Sixteen

The black air-floaters rose swiftly from the mound next to the command area and sped towards them. Irisis watched them come, overpowered by those recurring feelings of doom.

Fyn-Mah was supporting herself on the door jamb, swaying with every bump and lurch. The perquisitor was uncompromisingly honest, yet if she obeyed the scrutators she must repudiate Flydd, her superior, whose orders she was following. But Flydd had failed and been condemned, so where did her duty lie? Neither the agony nor her injuries showed on her pallid face. Fyn-Mah was a native of Tiksi, and Tiksi folk kept their feelings to themselves, but by the set of her jaw and the quiver of her normally rod-like back, she was having a hard time of it.

So was Irisis. Flydd was now a condemned man, Slave Flydd, and all his plans were undone. Undoubtedly he was a wily old hound, but the scrutators were equally cunning. There was no possibility of rescuing him. Her face and figure were instantly recognisable, and she too faced a death sentence if Ghorr ever caught her.

Fyn-Mah thrust away from the door and stalked rearward. She'd made her decision. 'Faster!' she said hoarsely, seizing the crossbow from Flangers and brandishing it in Pilot Inouye's face.

'It won't go any faster,' the little woman wept. 'I'm doing all I can.'

'Then we'll be taken.' Fyn-Mah twanged the rope rail, gnawing at her lower lip. 'Flangers, how good are you with a javelard?'

Among the best,' he said uneasily, seeing what was coming He was slumped on the deck, hanging on desperately to the ropes, and the bandage around his thigh was completely red. Flangers should have collapsed long ago, but duty drove him on.

'There's a light one at the bow. See what you can do with it.'

'You're asking me to fire on my own?' he whispered.

'If they catch us, the scrutators will put us to a pointless death.'

'That's no excuse.' He was as honest in his way as she was in hers. 'I've always followed orders.'

'Then obey mine. If the war is left to the scrutators,' gritted Fyn-Mah, 'humanity will be defeated before the year is out.'

'They're my lawful superiors,' said Flangers. 'The war will be lost a lot quicker if we defy our officers as we see fit.'

She drew herself up, saying stiffly, 'As I understand it, I am your superior officer here. I represent Scrutator Flydd, who has ordered me to save myself, and what I carry, no matter who should try to stop me! Taking a paper from her pocket, she handed it to him. 'Does this satisfy you?'

Flangers bowed his head. 'It satisfies the soldier but not the man.'

She seemed to take pity on him. 'No need to kill them,' Fyn-Mah said softly. 'Disabling the air-floaters will do as well. Aim for their rotors.'

Irisis helped Flangers to the bow and together they lifted the javelard out of its bracket. It was lightly built, like a large crossbow. They carried it to a bracket on the port side, halfway down. Flangers picked a wasps' nest out of the bracket and locked the javelard in. Irisis brought down an armload of stubby spears. He wound back the cranks and fitted a spear. His face was as grey as boiled mutton and he could not stand without clinging to the javelard.

'Can you hit the rotor from here?' said Irisis. 'It's an awfully long way.'

He wound the crank another notch, and another, sighting at the leading air-floater, whose large rotor was partly visible behind its cabin. 'I'd say we're just out of range, though it's hard to estimate in the air.’

The leading air-floater was furiously signalling them to go down. Flangers's eyes pleaded with Fyn-Mah They're giving us a direct order. Perquisitor.’

She set her lips. 'Fire.’

Flangers wound the elevation crank, sighted on the first of the pursuing air-floaters, wound again. His hands were shaking. He wiped sweat from his brow and pulled the lever. Click-thunngg.

After a good few seconds the spear fell past the front of the leading air-floater.

Flangers seemed pleased, and Irisis could not blame him. 'Out of range,' he said. 'Only luck could hit the rotor from here.'

'Try again,' urged Fyn-Mah. 'Their shooters are getting ready, and they'll be experts. Inouye, slow up momentarily. As soon as Flangers fires, go full speed.'

