan had strength only to cling to the side, her eyes watering in the gale that swirled in through the jagged hatchway.

It became bitterly cold and hard to breathe; she'd gone too high. Tiaan eased the flight knob down, wondering where to go, but the whine broke for a second. As she levelled out it broke again and smoke belched up on all sides. She put the front down, heading towards the ground. Had something vital been damaged in all that shaking and shuddering? If the mechanism failed at this height they would be smashed to jelly.

There were no more problems until, nearing the ground, she levelled out and the whine faded to nothing. An acrid smell drifted from behind the binnacle and a long black trail smoked in the air behind them. Perhaps she'd drawn too much power and the workings were burning out.

To her right stood the main encampment of the human armies, their command post perched on a flat-topped hill. A little closer to her left, Tiaan glimpsed the seven-sided command area of the Aachim, next to thousands of motionless constructs. She wasn't going that way.

White fumes came up the steps from the lower level. Merryl cried out something she could not hear. There were yells and screams from below.

'Tiaan,' Merryl yelled. 'We're on fire! Put it down, anywhere!

Better that humanity have the secret of flight than that the Aachim get it. She cut the power and turned right, skimming across the brown grass. The whine failed. The construct hit the ground, bounced like a stone on water, bounced again and skidded around in a circle, before thumping into a rock and toppling on its side.

Tiaan hit her head, hard enough to daze her. She hung onto the binnacle, gasping, as the people below scrambled for the ladder.

'Get out!' screamed Merryl.

Tiaan hit the release, snatched the amplimet and pulled herself out through the torn and tarry hatch, tumbling a short distance to the muddy ground. The underside of the construct must have been red hot – she could feel the heat from here because the brown grass began to smoulder, then burst into flame.

Two people emerged from the hatch, coughing so hard that they doubled over. They were freed slaves; Tiaan did not know their names. After them came Tirior, still bound and gagged, two more slaves, then Minis, dragging the fifth. Nish, whose hands were free, crawled out last. He untied Tirior and they hauled the others away from the fire. The burning grass was expanding away from the other side of the construct, which was now enveloped in flames and smoke. Where was Merryl?

White smoke puffed through the hatch. Tiaan thought she saw a shadow move inside. 'Merryl!' she yelled.

She dragged herself back to the hatch and sat up, stretching out her useless legs. The sixth slave lay unconscious in the hatchway. Merryl was behind her, pushing ineffectually.

Seizing the woman by the front of her shirt, Tiaan pulled her out and they fell together on the grass. Merryl flopped beside Tiaan, coughing so hard she could see specks of blood on his tongue.

'The grass is burning,' Tiaan said. 'We've got to get away from here.'

Tirior wrenched her gag off before carrying the unconscious slave to safety.

Merryl stood up, his eyes watering. 'I'm all right,' he said hoarsely. He picked Tiaan up and lurched away.

As they emerged from behind the construct, Tiaan saw a squad of soldiers racing down from the human command area. Behind them were uniformed officers, as well as shadowy figures in robes – the scrutators.

To her left, and closer, a small band of Aachim were sprinting towards her, Vithis at their head. Even from this distance she could see the angry set of his face. Tiaan let out an involuntary gasp.

'What's the matter?' said Merryl.

'That Aachim is my worst enemy.'

'Then he mustn't get you.'

He began to stagger the other way, towards the human lines. Tiaan looked over her shoulder. It would be a close thing. They went by Minis, who had freed his hands. He stared at Tiaan as she passed, his eyes tragic black holes.

'Minis!' roared Vithis, his robes flapping. 'You're alive!'

'Yes, Foster-father, I am.'

'Stop her!'

Minis, who looked as if he was about to cry, said, 'Foster-father, I will not,' and threw himself face-down on the grass.

Merryl kept going, lurching blindly from side to side. His red eyes were streaming. He looked around wildly then ran, not for the human camp but back towards Snizort.

'Merryl,' cried Tiaan, 'you're going the wrong way.'

He turned around, his eyes watering so badly that everything must have been a blur. Vithis was racing towards them but the scrutators were going to get there first.

In the confusion of the moment, Nish must have thought that Merryl was trying to carry Tiaan off. He roared, 'You're not taking her anywhere!' and launched himself through the air. His shoulder struck Merryl behind the knees. He went down, Tiaan flying from his arms.

It made all the difference. In a few strides Vithis was on them. Lifting Tiaan effortlessly in one arm, he drew his sword with the other hand. She struggled but he crushed her against his side, his arm squeezing the air from her lungs.

'Keep your distance!' he roared at the human soldiers. 'Tiaan stole what was mine and I will have it back.' More Aachim ran up to support him.

The soldiers skidded to a stop, swords drawn. Their line parted and a handful of black-robed figures pushed between them, including a tall, burly man and a short one with only one arm. His face was covered by a platinum mask.

'My name is Ghorr,' said the big man, 'Chief Scrutator. Give up the artisan, Lord Vithis.'

'I'll go to war against all humanity first; hissed Vithis.

More Aachim were running up all the time. Already they outnumbered the humans. Behind them Tiaan was pleased to see that the construct was blazing head high. With a loud bang, pieces of metal spun through the air. The secret of flight – the diamond hedrons and carbon whiskers – would be burned to vapour. Only Malien knew, and Tiaan herself. But could she keep that secret from Vithis?

Ghorr raised a clenched fist, took one step forward, then stopped.

Tiaan trembled in Vithis's arms, but the scrutators could not find the courage to attack him. With a sneer of contempt, Vithis turned his back and headed for the Aachim camp.

Six

Nish had made a terrible blunder and this time the whole world had been there to see it. Whatever had possessed him to think that the fellow was carrying Tiaan off? He pushed himself to his knees.

'Don't get up,' said Chief Scrutator Ghorr, pressing him down with a shiny boot. 'Lie in the dirt while we judge you, worm. Who are you, who has so betrayed humanity?'

Beside Ghorr stood Jal-Nish. Though he was greatly changed, and Nish had not seen him with the mask, he knew it was his father. What could be seen of Jal-Nish's face was white, but his one eye was blood red.

'The worm, surr/ ground out Jal-Nish, 'is my own son, Cryl-Nish Hlar. I have long thought that he was dead. Now I wish he had never been born.'

'So do I, Acting Scrutator Hlar. But since he is your son, and you crave elevation to the Council of Scrutators, I require you to prove that you are worthy. Devise a fitting punishment for the creature.' Ghorr's eyes showed his doubt.

Jal-Nish cast a wild glance at his son. Nish could not meet his eye; he was too ashamed. What would happen to him now? A fitting punishment. That could mean anything from the front ranks of the army to a death sentence. But blood was blood, after all. Surely his father would not 'Cryl-Nish Hlar,' Jal-Nish said. 'You have failed as an artificer as you failed as a prober, a diplomat, and at every other task you've ever been set. You are a liar, a cheat and, as has now been proven before my very eyes, a vicious traitor. The tragedy we face today stems from your initial betrayal, with Crafter Irisis, of Artisan Tiaan at your manufactory. Had you not conspired against Tiaan she would not have fled, nor fallen into the hands of the lyrinx, nor been ensnared by the Aachim. She would not have opened the gate that brought them here, with their invincible fleet of constructs. Had we still the use of her talent, and the precious amplimet, we might have gained the upper hand over the lvrinx. Alas, we've lost both, and the secret of flight, and now our alliance with the Aachim is sundered. And it's all down to you, boy'.'

I don't ask why you ensured that Artisan Tiaan, and this most precious of all secrets, should fall into Aachim hands. No doubt you've had vour bloodstained pay already.' No, Father!' cried Nish. 'I never -'

'Be silent!' Jal-Nish thundered. 'The entire Council of Scrutators saw you betray us. Your guilt has been proven beyond doubt. Cryl-Nish Hlar, you are no longer my son. You will be erased, expunged, obliterated from the Histories of the Hlar family.'

'Father,' Nish whispered. 'You can't take my Histories from me.'

'I can and I will, before this day is over.' 'But – what am I to do?'

'You should suffer the ultimate penalty, as all traitors must. But,' Jal-Nish said inexorably, 'we are in sore need of labour to haul our clankers to the nearest node. Therefore, Slave Nish, you will be harnessed into a team of criminals and slaves. You will be teamed with the treacherous Slave Flydd, and every time he incurs a whipping, so will you. You will haul clankers without respite until your heart bursts, and then you will be buried in the road, face upwards, that the meanest citizens in the world will tread you down. They will walk over you, Slave Nish, until there's not a fragment of flesh or bone or sinew left. And ever after, an obelisk at that point shall name your crimes and their punishment. Such is the penalty for high treason.'

Even the chief scrutator looked shocked, though not, Nish thought, displeased.

Jal-Nish turned away, struggling to contain himself, but after a few steps he doubled over and vomited into the grass. Shortly he returned, pulling the mask back into place. A single tear glistened in the corner of his eye, then the iron control was back.

'It is done,' Jal-Nish said to the Council. Take Slave Nish to his doom!'

'You have proven your worth over the past year Scrutator Jal-Nish,' Ghorr said softly. 'Should you save our clankers, and defeat the lyrinx in battle, a place on the Council will be yours. We have need of men such as you.' Taking Jal-Nish's arm, Ghorr led him up the hill.

A pair of white-faced soldiers stepped in beside Nish. 'I won't resist,' he said numbly, but they seized him anyway. One went through his pockets and removed everything of value. The other patted him down for weapons. Finding none, they lifted him between them and carried him away.

As Nish looked back, the crowd dispersed, except for two people. Tirior, who had been watching the proceedings from behind, walked slowly back to the Aachim lines. The other person was the one-handed man, Merryl, who had helped Tiaan. He stared after Nish, then began to trudge around the curve of the hill, away from the command post.