The air-floater slowed, allowing their pursuers to gain fractionally. Irisis held Flangers up. He gave the elevation crank another quarter-turn and fired.

'Where did that go?' said Irisis to herself.

'I think that's Scrutator Klarm in command; muttered Fyn-Mah, staring at the first machine through a spyglass. 'He's an honourable man, as scrutators go —’ She bit off the heretical thought.

The spear, falling at a steep angle, plunged through the top of the balloon into the roof of the cabin. The impact must have created a spark for the floater gas exploded, sending fire in all directions. The air-floater turned upside down, spilling bodies into the air, and fell, trailing flame. The balloon of the machine beside it collapsed from the Shockwave. The third machine veered away sharply, fired its javelard then raced back towards the command area.

Flangers cried out in horror. Irisis clung to the rail, her stomach churning. The fire had gone out and what was left of the first air-floater was spinning round and round, the rags of the airbag streaming out behind to break its fall. The second machine fell past, slamming into the ground hard enough to break bones. The first also struck and was dragged by the wind into a patch of trees.

Fyn-Mah's face had gone the colour of mud. Her lips were white, and she had trouble speaking. 'I've just killed a scrutator and broken my sacred oath.'

And condemned everyone on this air-floater. Irisis turned away. 'What do your orders say now, Perquisitor?'

Fyn-Mah turned to her. 'We run south with all possible speed and don't stop until we reach the uttermost pole. Or even then.' She covered her face and staggered into the cabin. Irisis heard retching.

Flangers lay sprawled on the canvas deck, arms up over his face. Stepping around him, Irisis went to the stern, where Inouye clung to the steering arm like a drowning sailor to an oar.

'Where are we going?' Irisis said, trying to be calm in the face of disaster.

Inouye was plucking at the hedron of her controller. 'The scrutators will expunge my family from the earth for this, even my little baby. I've brought doom on everyone I love.' Her voice broke and she hurled herself at the rail.

Irisis caught Inouye as she went over, dragged her back and carried the small woman to the cabin. Inouye began to wail and thrash about. Laying her in a hammock beside the silent Fyn-Mah, Irisis went out and bolted the door from the outside.

The air-floater was curving around in a circle. She wrenched it back on course, lashing the steering arm so the machine would continue due south. By the time she'd finished, the rotor had stopped. The air-floater would no more move without its pilot than a clanker could go with a dead operator.

Irisis could not use Inouye's controller, which was tailored just to her, without completely rebuilding it. She replaced it with her artisan's pliance, made from carnelian, layers of glass and silver filigree. Her pliance enabled her to see the field and tune a controller to it, and also to draw power. Nowhere near as much as a controller, of course, but air-floaters did not require much. Setting the pliance to channel power into the mechanism that drome the rotor, she left it to run by itself.

The four dark-faced soldiers stood together at the bow rail. They moved well out of her way as she approached, giving each other significant glances. Their muttered talk had broken off as she approached. They were afraid of her mysterious talent, and bitter that they'd been forced to become renegades.

None were from these parts, nor did Flangers know the country. That left only one person and Irisis had been avoiding him. She did not know how to deal with Eiryn Muss, a man who had reinvented himself so completely that there was no trace of his former self. He made her uncomfortable because she had no idea who he was or what he was thinking. He seemed impervious to everything in life, except the cloak he put on himself to become a different man each time he went out spying.

She found him around the other side, sitting on the canvas deck in the shade, studying a journal roll smaller than his little finger.

'Excuse me,' she said.

He looked up. 'You're wondering what to do and where to go.’

Irisis could not look at him without superimposing the fat, bald, leering halfwit from the manufactory, yet nothing about him, not even his voice, was the same. He did not fit. She preferred him as the halfwit.

'I'm lost,' she said. I have no idea what to do.' She wanted to throw up her intestines.

'Find a safe hiding place, then I'll try to contact the scrutator.’

'How?'

'That's what I do best,' he said simply, and his confidence calmed the roiling of her insides. 'Keep going south until we're out of sight of the battlefield. No, continue until after dark, then I'll give further instructions, if Fyn-Mah isn't capable.'

'She was told to leave Flydd a message,' Irisis recalled. Swinging around in a great circle, she drove the air-floater towards the hills north of the exploded node. 'In case he escapes.' Unlikely as that seemed.

That night they hid in a cluster of ovoid hills, like a nest full of eggs standing on end, in the forest south of Gospett. It was the best hiding place Muss could find close by. Without further word, he went into the cabin to change his clothes and appearance. Emerging scant minutes later as a bent old man, he walked into the trees.

Three days passed and nothing was heard from him. They spent the time on full alert. Though the air-floater was hidden at the bottom of a steep-sided valley between three of the egg-shaped hills, and concealed from all but a lyrinx or air-floater going directly overhead, they could never relax.

The air-floater was so cramped that privacy was impossible, but no one dared go far from it, in case of an emergency. The soldiers kept to the port side, muttering among themselves and giving everyone black looks. Fyn-Mah hardly spoke from one day to the next. She'd risked everything on her loyalty to Xervish Flydd. If he failed her, or if he was dead, she'd have betrayed her oath and her cause for nothing.

The little pilot had gone into a decline. Long periods of silence were followed by frenzied weeping and wailing for her family. Her only solace was her bond with the controller. She slept with it in her arms, rocking and humming to it as if it were a little baby. Without it, Inouye would have turned her face to the wall and withered away. Fyn-Mah, normally considerate of her inferiors, was incapable of comforting her.

Flangers also kept to himself, insofar as that was possible, fending Irisis off whenever she approached. However, on the third afternoon, as she was taking refuge from the heat by wading barefoot up a tiny rivulet, she came upon him sitting next to the water, head in hands. He must have heard her splashing but did not look up. There was a fresh bandage on his thigh and she was pleased to see that no blood showed through it. Flangers's sword and scabbard lay on a mossy ledge behind him, though she though nothing of that. A good soldier always kept tns weapons nearby.

She put a hand on his shoulder This bloody, bloody war.'

Flangers did not look up. I'm just a simple soldier, used to obeying orders. But when the orders contradict each other, what's a man to do?'

'Follow your conscience.'

'It's pulled in two directions, Irisis. The scrutator is a good man and I'd have followed him anywhere. But Flydd has fallen, so how can his orders be legitimate? Or Fyn-Mah's, since her superiors have contradicted them? I have followed her orders, but at the expense of my oath, my duty, my honour. I'm forsworn, Irisis, a traitor in my own eyes. I killed the people in Scrutator Klarm's air-floater, betrayed those I'd sworn to protect. How can I live with that?'

'We must keep faith with our master/ said Irisis, 'and trust to Flydd's purpose, no matter how hard the road.'

'You don't understand,' he said quietly. 'You haven't been forced to choose. A soldier's oath is paramount. For six years I've laid down my life to defend those weaker than me. I did my duty and was decorated for it. I was a hero. Now I'm a vicious traitor who turned on his own and shot them down without warning.'

'You followed orders,' said Irisis uncomfortably.

'Can that excuse any act?'

'I don't know.' Irisis had never thought about it.

'I didn't have the courage to refuse Fyn-Mah, but I should have.'

Irisis could not find any words to say to him.

'All I ever wanted was to do my duty,' he went on. And afterwards, hard work, a good woman, children and friends to share my life. That's all lost. There's only one way out, and it's the coward's way, but at least it'll put an end to it. If you would leave me now, Irisis.'

He rose, reaching for his sword. Irisis was slow to realise what he intended until he had the scabbard in his hand and the sword half out.

'No!' she cried, barring his way.

Flangers was a gentle man, for all his trade. He did not thrust her out of the way, but said, 'Please go, Irisis. It's not a sight for —’

'Will you hear me first?'

'There's no point.' Slipping by her, he drew the sword with a silent, practised movement. In another movement he reversed it and put the tip to his belly.