After a sleepless night in a solitary slave pen, Nish was hurled into the bloody slush of the battlefield. A clanker stood just a few steps away, its thick metal legs half-buried in mud. Wooden skids had been fitted underneath. To his left a group of people, slaves like him, were being harnessed together. They looked as despairing as he felt. Behind them were other slave teams, as well as teams of horses, oxen, donkeys and buffalo, soldiers and camp followers, women and even children. Every kind of beast had been harnessed to the impossible, heart-bursting task.

Nish was numb with horror. His own father had cursed him, had sentenced him to a bestial death. Even in this war, which had produced mountains of corpses, in which the whole fabric of human society had been torn apart, that was impossible to comprehend.

Crack' Pain flowered in Nish's ear. He put a filthy hand up and brought it back covered in blood. It felt as if something had bitten a piece out of his earlobe.

Crack! The other ear exploded with agony. Scrambling to his feet, Nish saw a grinning overseer coiling his whip, a good ten paces away.

'What the hell do you -?' Nish roared, driven careless by despair.

The whip lashed out again, catching him on the chest through the gape of his shirt. Muffling a cry, Nish looked around frantically. What was the brute trying to tell him?

He scrambled towards the head of the team, slipping and sliding in the muck, and every time he went to his knees the lash fell on his back or buttocks, or coiled around his waist to nip at his belly. The overseer was a monster, a sadist, and he, Slave Nish, the lowest worm in all of Santhenar, could do nothing about it.

Fumbling with the straps of the harness, Nish took several more lashes before he was fixed in place like a beast of burden. Go away! he prayed. Go and flog someone else.

Eventually the overseer did, the cries and wails of the whipped echoing down the line. Nish could feel no pity for them, though some of their groans were soul-wrenching. All that mattered was that the lash fall on another.

The man beside him at the head of the team, on his knees in the muck, was a scrawny old fellow whose back and meagre legs were crisscrossed with scars. He must have been a slave for a long time. It did not look as though he had much life in him.

'Just what I need,' Nish said to himself. 'Useless old coot will never pull his weight. He'll die in the muck and I'll be whipped for that too.'

The slave turned his emaciated, mud-coated head. Nish did not recognise him, nor even recall Jal-Nish's words, until the man spoke.

'How quickly they forget,' said Xervish Flydd, looking him in the eye.

'Scrutator! Surr!' Nish gasped. 'I'm sorry. I did not recognise -'

'You're just doing what you must, to survive,' said Flydd. 'Don't call me scrutator. Nish. That honour has been taken from me and, gossip tells me, given to your lather I'm Slave Flydd now. What brings you here?'

Nish told Flydd of his latest failing, in the smallest number of words he could. It hurt nearly as much as the lash. All his dreams were dead. He must face up to what he was, a worthless human being.

'We all make mistakes,' Flydd said out of the corner of his mouth. 'Get ready to pull.'

Nish looked around to see the overseer advancing, whip at the ready. The fellow caught Nish's eye, grinned and flicked the lash at him. It caught him on the nipple so painfully that Nish screamed. It felt as if his breast had been torn open.

'No talking!' rapped the overseer, lashing him again. 'Pull! Pull until your hearts shudder and your bowels groan or, by the powers, I'll make you suffer'.'

Nish threw his weight against the harness. Flydd did the same. The leather creaked; the rows of slaves behind them groaned. The whip cracked again and again, but the clanker did not budge.

'Pull!' roared the overseer.

Nish strained until his boots skidded in the mud, to no more effect than before. The overseer stormed back and forth, lashing and cursing them. Nish strained again until his heart felt about to explode in his chest. It made no difference. The clanker was irretrievably bogged.

If Nish had hoped for a respite, he was disappointed. While a bullock team was being brought up, they had to pull as hard as ever, and once it was harnessed in place the slave team was put beside the beasts. For every lash that fell on the haunches of the animals, the slaves felt three or four. All across the battlefield the scene was repeated: with soldiers, with other teams of slaves, with all the peasants and camp followers Jal-Nish had been able to round up, and with beasts of every description.

After hours of the most brutal labour Nish had ever experienced, the clanker began to creak and groan out of the mud wallow, though before it had gone a hundred paces it ended up in another, and many more lay ahead before it could be dragged to solid ground.

By that time it was well after dark. Each of the slaves was given a gourd full of sour water, a slab of black bread as hard as a brick and a mug of something which, with the most charitable will in the world, could only be described as slops. It had a sweet, off taste, as if it had begun to rot in the summer heat.

Nish took one sip and spat it into the grass. It was far worse than the food he had eaten in the refugee camp in Almadin in the spring. He was about to heave the mug of slops after it when Flydd said quietly, 'I'd advise you to eat every mouthful, and lick out the mug afterwards.' 'It's disgusting!'

'Aye, but you can't work without food. If you can't pull, the overseer will whip you into jelly and drag the clanker over you.'

'If this is my life, then the sooner it's over the better,' Nish muttered.

Flydd shrugged and sat down, jerking at the harness in a futile attempt to find a comfortable position. He ignored Nish, eating his slops slowly, as if savouring every morsel, and carefully wiping the mug out with lumps of bread. 'If you're not going to eat that, pass it over here.' Wordlessly Nish handed him the mug. Had it been the finest food in the land, he could not have eaten a mouthful. His stomach was throbbing with despair.

'Better get some rest,' said Flydd. 'They'll be calling us out again in a few hours.' 'But it's dark.' 'It'll be light enough when they start to burn the bodies.'

A few hours later it started again, but this time it was worse. The battlefield was dotted with pyres, blazing piles of human and lyrinx dead. They provided enough light for the overseer to pick his targets, though not enough for him to be accurate. A blow aimed tor Xervish Flydd's back came coiling around Nish's bent head, the hard tip of the lash catching him on the eyebrow with such force that he screamed.

'You stinking mongrel -' he raged, once the pain became bearable.

A dirty hand smacked him in the mouth, cutting off the abuse.

'Don't!' grated Flydd in his ear. 'Whatever thev do, don't react in any way. Just pull, as hard as you can.'

Nish strained against the harness. 'The swine nearly took my eye out.'

'If you attack him, he'll take pleasure in removing the other eye, in a way you will never forget.'

'I want to die!'

'You won't be so lucky. We're put here to suffer, and while we can stagger, that's what we're going to do.'

'It doesn't seem to bother you.'

Flydd forced himself against the straps, grunting with the effort. 'I feel pain the same as any man, Nish. I've just learned not to show it.'

Nish supposed that must be true. The former scrutator was brutally scarred and he moved as though every bone in his body had been broken. There were rumours of his torment at the hands of the Council when he was a young man, for some unspecified crime.

'I can't take much more of this,' Nish groaned. 'It feels as if my leg bones are splintering with each step.'

'You'd be surprised how much the human body can endure,' said Flydd. 'You've got months of slavery ahead of you yet.'

'Then I'll kill myself.'

Flydd's fist came out of the dark, crashing into Nish's chin and knocking him backwards into the slush. The next pair of slaves went over him, tripped and fell down, pulling down the pair after that. The team ground to a halt.

The overseer came up the line, flogging indiscriminately. The slaves fell over themselves to get away. It took a good ten minutes before the tangle was sorted out and they were pulling in unison again. Nish took more lashes, though no more than his share.

'What did you do that for?' he muttered, feeling a split lip. Two teeth felt loose and one had a chip out of it.

'Do your duty like a man and don't whine about it!' snapped Flydd. '1 expected more of you, Nish.'

'But we're slaves,' cried Nish.

'Aye. Even so, we're doing vital work. The fate of humanity may rest on us getting these clankers to the field, and never forget it.'

Nish fell silent. Trust the scrutator (he could not stop thinking of Flydd that way) to keep his eye on the greater goal. Nish could not, and he felt bad about it. The survival of humanity hung by a thread and any little thing could make the difference, but it meant nothing to him. His own troubles were too overwhelming.

He tried to talk himself into it, telling himself what a selfish, contemptible worm he was. Make something of your life, Nish! Do your very best, even if only as a slave.

It was impossible. He had fallen too far. Once he'd been part of a wealthy, powerful family. Now he'd lost everything, even his part in their Histories. Once he'd had an honourable trade; now he was beneath contempt. Once he'd had a father; now he had nothing. He was nothing.

They stopped just before dawn. Nish was so exhausted that he fell onto the mud and slept where he lay – blessed oblivion, though it did not last long.

He dreamed that he was sitting at a banquet table, dressed in robes woven with golden thread. A lovely young woman was at his left elbow, an even lovelier one at his right. He was speaking and the whole table hung on his words. Nish finished his speech to a roar of acclamation. As he bowed, he smelt the most delicious aromas as waiters hurried in, bearing huge platters of roast meats.

Nish woke salivating and the glorious smell was still there. He opened his eyes, realised where he was, and wept. He was covered in stinking, rotting mud. There was no dinner table; no audience. Worst of all, so horrible that he could not bear to think about it, the mouth-watering aroma came from the piles of burning dead. He was salivating over his own kind. He was a monster of depravity, no better than a cannibal.

'Ah, no,' he wailed, and flopped down in the mud again.

Flydd hauled him out, wiping his face with a callused hand. Nish, expecting to be smacked in the mouth again, pulled away.

'What is it?' said Flydd, watching the overseer over Nish's shoulder.

'I once had everything, and now I've lost it all. No, that's not true. I didn't lose it, I threw it away. I'm useless. And then, just then.., my mouth was watering from the smell of cooked meat, and it was human meat.'

Flydd stared at him for a long time. 'Mine too. It's entirely natural. It doesn't make you any worse in my eyes.'

'You're a slave, surr. What you think doesn't matter.'