Irisis hadn't expected him to be that quick. Surely there'd be some last words or, at least, a moment of reflection. Without thinking, she caught hold of the blade with both hands. The keen edges sliced into her palms and fingers.

He grew distressed at the sight of her blood. For a man of war, that struck her as strange. 'Let go, Irisis,' he said softly. 'This blade could take your fingers off in a second.'

'Then I'll have to live without them, for I won't let go. Put down your sword, Flangers. Hear me out.'

He measured her resolve, then, with a little shake of the head, his rigid body relaxed and he pulled the tip away from his belly. She went with him, not releasing the blade until he'd laid it on the ledge. She'd been down that road too.

Taking her wrists in his, he turned her hands palm upward. Blood was flowing freely from deep cuts across both palms and six fingers.

'Look what you've done to your beautiful hands! Why, Irisis?'

Truly an unusual soldier. 'Because we, and Xervish Flydd, can't do without you, Flangers.' She raised her head, never more beautiful, and looked him in the eye. 'And because you and I fought back to back in the tar pits of Snizort, and I care for you as a comrade-in-arms.'

"Then you'll understand that I must salve my honour in the only way left to me.'

'You won't relent?'

'I can't, Irisis. But first let me see to your hands. You must be in pain.'

She said naught to that but allowed him to lead her back to the air-floater, where he cleaned the cuts, smeared them with ointment and wrapped them in bandages of yellow cloth. When that was done, all with great gentleness and consideration, he put her hands in her lap. 'Now will you allow me to make my end?'

'Once you've paid your debt,' she said.

He frowned. 'What debt is that?'

'I risked my life, going down into the tar chasm to save yours. According to the customs of my people, and I think yours as well, you owe me a life. That is also a matter of honour.’

'And I pulled you out afterwards.' He was sweating.

'I might have climbed out anyway,' she lied, 'so you didn't save my life.'

'You're asking for my life in return?' said Flangers.

'It's the only coin you have.'

He thought the matter through, and finally bowed his head. 'It is, as you say, a matter of honour. My life is in your keeping, and no longer mine to take, until you should release me.'

She let out her breath. 'Thank you, Flangers. You won't regret it.'

'I'll regret it every minute my own honour goes unrequited; he said, 'but I've given my word and won't go back on it.' He rose, turning towards the stern. 'But of course, should I ever save your life, the debt is paid, and mine will be in my keeping again. Honour must be satisfied.'

Irisis let him go, her troubles only postponed.

'Irisis, wake up.' Flangers was shaking her by the shoulder. 'There's something going on.'

'What?' she mumbled, still half in her dream, for it was the middle of the night.

'Shhh.' He hauled her out of her blankets. 'The soldiers are set to mutiny. Take this.' Pressing a knife into her hand, he stood by the door of the cabin.

No time to look for her boots. She roused Fyn-Mah and Inouye. Inouye took a deep, quivering breath. Irisis slapped her bandaged hand over the pilot's mouth.

'Don't scream!' she hissed, 'Or we'll be slaughtered where we stand. Inouye, is there any way to get out of here without them knowing?'

Inouye gulped, her breaths coming hard on each other. 'Only by cutting through the ceiling canvas.'

Irisis climbed onto a shelf and pushed her knife through the fabric, which gave with a ripping sound, too loud for comfort.

'What are they doing, Flangers?' she whispered.

'Getting up the courage to attack. They're well trained. We can't hope to beat four of them.'

'I doubt if they'll attack women,' said Fyn-Mah. 'The prohibition against harming females of child-bearing age is a strong one. Besides, as perquisitor I have a certain legitimacy, even after what happened the other day. Whatever they do, they'll be blamed for it.'

'Desperate men with nowhere to turn might well slay us all,' said Irisis, 'and worry about legitimacy afterwards. Can you make a diversion while I cut through the roof?'

Fyn-Mah did something which, in the gloom, Irisis did not see. Suddenly a man's voice boomed through the wall. 'Kick the door in, Rulf. I'll take the traitor first —’

'Why are you shouting?' shrilled another, so loudly that it hurt her ears.

'I'm not —’ He broke off.

'Sorcery!' whispered a third, as loud as steam hissing from a boiler.

Irisis slashed through the roof and pulled herself up. Flangers followed swiftly. The soldiers were milling about the door. A stocky man drew his sword with a squeal like a knife skating across metal. He hesitated for an instant, found courage and kicked the door off its flimsy hinges. The sound was like thunder in the still night.

The soldier sprang through, but came flying out again, juggling his sword, which was glowing red. He dropped it on the canvas deck. Smoke belched up and someone kicked it over the side.

The next man to move gets a bolt in the eye;' said Flangers, showing his crossbow. Put down your weapons.'

The soldiers looked up. No one made any move for a long moment. Irisis held her breath. If he shot one, the others would be on him before he could reload.; Four against one could only end one way.

'Who's going to be the first?' said Flangers, pointing his weapon at each in turn. 'You, big man?'

The dark-faced fellow still clutched his sword. 'I'm prepared to die for my duty,' he sneered, 'and I'm not afraid of a stinking traitor like you.'

Irisis could sense Flangers's pain, but he said nothing.

'But are you afraid of a perquisitor?' said Fyn-Mah from the doorway.

White smoke was coiling up from the bush where the red-hot sword had landed. As the leading soldier looked over the side, his weapon drooped.

'Run,' said Fyn-Mah softly. 'Tell the scrutators I forced you with the Art. It's close to the truth.'

He nodded, not looking at her, and slipped over the side. The others followed, disappearing into the forest.

'Inouye,' said the perquisitor, 'go to your station and be ready to take the air-floater up. Irisis, you and Flangers unfasten the tethers.'

'Where are we going?' said Irisis.

'To the next place on Flydd's list. I daren't stay here, in case they get their courage back.'

They spent more than a week travelling from hideout to hideout, sometimes staying only long enough to check if Eiryn Muss had left a message, though they did not see him in that time. On the ninth day after the mutiny, as they drifted over the latest rendezvous — a dead tree with a fire-scarred, hollow trunk, broken off about ten spans above the ground — a head appeared at the top. An arm waved.

Inouye hovered, Flangers let down the rope ladder and Muss scampered up. 'Go west,' he said.

'Did you find the scrutator?' cried Irisis.

'I learned where he is,' Muss said grimly. 'He was sent to slave in one of the clanker-hauling teams. Cryl-Nish Hlar was with him, condemned by his own father.'

'Nish?' Irisis found her voice had gone squeaky. 'He's alive?'

'For the moment.'

'You said was', said Fyn-Mah. 'What's happened?'

'Flydd escaped six days ago and fled north, beyond the Snizort node, with Nish and Ullii.'

'We can assume he's received my message then,' said Irisis. 'We'd better get after him.'

'Unfortunately,' said Muss, 'they're pursued by all the might of the scrutators, including no less than three air-floaters. We can't risk it.'

'So what do we do?'

'Go to the rendezvous. Sit tight and wait.'

'Wonderful!' said Irisis, who hated enforced inaction in any form.

And there was another problem. The phynadr, which they had risked so much for, and lost more to recover, was withering daily. They kept it cool and damp in a wetted sack, but it wasn't enough. Within days, Irisis felt sure, it would be dead, and all their sacrifice would have been for nothing.

But at least Nish was alive. She'd thought she was over him long ago, but lately Irisis had been thinking about him all the time. She would have given anything to be with him now.

S EVENT E E N

Gilhaelith fell swiftly, feet first, so by the time Gyrull could react, he was a hundred spans below her, hurtling towards the Sea of Thurkad. At this speed it would be as hard as rock.

She folded her great wings into the shape of an arrow and dived after him, though at first she did not seem to be gaining. He looked up at her, then down at the sea. He could see whitecaps and the fluid streamlines of windblown spume.