Flydd clenched his fist, but unclenched it. He sighed and, though plagued by his own self-doubt, put it aside. 'You've done plenty that's right, Nish. You got the best out of the seeker, little Ullii, where no one else could. You thought of the idea of air-floaters, without which the war might already be lost. You sailed a balloon all the way to Tirthrax, and found Tiaan there. You might have brought her and the crystal back, had you not faced people with far greater power than yourself. You killed the nylatl single-handed, and that was a feat worthy of half a page in the Histories. You saved the lives of thousands in the refugee camp. Had you not given warning in time, every person there might have fed the enemy.'

'How did you know about that?' said Nish.

'If a leaf falls in the forest when it should not, the scrutators hear about it.'

Nish must assume that the scrutator also knew about his disastrous attempt at diplomacy, and the unfortunate liaison, if it could be called that, with Yara's sister Mira.

'I have other failings,' Nish said, determined to scathe himself to the bone.

'Who does not? I have so many weaknesses that it makes me shudder to think about them. It doesn't stop me from trying, though. Don't take on the slave's mentality, Nish. Once you do, you might as well be dead.'

Nish glanced over his shoulder The overseer was not in sight, but a slave was squelching down the line with pannikins of water. Behind him, another bore a platter on which chunks of black bread looked as though they had been hacked up with an axe, and a filthy axe at that. 'There's one thing you haven't heard,' he said quietly.

'Oh?1 said Flydd.

'After my latest failing, which put Tiaan into the hands of Vithis, I came before the Council of Scrutators. The head of the Council…'

'Chief Scrutator Ghorr,' Flydd prompted. He stared into space, lost in his own world, and Nish had to nudge him when the trusties held out the bread and water.

'Yes, Ghorr,' Nish said after they had gone. 'He demanded that my father prove his suitability to be a scrutator, by sentencing me. And Jal-Nish did.' Nish repeated the sentence, word by awful word. It was engraved in his mind, and would be until the day he died. 'My own father/ he said brokenly. 'He – he condemned me without a second's hesitation.' Nish related the whole terrible episode. 'I just can't comprehend it, surr.'

Flydd was staring at him, not breathing. 'And how did Ghorr react?'

'He seemed delighted.'

Flydd went so still that Nish wondered if he was alive. The lump of coarse bread was held out in one hand, the gourd of water in the other. His scarred and knotted jaw looked as if it had been cast from bronze. Finally he gave a great shudder, turned to Nish and handed him the bread.

'Take this. I cannot eat.'

'But…' said Nish, 'yesterday you told me I must eat to survive.'

Flydd looked over his shoulder, then lowered his voice. 'What you've just told me makes my flesh crawl. There have always been people who would do anything, even sell their kin, to satisfy their lusts. I've met more than enough in my time. But for the chief of scrutators to encourage such a deed, to demand it as proof of worth to become a scrutator, shows that the Council is corrupt to the core.'

'I always thought the Council would do anything -' Nish began, but quickly censored himself.

'We did what was required for humanity to survive. I've done many things I'm not proud of, though, as scrutator, I would do them again. But this… How can the Council not see?'

'See what?' said Nish, gnawing at the hard bread, which had been milled so coarsely that many of the grains were whole. He spat out a particularly large grain, which turned out to be a pebble.

'That this deed, alone, makes Jal-Nish unworthy to be scrutator, and Ghorr to be chief. A man who puts ambition before anything else can never be trusted to act for the common good. And a man who demands such an act lacks the judgment to be a lowly prober, much less a scrutator. Ghorr must be brought down, and the Council with him.'

With a loud crack, the neck of the gourd shattered under the force of Flydd's grip, showering him with water. He put the ragged end to his mouth and drained it, then tossed the gourd into the mud.

With a rueful smile he spoke, quietly so the next pair of slaves would not hear: 'Well may you laugh, to hear a slave plot the downfall of the scrutators. But I swear to you that I will do it, whatever it takes. This monstrosity, this abomination of the Council, must be wiped from the earth.'

'Including my father?' Despite everything, Nish could not even think of revenge. All he felt was an empty bewilderment, that his father could have done such a thing to him.

'Especially Jal-Nish.'

Seven

In the panic after the node exploded, and the disabled air-fioater crash-landed in the middle of the battlefield, everyone fled for their lives. No one noticed that little Ullii was not with them.

Ullii was so furious with Flydd and Irisis that she stayed behind. The scrutator had gained her cooperation by telling her that he'd found her long-lost twin brother, Mylii, but it had all been a lie. Flydd had no idea where Mylii was.

When the reverberations from the node had faded enough for her to open her lattice, the mental matrix by which she organised her unique view of the world, there were lyrinx everywhere. Huge lyrinx with bloodstained claws and shreds of flesh and skin between their teeth. Ullii stifled a gasp, jumpad over the side and ran after Flydd. Better him than the clawers, as she thought of them, but the bright sun burst up, right into her eyes. Covering her face, she lurched back to the air-floater, but couldn't find her mask or goggles. In daylight she was helpless without one or the other. Ullii was groping under the tilted deck for them when she realised that she was completely alone.

'Wait!' she wailed, but her high, despairing cry did not carry. Despite Flydd lying to her, despite Irisis letting her down as well, in this nightmare of blood and violence Ullii could not do without them. 'Wait!' she shouted in her high little voice.

It was impossible to hear anything above the battle cries of the lyrinx, the sound of weapons on armour, the hiss of spears and catapult balls, the screams of men and beasts in agony.

Her ears hurt; even after plugging them with lumps of wet clay she could still hear the racket.

Her burning eyes were streaming with tears and she could not leave the air-floater. Ullii searched for Irisis and Xervish Flydd. Since they both had a talent for the Secret Art, they should have appeared in the lattice. But Irisis and Flydd were far across the battlefield, and in the chaos Ullii could not pick them out. Thousands of lyrinx showed, and devices powered by the Secret Art. Only those capable of storing power were working now. Anything that relied on the field was dead.

Ullii felt abandoned – it had been happening all her life. What was she to do? She couldn't survive by herself. And what about the little intruder growing inside her? She felt protective towards the baby because she and Nish had made it together, but sometimes she hated it. One day it would abandon her, too.

The battlefield became so terrifying that Ullii had to shut down her lattice. She could not stand violence of any kind. The war was a nightmare brought to life and she did not know how to cope. Ullii did the only thing left to her. She crept into the smallest, darkest space she could find, a corner of the air-floater's tiny galley, curled up into a ball and closed down her senses one by one. The world vanished.

All day the battle raged around her. Several times the wrecked air-floater was struck by running lyrinx, hard enough to shake the flimsy structure. Once a minor battle raged inside as four soldiers pursued a wounded lyrinx and dispatched it. Men and lyrinx died to her left, then in the rear. Ullii was oblivious. Thirst roused her in the cool of the evening. Uncoiling gracefully, she opened her crusted eyes. The galley was a mess. When the air-floater had flipped upside down, pans, pots, food and wine-had been scattered everywhere. Ullii found a battered pot, tapped water from a barrel and gulped it down, though it had an unpleasant metallic taste. She found dried fruit, stale bread and a piece of mild cheese that had gone hard and cracked in the heat of the day. It suited her perfectly, for Ullii could not bear any kind of herb or spice, or other strong flavours, which were to her overpoweringly intense.

Sitting on the floor, she gnawed at the cheese while she used the lattice to sense what was going on around her. The fighting had paused; the battlefield was quiet apart from the piteous groans of the dying and the cackle of fires here and there. The smell of blood, excrement and raw flesh made her stomach heave.

Other fires lit up the human camps, as well as those of the Aachim, but not the lyrinx. They did not need camp fires. And in the distance Ullii could see, and feel, and sense with every one of her senses, the baleful incandescence of the exploded node. It was still molten, concealed by impenetrable fumes, and spurting and dribbling white-hot rock like a miniature volcano. The fields that had once been such a vital part of it had gone, though Ullii still sensed something there.

Once more she sought for Irisis and Xervish Flydd, but did not find them. There were too many people with uncanny talents, and too many devices employing the Secret Art. Her lattice glowed with them, like knotted stars in the heavens. Ullii did not look for Nish, though she longed for him. Having no Art, he did not appear in her lattice at all.

But one point stood out like a nova in the night sky, and she recognised it at once. It was the glowing knot of the amplimet, twinned to a smaller knot that signified Tiaan. After months of searching for them, Ullii knew those marks the instant they appeared.

They were not far away, though she could not tell where. The lattice was twisted up on itself, blasted out of shape by the sub-ethyric explosion from the node. Everything was warped and confused.

Ullii did not feel safe in the air-floater but she had nowhere else to go. She had never felt so abandoned. Nish, she cried silently. Where are you? Ullii had last seen him as a prisoner of the Aachim, and he'd not seemed as pleased to see her as she'd been to find him. She suppressed that worry. Could he be at the camp surrounded by those shining metal constructs? Ullii dared not go to see; the Aachim leader was a harsh man, like the people who had tormented her in childhood.

She ate some more bread, then slept, the baby kicking in her belly like the feathery brush of a fish's tail. The night passed. The fighting stopped briefly before continuing, as brutal and bloody as ever. In the morning her sleep was interrupted by flashes brighter than the sun. One passed right across the air-floater, showing even,' rib, strut and wire of the collapsed gasbag, and her black glass goggles jammed under a bench.

Scrambling for them, Ullii stared up at the sky. The fleet of air-floaters was impossible to miss. Their crystals appeared faintly in her lattice, a perfect formation of three by four. Something else showed, too. The presence was also faint, denoting only a minor talent for the Secret Art, but it had a signature she would have known anywhere – a festering corruption of mind and body that made her belly cramp and her skin crawl. Ullii had not felt it since their escape from the mine at the manufactory, months ago. It was the man she feared most – Jal-Nish Hlar.

She tried to close down her senses again, but this time they would not obey her, for fear of what might happen when she was helpless. Scuttling into the galley, she closed the door and piled bags and barrels against it. Without a window, it was stiflingly hot – too hot for comfort – and though it was dim inside, for once that did not help.