She matched his speed, now more than matched it. Gyrull was gaining, but so was the sea. He knew what she was trying to do, but how could she do it in time?

She mouthed something at him, though the sound was whipped away by the wind. What did she want him to do? Slow down! Gilhaelith spread his legs and drew out his coat on either side. It flapped wildly, the wind trying to tear it out of his grasp, but braked his fall a little. Would it be enough?

As the water came hurtling up, Gyrull flung herself at him, the claws of her outstretched feet striking him hard in the sides. They went straight through his coat and shirt, his skin and flesh, and in between his ribs. Gilhaelith screamed in agony. It felt as if the claws had gone right into his lungs.

She roared out words of power as the huge wings cracked to slow her plummeting fall. Something tore in his side; it felt as if the strain was stripping the ribs from his living flesh. Crack-crack, another tear. The pain was excruciating. The angled wings broke the free fall into a dive, then into a steep glide. His fragile brain throbbed from the power she'd used to keep them aloft.

He guessed trajectories. They must still hit the sea, and neither would survive it. Lyrinx were helpless in water, for heir bodies were too heavy to float Swimming was harder for them than flying, and panic soon pulled them under. Gilhaelith was a competent swimmer but could not survive these chilly waters to reach the shore, more than a league away.

Again his brain sang as she drew more power. The glide shallowed, the roaring waters rushed closer. She pounded her wings, digging into the salty air. Now they were just ten spans above the sea, now five, now three, two, one. His feet skimmed the water, the wings cracked harder and Gyrull lifted a fraction.

But the matriarch was very tired now. He could feel it in her movements, which were more sluggish than before, the slower beat of the wings, the droop of her neck. One claw slipped from between his ribs, leaving him dangling in the path of the swell. Driven by the wind, it was a good two spans high.

She tried to climb above it but only succeeded in dragging Gilhaelith through the crest. It broke over his head, drenching him. She let out a cry; her colours flashed and faded. He was sure she could not hold him. But Gyrull was not matriarch of a great and powerful race for nothing. Drawing on her last reserves of strength, she dug her claws further into his flesh, lifted him free of the water and slowly began to beat her way up.

The lyrinx surrounded her in a fluttering, spherical shell, offering their strength and shepherding her the last league to the shore of Meldorin. She hovered above a platform of yellow rock, a stone's throw from the water. Gyrull retracted her claws and Gilhaelith fell heavily, ruddy salt water streaming off him. Misty rain drifted down from the hills. It was as cool as Taltid had been sweltering.

Flashing dark browns and reds, colours he could not interpret, Gyrull settled beside him. He expected her to abuse him for his stupidity, but she bowed her head, displaying camouflage colours.

'I beg your indulgence. Tetrarch Gilhaelith,' she said hoarsely, inclining her head towards him. You startled me, but that is no excuse. The conveying code is a sacred one and I should not have dropped you under any circumstances What was it you wished to say to me?'

Gilhaelith lay on the wet rock, so frightened and dazed that he failed to capitalise on the advantage. A matter of the greatest moment, and great urgency too. It concerns the Snizort node that exploded and died to nothing.'

She tipped her head to one side, studying him with eyes like liquid gold. Her breast was heaving. 'Go on, pray.'

He pressed his fingers against the throbbing punctures between his ribs, praying her claws were clean. 'My knowledge of geomancy, and my studies of many nodes, tell me that a node cannot simply explode and disappear.' He explained how he came to know that. 'There must be some residue left behind to balance what has been lost. That residue, in the wrong hands, could be perilous indeed.'

'Present your reasoning, if you please, Tetrarch.'

Before he was finished, he saw, from the look in her eyes and the patterning of her skin, that she had reached the same conclusion. He had forgotten what a frightening intellect she had. Indeed, because the lyrinx ate human flesh and mostly fought with their bare hands, it was easy to underestimate them, to think of them as savages. That could be a fatal mistake.