She closed her eyes, but again that beam passed over the air-floater, and light streamed in through a tiny crack in the wall, so bright that she felt it. Ullii was not safe anywhere. As she put her hands over the goggles, the earth began to shake as if thousands of heavy feet were pounding it. The clawers were on the move. If they came this way, one of them would eat her in a few bone-snapping, brain-spurting gulps.

Clearing the door, Ullii crept out, peering fearfully through her goggles. Another blast of light seared from sky to ground. A great wail went up and she saw the enemy running for their lives, a horde of them heading directly for the air-floater. In their panic, they might crash right through the flimsy structure.

Not far away a clanker lay on its side, torn open from one end to the other. It offered better shelter, since the beasts would have to go round it. Slipping over the side. Ullii bent low to the ground and ran. The enemy pounded towards her. Halfway to the clanker she encountered a dead dawer lying in a depression. Ullii froze, staring at the great hulk, whose eyes seemed to be looking right at her.

It was almost her undoing. Ullii could not move, terrified that the creature would come to life and tear her in half. It didn't and, finding courage at the last instant, she leapt over it and scuttled the dozen steps to the side of the clanker. Pulling herself underneath its overhanging side, she closed her eyes and prayed.

The mob thundered past, rocking the clanker. The metal frame creaked and groaned. Ullii shuddered and curled into a smaller ball, knowing that the clawers could find her by smell if they wanted to.

The last went by, limping. She did not move. Not until the stampede faded into the distance did she dare to open her eyes.

The air-floaters still shone their beam one way and another. Ullii slipped inside the clanker, looking for water and food. She did not find any, only blood on the floor, the srhell so sickly that she almost passed out.

She hid underneath in the small patch of shadow, following it around as the sun rose higher then sank towards the west. By the mid-afternoon it became clear that the enemy were abandoning Snizort, but Ullii did not know what to do. Experience had taught her that few people could be trusted. Nor could she live alone, in the wild. Food, clothing and shelter had always been provided for her and, by herself, she would not survive a week. She could not kill another animal for food, nor eat its bloody, pungent flesh if she did.

She would have to follow the clanker column and find a way to live off it without being caught. Though Ullii was a creature of the night, used to moving silently and secretly, that thought filled her with terror. Stealing from the army was a capital crime. Should she be caught, they would kill her like a beast. But she had to eat.

Going back for water, she found the air-floater smashed to pieces. The gasbag, a good fifteen spans long, had disappeared. Searching in the mud she discovered a water barrel with a few handfuls of brown water in it, and drank the lot. There was nothing left of the food.

It was growing dark. She circled around one of the camps, and around again, silent as a ghost in the darkness. Many times she came on ruined clankers, but the smell of blood and death was so strong she could not bear to crawl inside. She was ravenous, and so desperate for a drink that, not long before dawn. Ullii approached a dead soldier. Holding her nose with one hand, she went through his pack.

She found nothing to eat or drink, but the next corpse had a stoppered skin of wine and a bag of flat honey biscuits. After wiping the mouth of the skin a dozen times, and suppressing a shudder, she put it to her lips.

The wine was so sour that it took her breath away, and the taste made her want to wash her mouth out. She took another sip, then a mouthful. It had been watered and was weak, but Ullii had not taken wine before, nor any kind of alcoholic drink.

Moving upwind of the corpse, she nibbled at one of the honey biscuits. It was delicious, though intensely sweet. She ate it all and took another sip of the wine, which now tasted even more sour.

Ullii wandered off, alternately nibbling to break the sourness of the wine, then drinking to rid her mouth of the excessive sweetness. In this way she circumnavigated the camp again. To her right she heard cursing and the distinctive sound of the whip. Groups of harnessed men were attempting to drag clankers out of a bog. She turned the other way and shortly came upon a ruined clanker, just as the sky was growing light. Her head felt strange. Ullii giggled, staggered and threw up.

The sun burst over the horizon, right into her eyes. Ullii stumbled around the clanker, found a hole in the side and crawled in. All around her echoed the roars of overseers and the groaning of slaves. There was only one consolation – the lyrinx had gone. In the core of her lattice she could see their columns, moving steadily away, abandoning Snizort and all they had made here.

Not quite all – they carried a number of strange objects with them, thick with the aura of the Secret An. But they were shielded and Ullii could tell no more about them, even had she wanted to. She sought for the solace of sleep.

Ullii woke with a terrible headache, for she'd slept the day through, and the night. The sun was beating down on the clanker now, which creaked and squealed as the metal plates expanded and slipped over one another. Her mouth tasted foul; she was thirstier than ever but could not stomach the wine. She ate a few more honey biscuits, sniffed the contents of the skin and poured it onto the ground.

Not daring to go out in the daytime, Ullii lay panting in the clanker until sundown, growing weaker and weaker. Her headache was worse than before. She felt sure that she was dying.

The clanker cooled quickly once the sun set and Ullii, idly trailing her fingers along the upper side, discovered that it was covered in beads of moisture. She licked her fingers. Her tongue was so dry that it felt crackly. Following the trail of drops down the side she discovered a small pool of condensation, about a cupful, in a metal hollow. After drinking it dry, she felt strong enough to look for more.

Her senses were so acute that she could smell water, even among the fumes from the bodies that had been burned, and the putrid reek of those rotting where they had fallen. She found a gourd of water, drank her fill and went back to her hiding place, where sleep was her only escape from the stench. The next morning she finished the water and went outside. Something had changed.

All was silent. The hauling teams had dragged the last of the undamaged clankers from the mire onto solid ground, and were now heading towards the nearest field. She was alone with the dead.

Ullii followed the column for days, sleeping in a tree or hollow by day, creeping at the coat-tails of the procession at night, and living on the few meagre scraps she could find. She did not know what else to do.

It was most unpleasant. Several times she saw the one-armed man in the platinum mask, and after that Jal-Nish's knot was always in her lattice, a shuddering horror. And even from half a league away, the smell of eighty thousand unwashed bodies was so strong than she had to plug her nose. The merest whiff made her gag, and it grew worse as time wore on. One night she found nothing edible at all, and was driven by hunger to creep to the front of the procession, where the noise and light were least, to see if she could steal anything.

It was the boldest deed little Ullii had ever attempted. Her whole life had been spent in fear of people and their punishments. Now she must steal or starve. She crept along the line of the leading column, keeping watch in her lattice for Jal-Nish. He was over the other side, thankfully. A gentle breeze drifted the stink of the army away from her. Ullii took out her noseplugs. Smell was her most powerful sense and she needed it here.

The column was still, the slaves taking a few hours' rest before the labour began again at dawn. She slipped closer, as quick as silk in the darkness. An errant breeze brought her an aroma from the camp ovens – fresh bread. Five hundred bakers had worked all night to feed the multitude their breakfast.

Salivating, Ullii scanned the area. The bakers' wagons and their portable ovens, were well lit and securely guarded, so there was no chance of stealing anything there. She moved up the line, looking for something she could snatch. It had to be done secretly. If they saw her she would never get away.

As she prowled, the wind changed, momentarily blowing from the head of the line. Even among the thousands of sweaty bodies, Ullii caught an elusive, familiar scent. Her eyes moistened. She raised her head, sniffing the air. There it was again. Her nipples stood up and Ullii felt an overwhelming flood of desire.

It was Nish! Her beloved Nish, who had looked after her so tenderly before. If only she could get to him, she would be safe at last.

Eight Irisis screamed as the pair of lyrinx leapt through the door; she couldn't help herself. With a backwards flip that she had not known she could perform, she fled the other way, expecting to find Flangers dead.

He was working the sword furiously with his good arm, fighting for his life. The lyrinx was moving slowly now, the hole in its side pulsing purple blood, though one of its blows might still have disembowelled a man.

Flangers hacked at it but missed. It slashed with one hand, then the other, the blows tearing through the soldier's shirt as he wove backwards. He stumbled, slipped in purple blood and fell to one knee.

Irisis, still running, acted instinctively. Leaping high, she landed on the lyrinx's back, caught hold of its crest and brought her knee up hard against the base of its skull. The lyrinx reared up, shaking its head as it reached back with its left hand to tear her off.

As the blood-tipped claws came at her face, Irisis hung on with her knees and pummelled it about the side of the head. The blows seemed to daze it so she poked her fingers into its eyes.

Flangers came up off the floor like a ball from a catapult. The outstretched sword slid between Irisis's knees, found the gap in the plates and plunged into the creature's throat. Irisis, unable to untangle her legs in time, went all the way down with the falling beast. She hit the floor, rolled and came up holding her sword.

At the death of their comrade, the other two lyrinx checked, though not for long. Irisis just stood there, her initiative exhausted. Flangers caught her hand, jerking her away.

'Through the door behind me.'

It was just a few steps away but she hadn't noticed it before. Irisis waved her sword around in a professional manner as Flangers jerked it open.

'Hurry!' he roared.

Irisis took one look over her shoulder and ran for the door. Flangers kicked it shut behind them. They fled across the oval space outside but, halfway, Irisis stopped to look back.

'Come on!' Flangers was limping badly.

She stayed where she was. 'There's something wrong. They're not coming after us.'

He felt his injured arm with his good hand. 'Perhaps they're sneaking round through one of the other doors, to take us from behind.'

Irisis tiptoed back to the door, beyond which she heard thuds and squeals. 'No, they're back at their bloody work, killing the little beasts. They don't want any of them taken alive. I wonder why?'

'I can't bear to think,' said Flangers. 'Hey, now!'

Irisis had opened the door and was peering inside. One of the lyrinx, not three steps away, broke off from its bloody work with the club. Its dark eyes, the size of lemons, were fixed on her. She trembled. In the past year she'd had a number of encounters with the great beasts. It could kill her with a blow, yet it fascinated her. Its size, its strength, the play of muscles down its armoured front, the flickering skin colours, now mauve, now purple and black – and something more.

'What are you doing?' she said, not expecting it to know her language.

'My duty,' it said clearly, in a rumble deeper than any human had ever spoken. The sound tickled her eardrums. 'Seek you to stop me, small one, I must end you the same way.' It hefted the bloody club.

No one had described Irisis as small before, but to a lyrinx the largest humans were puny creatures. The other creature called in a higher voice, almost a chirrup. The first brandished the club. Irisis ducked backwards, the door was kicked shut and something slammed against it.

'Whatever they're doing,' said Irisis, 'they're determined to finish it. I'd better have a look at your arm.'

'It's not too bad.' Flangers peeled back the shirt to reveal two raw gouges from wrist to shoulder. 'Painful, though.'

'I'll bet. What about the other wound?'

He looked abashed. 'Oh, it's all right.'

"Then why are you limping? Turn around, let me take a look at it.'

The seat of his trousers had been torn out, and four deep claw marks carved across his right buttock, two extending onto the left. 'That'll need attention…' she began.

'Don't see much point right now.'

'Hoy!' called a soldier's voice.

'Over here,' roared Flangers.

Young Ivar and the other soldiers came running, followed by Fyn-Mah and a dark-skinned man Irisis had never seen before – yes she had. It was Eiryn Muss, Flydd's spy, in another of his disguises. This one was masterly – he seemed to have altered his size and shape as well as his appearance. He was the same height, but lean, stringy, and his eyes were a glossy dark brown.

'What happened?' panted Fyn-Mah.

'We found their flesh-forming cages, at least five rooms of them,' said Irisis. 'All the creatures in the first three rooms were dead or dying. In the fourth we came upon a lyrinx, destroying the remainder. It attacked; nearly killed us too, and then another two appeared. Flangers managed to kill the first lyrinx and we got out the door. They didn't come after us – weren't interested. They're finishing off the rest of the flesh-formed.'

'They don't want us to get a live one' said Fyn-Mah. 'All the more urgent that we do.'

'What are you doing here?' Irisis said to Muss, who reeked of tar smoke.

'Scrutators' business.' He looked frustrated. It was the first time she'd seen him show emotion.

'So are we. We need a hand.'

'In the struggle, some of the cages were broken open,' Irisis said to Fyn-Mah, and a few animals escaped. If we were to attack suddenly, we might overcome the lyrinx and catch one of the little beasts.'

'By the time we break down the door there'll be no taking them by surprise.'

'Especially since they've barricaded it.' said Flangers.

'But…' Fyn-Mah rubbed her fingers together, reflecting for a moment. 'If I were to blast the door off its hinges, using the Art… All right! I'll try it. Stand back.1

'The node is dead,' Irisis reminded her.

'Artefacts that store power will still work, though I'd have preferred not to waste one here. Put your hands over your ears.'

She pressed a bead into her right ear, another into the left. Taking something small and shiny from a buttoned pocket, Fyn-Mah rubbed it between her hands as if to warm it, closed her fingers loosely around it and held her hand high. The upraised arm shook, her face went red, and a blade of raw sound sheared out between her fingers. The air shimmered, marking its passage. The door burst into splinters. Fyn-Mah was tossed the other way, to land on her back.

The sound, even through Irisis's hands, was a nagging, rasping screech. She crouched down, put her head between her knees and pressed her hands over her ears. Beside her, Flangers grunted as if he'd been punched in the stomach.

Beyond the doorway, the cages had been piled against the far wall by the force of the blast. One lyrinx lay on the now empty floor, kicking feebly. A shard of wood the size of a pick handle had gone through its thigh, severing the artery, and it was bleeding to death. The one Irisis had spoken to had come to rest against the far wall, its neck broken.

Several flesh-formed creatures lay on the floor, dead. 'Go through all the cages,' said Fyn-Mah, stooped and shaking with aftersickness. 'If there's any beast left alive, we must have it.

Are you all right?' said Flangers.

'Go on. I'll be with you in a minute.'

They started on the grim task, keeping a careful watch on the wounded lyrinx. It tried to get up, its claws scraping at the soft sandstone underfoot, but was too weak. Finally it slumped on its side, unmoving, its yellow-brown eyes watching them.

It did not take long to search the cages, but they found nothing alive. Fyn-Mah appeared, shaking her head. 'They must have killed them all' She knelt beside the dying creature; not too close. 'Are they all dead, lyrinx?'

'Yesss…' It was just a puff of breath. 'All dead.' Its head thumped against the floor.

'Some escaped their cages,' said Irisis. 'I don't think they could have got out of the room.'

The smoky smell had grown stronger, suggesting that the fire was moving this way. 'Search the room,' ordered Fyn-Mah. 'Quickly. Every minute we spend here lessens our chance of getting out of Snizort.'

'Here's something,' said the young soldier, on his knees beside a cupboard that had fallen on several others, leaving spaces between. 'A trail of blood goes in here.'

They dragged the cupboards out of the way. Underneath lay a flesh-formed creature, as dead as the others. Fyn-Mah stood frowning at it, took a notebook from her pocket and began to write swiftly.

She went around the room, describing and sketching the dead creatures while the search was completed. Looking bitterly disappointed, she disappeared into the adjoining room. The soldiers followed, leaving just Irisis and Flangers.

'Where's Muss?' said Irisis.

'He was right behind you -' Flangers scratched his head in bemusement. 'I wonder what he's up to?'

'It doesn't do to inquire into scrutators' affairs,' said Irisis. 'We'd better go.'

Flangers rubbed his wounded arm, staring at the floor. 'Take a look at this, Crafter.' He squatted down, further splitting his pants, and emitted the faintest of groans.

'What is it?'

His finger traced a bloody squiggle across the floor. This was made by something trying to hide. Give me a hand.'

They pulled the broken cupboards out ot the way, inspecting each carefully, though it was not until the very last that they found anything. It was a furred creature about the size of Flangers's hand, the oddest little thing Irisis had ever seen. The fur was wet, bloody in patches and sticky in others. It scratched at Flangers as he picked it up, though its soft claws did not break the skin.

'It's newborn, he said wonderingly. 'That must have been the mother and, as she lay dying, she gave birth.'

'Better than nothing, I suppose.' Irisis looked for something to keep it in. 'I'll tell Fyn-Mah. Flangers, what are you doing?'

He was crouched beside the dead mother, holding the little one to a teat. 'It'll need feeding, and there's nothing better than mother's milk.'

The man never ceased to surprise her. Leaving him to his domestic duties, she went into the next room. 'Fyn-Mah! we've found one – an infant.'

The perquisitor came running. 'Where?'

'Flangers is feeding it.' Irisis found a small, undamaged cage which she padded with handfuls of straw.

Fyn-Mah was standing over Flangers. 'Come on, soldier!'

'One feed will make a big difference to its chances,' said Flangers.

'The time could make a big difference to our chances. Oh, all right, but only a few minutes. Where's Muss?'

'He just disappeared.'

Fyn-Mah did not look surprised. 'He's got other business to attend to.' With an anxious glance at the door, she hurried back to the adjoining room to resume her search.

Irisis sat the cage next to the dead mother. It made her uncomfortable to see Flangers feeding the creature, but it fascinated her too. What an unusual man he was. 'Did you grow up on a farm?'

No, I lived all my life in Thurkad, until I signed up.'

'Then how did you know…?' I'm just interested in things. Do you know -'

Fyn-Mah came flying through the door, followed by the soldiers. 'Come on!' She hurtled out.

Flangers slipped the little creature into his pocket. Irisis took the cage. 'What's the matter?'

Fyn-Mah was running on tiptoes. 'There are more lyrinx on the way.'

'How do you know?' Irisis panted. 'Where are they?'

'Shut up and run!'

She led the way, followed by Irisis and Flangers, then the soldiers. The young captain looked very uncomfortable to be bringing up the rear. They raced down the corridor, sticky tar rasping underfoot, turned the corner and saw half a dozen lyrinx ahead. Fyn-Mah spun on one slender foot and darted to her right, into a smaller, darker tunnel.

'I'm not sure this is the right way,' said Irisis.

Fyn-Mah glanced at the swinging cage as Irisis pounded beside her. 'Where is it?'

'Flangers has it in his pocket.' He was in the middle of the line of soldiers.

'Flangers! Up with me. Myrum, go back with Irisis.'

Flangers made his way up. Myrum, a stumpy chunk of scarred muscle, moved back. Irisis studied him as he joined her. Long black hair curtained a high, bald dome. The old soldier was missing one ear, most of his teeth and the tip of his nose, yet she had not seen him without a smile.

'What're you so happy about?' she said.

'Being alive,' Myrum said with zest.

'Enjoy it while it lasts.'

I do – every minute.'

'Lead the way, Flangers,' said Fyn-Mah. 'And take good care of the little beast.'

He flashed her a grin, sketching a salute with his left hand, and moved ahead. Fyn-Mah came next and Irisis just behind, with a short gap to Myrum, the other four soldiers and the captain at the rear.

Fyn-Mah s eyes were fixed on Flangers's scored buttocks, which were round, tight and moved beautifully as he ran. Irisis found her own eyes drawn to the sight, and once there, it was hard to look anywhere else. She could not help wondering what it would be like to lie with him- She'd not slept with a soldier before. Her lovers had been men from the manufactory. She wondered if Fyn-Mah was drawn to him. Impossible to tell; the perquisitor never gave anything away.

Fyn-Mah was fleet, considering her small stature. Irisis's long legs could barely keep up with her. The soldiers were also labouring, but they wore chest armour and carried heavy packs. Behind them a sword clanged on something hard. A man cried out, then there was a thud, barely audible over the sound of their pounding feet.

One down, Irisis thought. Probably the captain who'd insisted on his orders in writing – fat lot of good it had done him. Why was this mission so important? Was this little creature what Fyn-Mah had hoped to find, or had she been looking for something else when she went off the other way? It was unlikely Irisis would ever find out. All quisitors, from lowly probers to exalted scrutators, were close-mouthed, but Perquisitor Fyn-Mah made an art form of it. And she had good reason not to trust Irisis.

Irisis caught a whiff of smoke – the throat-gripping reek of burning tar. When the node-drainer was destroyed, the incandescent blast would have liquefied rock.

A scream and there was one less pair of pounding boots behind her. Attacking from the rear, out of the dark, suited the lyrinx perfectly. There was nothing to be done about it. They had no spears to throw, no crossbows to fire, and they dared not stop to make a stand. The tunnel was too narrow. All they could do was run.

The third man fell without a sound, the sudden lack of footsteps all they knew of his passing. 'That's three we've lost,' Irisis gasped. 'Slow down.'

A grunted cry. Four!

Fyn-Mah threw a glance over her shoulder. Her iron control was slipping; Irisis could see the panic in her eyes. 'We can't afford to.'

'We can't afford to lose anyone else,' said Irisis.

Fyn-Mah called out to Flangers, who wore neither pack nor armour and had heen drawing ahead, despite his injury. 'Slow down, soldier.'

The two remaining soldiers closed the gap. Myrum was still grinning, though it was more forced. Young Ivar's eyes were ablaze with terror.

Myrum clapped him on the shoulder. 'Do your duty like a man, lad.'

Ivar nodded as he ran, his head jerking like a puppet. Myrum ushered him ahead, taking the last place in the line.

But he's not a man, thought Irisis. He's just a boy. What kind of monsters are we, that we demand such sacrifices of children? Yet, selfishly, she was glad that the lad was between her and the enemy. Those few extra moments of life were precious.

I'm sorry, Ivar. Myrum is going to be next, and then you. The old fellow will put up one hell of a struggle, maybe even kill one of the enemy, if he's lucky, but the next will get him. That's all his life was for. And then, just you, Ivar. You won't last a minute. Who'll mourn your insignificant life and brutal death? We won't, because we'll be following you. Everything we've done will have been for nothing.

'Where are you going?' panted Irisis. Fyn-Mah had called directions to Flangers whenever they came to a junction, but apart from that she'd said nothing at all.

'I left a finder in the air-floater. I'm tracking it back as best I can.'

Irisis had never heard of a finder. How could it show Fyn-Mah the way back through this labyrinth?

'Fyn-Mah!' she hissed. 'Why don't you blast them with another of those crystals?'

The perquisitor turned as she ran and Irisis saw torment in her eyes. 'I can't.'

'You don't have any more crystals?'

A long pause. I have one,' she said softly. 'I'm saving it for an emergency.

'And this isn't?' Irisis said in a low voice. You could have saved those soldiers and you chose not to? You callous bitch!'

The whole left side of Fyn-Mah's race quivered. 'I have my orders, Crafter. If I use it now I won't have it later, and believe me, before we get out of here we're going to need it.'

Irisis lowered her voice. 'So the soldiers are expendable?'

'I don't like it, but yes, they are.'

'And me? Is that what I'm here for too?'

'You know it isn't. But, since you've asked, I'll sacrifice you, too, if I have to. What are any of our lives, before the fate of humanity?'

Nine They ran until they could run no further, when Irisis realised that only Myrum was behind her. Ivar had fallen back and been killed without their even knowing it. Irisis brushed a tear from one eye. He had been just a boy doing his duty.

Myrum was scarlet in the face and labouring under his pack. 'I'd chuck that away, if I were you,' said Irisis.

'I can manage it,' he gasped. 'It's needed. We seem to have lost them.'

Iris doubted that. 'We must have run leagues, Fyn-Mah. Are you sure you're going the right way?'

The perquisitor avoided her eye, staring down the three passages ahead.

'In a straight line,' Irisis went on, 'we'd have gone right across Snizort and out the other side by now.'

Fyn-Mah checked the small object in her hand. 'We go right.'

'You're not leading us out at all!' Irisis said furiously. 'You're taking us further in.'

The perquisitor moved into the right-hand tunnel. 'We had to take the long way round,' she said unconvincingly. 'There's fire in a central core of tunnels surrounding the Great Seep.'

Irisis followed, keeping a careful watch over her shoulder. As she passed what seemed no more than a dark niche in the wall, something slipped out beside them. With a yelp she leapt out of the way, for it looked like a little wingless lyrinx. She had her sword out when it said, in Eiryn Muss's voice, 'This way!'

The disguise was a brilliant one – it might even have fooled a lyrinx, from a distance. Muss was truly a master. How did he create such wonders from the small pack on his back?

'I've found it; he said to Fyn-.Mah. 'The tunnel collapsed and they must've thought it was buried too deep to recover.' He still had that frustrated look 'What's still here?' said Irisis. What were they up to now?

Muss did not answer, but led them past a T-junction down a tunnel littered with fallen rock. The floor drops sharply, just ahead.'

Several slabs of the tunnel had slid downwards, like slices off the end of a hollow loaf. Irisis made it down the half-span onto the first step, and a similar distance to the second, but the third slab had fallen so far that only a crescent-shaped hole, the size of a section through the side of a beer barrel, connected it to the space they stood in. There were smash marks on its upper lip, presumably where the lyrinx had tried to break in.

Irisis hesitated. It would be a tight squeeze. 'If we're halfway through and it slips again, it'll cut us in half.'

'I've been down there,' said Muss. 'It's as safe as anywhere in Snizort.'

'That's comforting!'

Flangers squeezed through head-first, grunting with the effort, his feet waving in the air. Abruptly he cried out and his legs whipped through. Fyn-Mah pulled back, snatching out her knife. Irisis drew her sword – not that it would be much use in such a confined space.

'You damn fool, Muss!' cried an enraged Flangers, following that with a stream of oaths Irisis had never heard before. 'Why didn't you tell me the drop was a span and a half? I nearly broke my neck.'

'I got down it without any trouble,' Muss said indifferently.

'Must be a bloody lizard! Pass me the lantern, Fyn-Mah, and come through carefully. I'll catch you.'

Being small, Fyn-Mah wriggled through without difficulty. Irisis followed. It was a tight fit for her and she felt sure she was going to fell on her head, but Flangers's upstretched hands caught hers and she slid into his arms.

He bore her weight without strain and set her on her feet. Taking up the lantern, he led the way down a series of tunnel slices like thigh-high steps.

'Aren't you going to give Muss a hand?' she said in his ear.

'He can bounce down on his pointy head for all I care.'

'You don't like our prober?'

'There's something a bit off about him; Flangers said out of the corner of his mouth.

Irisis looked back but the spy was already standing at the base of the drop, as if he'd floated down. He brushed past, taking the lantern.

'He's a.strange one,' she said quietly. 'His work is always flawless, but he hasn't a friend in the world, unless you count Flydd. He eats alone, even sleeps alone, if he sleeps at all.'

'Maybe being the perfect spy is all he needs,' said Flangers. 'It's a solitary profession.'

'It's just here!' called Muss. 'Get a move on.'

They crowded into a small, circular chamber whose roof was a perfect dome of sandstone. A squat object like an inverted sombrero stood knee-high on a pedestal in the centre of the room. It had a short brown stalk on which was mounted a yellow frilled brim. It was not alive – it had been created by the lyrinx in one of their patterners.

Fyn-Mah skidded to a stop. 'Myrum, defend the entrance. Muss, check that there's no other way in. Flangers, see if you can get that.'

'There isn't any other way in,' said Muss.

'What is it?' said Flangers.

'It's called a phynadr,' said Fyn-Mah. 'The enemy make them in all shapes and sizes, to draw power from the field. We're taking it back so we can see how it works.'

'The lyrinx tried to break in for it,' said Flangers, 'so it's likely they'll be waiting when we crawl out.'

'Then it it'll be time for you to do your duty, soldier/ said the perquisitor.

Flangers took hold of the object, which slipped through his fingers. 'Can't get a grip on it,' he muttered.

Irisis touched it with her fingers. The phynadr was superficially similar to the torgnadr, or node-drainer, she'd helped Flydd to destroy, though it had been leathery. This phynadr was soft, compressing under her touch but springing back into shape when she let it go.

Flangers put his arms around it and heaved, but his arms slid off. To their right, Fyn-Mah was sketching shapes in the air. Whatever magic it was, Irisis prayed that it would work quickly. She threw a glance over her shoulder.

Flangers whipped out his sword. 'Don't damage it,' yelled Fyn-Mah.

He slid the point of his sword under the flat base of the phynadr. The edges, tinged purple, seemed to recoil from the metal, revealing a white underside. Flangers pushed the sword all the way, levered, and the phynadr popped off, emitting a musky, molasses-sweet odour.

Irisis caught it as it toppled. It was rather heavier than it looked. The phynadr bent in the middle and the base pulled itself down hard, trying to reattach to the pedestal, but Flangers kept the blade underneath. Yellow jelly oozed from beneath the cap. Fyn-Mah pushed Irisis out of the way, drew a black bag over the phynadr and swiftly tied the top. Throwing it over her shoulder, she staggered under the weight, recovered and hurried back to the collapsed section.

'I'll go first,' she said at the vertical wall.

Flangers boosted her up. 'Keep a sharp lookout.'

'Don't worry.' She crawled through. 'It's safe.'

'It would be,' said Irisis. "They want the phynadr more than us, so they'll be waiting around the corner.'

Flangers boosted Myrum, then Irisis. Muss gave Flangers a leg-up. 'Need a hand?' Flangers said.

'I'll be right; said Muss.

'Come on!' Fyn-Mah called. 'It's not far now.'

A lyrinx roared near the T-junction. Myrum shouted a battle cry and ran for it. His sword clacked against a skin plate, something whistled through the air, then he was back-pedalling, attempting to defend himself against two lyrinx at once.

He cursed, slipping to one knee. Irisis was sure he was done for, but the old soldier sprang forward, fast and low, his sword sliding neatly between the belly plates of the leading lyrinx. It sagged to the left, crashing into the other beast, and they went down in a tangle of arms and legs. The soldier dispatched the second with a sword tip to the jugular.

'We go right,' said Fyn-Mah, leading the way with the bag slung over her shoulder.

'That was a neat piece of sword work.' Irisis said to Myrum.

'Just luck,' replied Myrum. 'I was sure I was dead.'

'Dare say you will be before we get out of here.'

'Dare say we both will.'

The tunnel now headed steeply down. It was dark, but the way ahead was illuminated by a reddish glow coming from Fyn-Mah's fist. The other crystal, presumably.

It was hard work running down the steep slope. Halfway to the bottom they passed from stone into solid tar. It was so sticky underfoot that with every step they were in danger of toppling. Myrum looked exhausted, Fyn-Mah was staggering under the weight of the bag, and Flangers winced with every step. The scabbed gouges across his buttocks were bleeding. Muss had disappeared again.

'Should we wait for the prober?' asked Irisis.

'He can take care of himself,' said Fyn-Mah, moving the bag onto her other shoulder.

'Do you want me to carry that?' Irisis offered.

Fyn-Mah shook her head.

They were still heading down steeply and the air was smoky. 'How far now?' said Irisis, worrying that Flangers would break down. She felt sure Fyn-Mah would leave him behind.

Fyn-Mah did not answer, which was worrying. They swung around a corkscrewing left-hand bend together and the floor, roof and walls disappeared. Irisis threw herself to the floor on the very brink of a chasm. Flangers landed on top of her. FynMah held up her light. The details slowly emerged from featureless black.

A crevasse cut across their path. The solid tar, or rather brittle pitch as it was here, had recently been torn apart by some great force, leaving a gap of about eight spans to the other side of the tunnel. The tar wall was a sheer face of pitch, as smooth and curved as fractured glass, apart from shards that hung down, or stuck up, here and there. The bottom could not be distinguished, though it must have been a long way below them. The crevasse extended beyond sight to left and right.

The gap had been rudely bridged by an upside-down arch of pitch, a solid, smooth black curve half a span thick but no wider than Irisis's hips. Lyrinx footprints tracked across it.

'What the hell has happened here?' said Flangers, picking himself up and rubbing his backside. His fingertips came up bloody.

'The exploding node must've wrenched the ground apart,' said Fyn-Mah.

'Or the Great Seep has drawn back into the earth,' Irisis muttered, 'cracking away the solid pitch around its edges. This bridge hasn't been here long.'

'And we could run into more lyrinx at any time.' Fyn-Mah edged out onto the span, holding up her glowing crystal.

Even as she spoke, a shadow appeared from the opening on the other side. An enormous male lyrinx spread its wings and opened its bucket-sized mouth in a grin of triumph.

Behind them, Myrurn's sword scraped as he drew it from the scabbard. Irisis looked over her shoulder. A lyrinx, no, two, were coming the other way. They were trapped.

'Let me go first,' said Flangers, drawing his sword. 'That's what I'm here for.'

'Stay back!' Fyn-Mah had one hand in her pocket. She gave Irisis a sideways glance, as if to say, Do you now question my judgment? 'When I give the word, cover your eyes.' She crept a little further along the bridge, which curved down then up, like a suspended rope.

The lyrinx stood at the other end, its eyes glittering in the light from the perquisitor's crystal. It had something in its left hand. Irisis could not see what, but her heart began to thump. This was no ordinary lyrinx. She could sense the power; the intensity. Many lyrinx had a talent for the Secret Art, though few used it for anything but flying. This creature was different. She sensed that it was a mancer every bit as powerful as the great human or Aachim mages, and the device in its hand felt potent.

Myrum sang out, 'Might need a bit of help, Crafter.'

She whirled. A pair of lyrinx were advancing from the tunnel, side by side. Drawing her sword, she stood shoulder to shoulder with Myrum. From the corner of her eye she could see Fyn-Mah on the bridge, only waist high to the mancer-lyrinx.

It let out a deep, roaring bellow that echoed strangely off the hard walls. The left hand slid out, palm upwards. Irisis felt a hot glow on her cheek, had the sense of an invisible cloud roiling outwards, and the floor softened under her. She instinctively lifted one foot, but when she put it down again, the surface had already hardened. The other foot did not move. She was stuck, like a fly to tar paper.

She jerked as hard as she could. It jarred the muscles of her leg but her boot remained firmly embedded in pitch. The two lyrinx were also stuck, though they probably had the strength to pull free.

Myrum cursed and began to hack at the pitch with his sword. She did the same, trying to watch the bridge and the enemy at the same time. Flangers, being closer to the source, was more deeply embedded, while Fyn-Mah was buried to the ankles. Lacking a sword, she had no way of freeing herself.

Flangers hacked the laces off his boots and pulled his feet out. Tearing off his socks, he ran out onto the bridge.

'Go back,' cried Fyn-Mah. 'You can't save me.'

'Then I'll die trying.' He hammered the brittle pitch around her boots with the point of his sword, sending chips flying everywhere.

'Take this and go! It's more important than I am.' She heaved the heavy bag to him.

He lashed it to his belt but kept hacking, the bag banging against his calves as he worked. There's nowhere to go, Perquisitor.'

'Take it!' she roared. 'It's an order, soldier.'

It was too late. The mancer-lyrinx was edging towards them, moving tentatively as if unsure whether the bridge would hold its weight. This small chasm was a dangerous place in which to fly, if it had to.

'Now would be a really good time to use whatever you were keeping for an emergency,' yelled Irisis, still prising at the pitch that held her boot fast.

Fyn-Mah just stood there, one hand holding up the glowing crystal.

Why didn't the mancer-lyrinx blast them? Irisis prised away. Her boot came free, along with a lump of pitch resembling a club foot. She smashed it off. Did the creature want to take them alive? That didn't make sense, since the other lyrinx had tried so hard to kill them. It had to be the phynadr.

The lyrinx edged closer, the bridge shivering under its weight. The beast gestured towards the bag. Irisis could see the knots in Fyn-Mah's jawline. She was terrified but defiant, and Irisis could not but admire her for it.

Behind Irisis there came a roar as one of the lyrinx freed itself and leapt, its foot trailing blood. Myrum, who was still stuck, slashed wildly at it. The lyrinx landed hard on the torn foot, lurched sideways but recovered to beat through Myrum's defences. Throwing its arms around him, it squeezed him against its chest plates. Ribs cracked as Myrum fell backwards, carrying it with him. The great mouth darted at the soldier's head. It reminded Irisis of the time she had been held beneath one of the lyrinx, and only Flydd's heroism had saved her.

She swung her sword against the back of the creature's armoured skull with every ounce of her strength. The armour cracked and the lyrinx's head was driven into the floor. It did not move, though the blow could only have stunned it.

Finding a gap between the skin plates of its side, she drove her sword through the ribs.

It took all her strength, and all of Myrum's, to get him out from under the fallen creature. He was so battered and bruised he could not stand up. The second lyrinx was still nving to free its feet from the pitch. She hacked Myrum's boots out.

On the bridge, the mancer-lyrinx was almost within reach of Fyn-Mah. The bridge shuddered. The creature reached out for her. Her eyes fixed on it. Fyn-Mah tossed the crystal towards the roof of the chasm and yelled, 'Cover your eyes!'

Irisis, watching the crystal arc up into the darkness, screwed her eyes shut. The explosion of light burned her eyelids and sent blood-red pulses through her brain. She opened her eyes, dazed and dazzled, to see the mancer-lyrinx topple head-first off the bridge. Its wings spread as it hurtled downwards, but they were insufficient to support it without the aid of the Art, and the exploding crystal had filled the ethyr with echoes, preventing it from drawing on a distant field. Only devices that stored power, like Fyn-Mah's crystals, could work here, and once that power had been used they were useless.

The bridge softened and began to droop beneath Fyn-Mah's feet. She pulled one foot from its boot and heaved at the other. Flangers scrambled down the curve to her.

'Go back,' she screamed. 'Save the phynadr.'

Fyn-Mah was going to do her duty to the bitter end. You're a better woman than I'll ever be, Irisis thought.

The curve of the bridge steepened and thinned like molasses sagging between two spoons. Soon it must break, plunging Fyn-Mah into the abyss. Flangers kept moving towards her as the stretching strand of pitch pulled her away but, as he grasped her outstretched hand, the bridge snapped. Fyn-Mah fell, pulling Flangers with her. He threw his other arm around the pitch. They swung on the end of the still lengthening ribbon, then disappeared into the darkness. Irisis heard a thud as they struck the side of the chasm, a muffled cry, then nothing. Darkness, utter and complete, swallowed the world.

'Don't suppose you've got a flint striker in your pocket.' Myrum's voice came from not far away.

She felt it out and snapped it a couple of times so he could see the sparks. 'Here. What's happened to the other lyrinx.'

'Was still stuck, last I saw.' He in a lantern. The creature lay on the floor, one foot at a strange angle as if it had broken its ankle. Its hands were pressed against its eye-sockets, its face covered in red-stained tears. 'Burned its eyes, I'd reckon. They don't like bright light.' He put his sword to the defenceless creature's throat.

Irisis turned away. It had to be done but she did not have to see it. 'Bring the lantern when you're finished. We'll have to recover the phynadr, and the little beast if we can, though I don't see how we're going to get out again.'

'I can smell fresh air,' said Myrum shortly. 'It must be coming from the other side.'

'No use if we can't get to it. Got any rope in that pack of yours?'

'As it happens, I have.' He produced a hank of thick cord, knotted one end around his burly torso, and the other around hers. 'Nice chest you've got here, Irisis.'

'This is as close as you 're ever getting to it,' she said with a cheerful grin.

He was philosophical. 'Ah well. I still have my dreams.'

'I hope you live to have many more.'

'What if you go down on the rope, and I hold you?'

'I'm heavier than I look.'

He eyed her up and down. 'Even so.'

All right, but keep your thoughts on the rope.'

His gummy smile widened. 'Don't know as how you can dictate terms when I'm holding you up.'

Myrum lowered her over the edge, which turned out to be an overhang. Irisis held the lantern out in her right hand, though its smoky yellow glow barely penetrated the blackness. Heat wafted up past her and, as she swung back and forth, she caught a glimpse of something glowing in a crack, a long way down. It looked like lava, but wasn't. The tar was on fire and it would burn wickedly if she ended up anywhere near it.

Recalling that thud, she directed the lantern light along the nearer side of the crevasse. Here the wall consisted of a series of sheer miniature cliffs, broken by narrow platforms topped with jagged spires of pitch, some as sharp as broken glass. Irisis cringed at the thought of crashing into them.

It was hard to see, for the black surfaces reflected only an occasional glitter. Unable to get close enough to the wall because of the overhang, she began to swing back and forth on the rope.

'You all right?' called Myrum.

'Yes. Can't see much, though. Lower me down a few spans. Oh, and Myrum?'

'Yes?'

'Keep a sharp lookout behind you.'

He snorted. 'You've got the bloody lantern!'

'There should be another one.'

Her swing was now long enough to reach one of the spikes. She caught hold of it low down, where it was not so sharp, and pulled herself into a space between a cluster of spires.

'I'm standing!' she called, so he would not worry about the weight going off the rope. 'Let out a bit more.'

'Good-oh!'

Irisis edged as far as she could to her left, until she was brought up by a sheer drop that went all the way down to the fiery crack. If Fyn-Mah and Flangers had fallen that far, they were lost. She crept the other way, between spines, shards and spears of frozen pitch. Ahead, the surface formed an irregular series of steps, some almost as tall as she was. Holding out the lantern, she peered down.

Nothing that way either. She looked over the outer edge. A ribbon of solidified pitch was looped around one of the spires further down. It had to be from the bridge but she could not see anyone. Below her the crevasse wall curved out into another spike-studded mound, this one about fifteen paces by ten. Its edges fell away on three sides while the fourth was the sheer, unclimbable wall Irisis leaned out, the lantern tilted, and a few drops of hot oil spilled. From below she heard a faint groan.

'Fyn-Mah? Flang-'

No answer. 'I've found something,' she called up to Myrum. 'Lower me down a few spans, carefully.'

'Not much rope left,' he yelled.

'Give me all you have.'

She went down, swinging back and forth, pushing herself away from the razor shards with her feet. Several spikes broke off. How secure was any of this? The least shock might crumble the lot and send it into the abyss.

There was no rope left when her boots grounded on a shelf at the edge of the spiky mound and, in the light of the lantern, she saw Fyn-Mah wedged between two spires with her head at a strange angle. It looked as if she'd broken her neck.

'Fyn-Mah?' Irisis touched the perquisitor on the cheek.

The small woman's eyes opened, moving all the way up the crafter's elongated form to the rope around her chest. She moved her head back to the vertical. 'Didn't expect to see you,' she said in a faint, slurred voice.

'I came for the phynadr,' said Irisis coolly. 'To do my duty, of course.'

"Course,' Fyn-Mah echoed. 'Help me up. Stuck.' She tried to lift an arm but it flopped down.

'I thought your neck was broken.' Irisis held the lantern close. One pupil was larger than the other, which meant she had concussion.

'You'd be happy then.'

'I don't hate you -' Irisis began.

"Nother time, Crafter!' The last word trailed out and Fyn-Mah looked confused. 'Head hurts.'

Putting down the lantern, Irisis lifted the perquisitor to her feet. Her legs buckled. 'Where's Flangers?' said Irisis, holding her with one arm.

'Who?"

Irisis untied the rope, steadied the perquisitor and began knotting it around her chest.

'What – doing?' said Fyn-Mah, her voice slow and slurring more than before.

'Getting you out.'

Irisis checked the knots, then shouted up, 'Myrum! Fyn-Mah's alive. You're pulling her up now. Ready?'

'Ready.' The rope tightened and Fyn-Mah rose in the air, flopping like a rag doll. Her head went back to that unpleasant angle.

Irisis turned away, weaving through the razor-edged blades and spires. Shards crunched underfoot. 'Flangers?'

He lay at the rear of the mound, among a pile of shattered spikes, unconscious. There was a lump on the back of his head where he'd hit the floor, but that wasn't the worst injury. A long blade of pitch had gone through the outer side of his right thigh, sliding beside the bone almost all the way through before it broke off. There was a lot of blood, but not as much as if an artery had been severed. Flangers would live, though the wound was so wide and deep Irisis could have put three fingers into it. It would be a miracle if it did not become infected.

An even bigger miracle if she could get him across to the edge of the mound to the rope. Even if she could, she would have to stand him up while she tied the rope on. It wasn't long enough to reach to the floor.

She shook Flangers, gently, but he did not rouse. He must have taken a heavy blow. His breathing was steady, though, and his pupils not dilated, so he should recover. More importantly, the bag containing the phynadr was still tied to his belt. She felt it. It did not seem to be damaged. What about the little flesh-formed creature?

She went through his pockets, one by one. The creature was dead – he must have landed on it. She tossed it aside. They'd risked their lives, and five soldiers had lost theirs, for nothing.

Irisis lifted Flangers to a sitting position, regretting that she'd sent Fyn-Mah up first. Flangers was heavier than he appeared. It would be hard to get him as far as the rope.

Slapping him gently on the cheek, she called out, 'Flangers?'

He made no sound. She slapped a little harder and again he gave a muffled moan, deep in his throat. She eyed the wound. Perhaps if she hurt him.., Irisis cut off the ragged trouser leg and tore it into strips, which she laid beside him. She wiggled the shard in the wound. He groaned. It was tapered and should come out easily. Taking hold of it, she pulled firmly and it slipped free. The wound began to bleed profusely. She put two fingers in, feeling around for broken pieces, and drew a sliver of pitch out. There did not seem to be any other large fragments.

Flangers groaned and opened his eyes. 'Bloody hell're yer doin'?' he slurred. 'Get yer hand outta me leg.' A comical expression crossed his face, as if he had just realised what a stupid thing he'd said, and his eyes closed.

There came a faint, fluttering sound from out in the abyss. Irisis held up the lantern, but saw nothing. It must have been the rope scraping across the cliff face.

Lacking anything to sew him up with, she bound Flangers's leg with strips of cloth until the wound closed and the blood flow dropped to a trickle. Irisis tied another pad across the top.

'Flangers!' she said urgently. 'You've got to stand up.'

He didn't open his eyes. 'Can't.'

'It's your soldier's duty, Flangers.'

The soldier wept with pain as he struggled to get to his feet. Irisis crouched and gave him her shoulder, heaving him up with one arm around his muscled waist. They staggered between the spikes to the edge, swaying while she waved the lantern around, looking for the rope. It wasn't there.

'Myrum?' Her voice echoed shrilly.

There was a long pause before he answered. 'Yes?'

'I've got Flangers. He's badly injured. Where's the bloody rope?'

'It's coming. I've.., had a few problems up here.'

Again that fluttering sound, a whispering echo back and forth in the crevasse. Sympathetic shudders fluttered down her spine.

1Hurry it up. I've got a nasty feeling about this place.'

The end appeared, wriggling like a brown snake in the lamplight. Setting down the lantern, Irisis pulled the rope as far as it would go and looped it around the soldier's chest. Flangers was just clinging to consciousness. His fingers dug into her shoulders and his knees flexed as he swayed, but the rest of him had shut down.

It was hard work tying a secure knot with his weight on her, but she managed it at last. "It's done. Pull him up!'

The rope went taut. 'He's a heavy sod!' Myrum's voice echoed down.

Get Fyn-Mah to help you.'

'She's passed out.'

The fluttering sounded again, closer, followed by a scraping sound like a fingernail on rock. Or a claw.

'Hurry up,' she shouted, unable to keep the fear out of her voice. 'That lyrinx is still alive.'

Flangers jerked up, stopped, jerked again. Blood running down his leg began to drip off the toe of his boot. She watched him pass through the circle of light, then directed the lantern around and below her, trying to pick the creature out. Maybe it wasn't the lyrinx. Worse creatures dwelt in the abysses of the world, creeping about their unknown and unpleasant business. All sorts of beasts had made their way to Santhenar when the Way between the Worlds was open, and at other times in the mythical past. Not all of them wanted to wage war, as the lyrinx did. But if they were disturbed, if they felt threatened…

Ten

'Stop it!' Irisis said aloud. 'Don't make things worse than they need to be. It's just the lyrinx.'

Just the lyrinx! There was no such thing as just a lyrinx, even if it was injured and unable to use the Secret An. She scanned the gulf again, but finding a dark-skinned creature against the blackness was impossible. Her lantern began to flutter, making threatening shadows. She sloshed it back and forth: not much oil left.

Another scrape, much closer, followed by a deep rumbling purr. She still couldn't judge the direction, but it wasn't far away.

'Where are you?' she screamed. 'Show yourself!'

The echoes had a strident tone that frightened her. She was losing it. Stay calm – you've been in dangerous situations before and got out of them. You can do it again. It didn't help. Irisis was at her best when she could react swiftly to danger; she didn't like waiting. It allowed her to dwell on her inadequacies.

Well, do something. Take the initiative. Don't just stand there moaning.

Drawing her sword, Irisis swished it back and forth. It made a comforting sound as it sliced through the air. Pity she'd had so little training with it. If only she had a crossbow. Irisis had done most of her manufactory training with that weapon and was a fine shot, though of course she had to see her target. The lyrinx was not so handicapped. It could smell her well enough to strike in the dark.