'This residue,' said Gyrull, 'could be a mighty power, in the hands of someone who knows how to use it.'

'That is my belief,' said Gilhaelith.

'And you want it for yourself, of course.'

'I don't,' he said untruthfully, 'for I've never sought power over others. Knowledge and understanding are my passions. I would, however, like the opportunity to learn from this residue.'

'Then why tell me?'

'As a token of good faith, to set against my debt.'

Again that sideways, birdlike glance. 'You hope I'll gain for you what you can't get by yourself. And when the debt is repaid, what do you ask of me, Tetrarch?'

'My freedom. And carriage to a place where I may continue my work.'

'We'll see about that after my searchers return.'

Calling her lieutenants together, Gyrull spoke rapidly in a low voice. For once she displayed no skin-speech at all, and the others little more than blushes of yellow or grey. After a few minutes, three of the strongest lifted off from the platform and headed back across the sea, in the direction of Snizort.

'They go to establish the truth of what you've told us,' she said. 'We'll rest for an hour, then take you to Oellyll.'

'What's Oellyll?' said Gilhaelith.

'A city of ours, the best part of a day's flight from here.'

He felt the familiar panicky tightness in his chest, the difficulty of getting enough air. Once she had him there, it was unlikely she would ever let him go. And, held like a pet in a cage, subject to Gyrull's whims, he must eventually go mad.

After flying through dense cloud that night and all the next day, they arrived at Oellyll on a dark and rainy evening. Gilhaelith had no idea where in Meldorin they were. He was carried blind-folded through caverns lined with cut slabs of carven stone, into a deeper underground that the lyrinx had excavated out of rock. It was warm here, which was pleasant, for he was still saturated with an inner chill.

He learned nothing about Oellyll that night, save that it was ventilated by great bellows up on the surface. Several times he passed through their blasts of air, so strong that they almost tore him from the lyrinx's grasp. He was left in a warm room on a low platform which passed for a bed. It had an open doorway. They had no fear of him escaping for he could not stand up.

He lay on the platform, closed his eyes and did not wake for twenty-four hours, not even while their healers attended his injuries.

Two more days Gilhaelith spent in his room, lying on the platform without strength to raise his head. He had been badly hurt by immersion in the tat His liver troubled him, his head still throbbed, his heart would race for no particular reason and he felt incredibly weak. Walking the few hundred steps to the privy was beyond him. And the movement of those gallstone fragments along his internal ducts proved more excruciating than his most dismal imaginings.

Making matters worse, the food they gave him was a murky sludge the colour of rotting leaves. Reaching over the side of the platform, Gilhaelith dipped a finger in the bowl. The stuff turned out to be vegetable in origin, but quite bland. He pushed it away. The only vegetables he cared for were strongly flavoured ones, such as onions, turnips and radishes. He'd lived on a diet of slugs, pickled organs and other delicacies most of his adult life, and his palate craved exotic and the intense tastes. But if this pulverised goop was all he was going to get, he'd better eat it. He extended bony fingers, scooped up a gob of the green-brown muck, and swallowed. The repulsive blandness reminded him of his miserable childhood and the repressed memories exploded.

An orphan who had been dragged screaming out of his mother's lifeless body, he'd been carried to a far-off land by his loyal nurse, travelling by night and hiding by day. Gilhaelith had never learned why, or who he was, and had long since decided that he did not want to know. It could only cause him more trouble.

He'd never fitted in. Gilhaelith shivered as the distant memories ebbed and flowed. He'd been plagued by illness and stomach upsets as an infant. As a child, learning had been difficult, and if not for the patience of his nurse he'd still be illiterate. Once he'd mastered reading, though, and especially numbers, the whole world had opened up to him.

Then came the greatest tragedy of his life. His nurse fell ill and died, and Gilhaelith ended up in an orphans' home, fed on tasteless gruel and little enough of it. He thrust the bowl away so roughly that mush slopped all over the floor. In the home his stomach had begun to trouble him again and it wasn't until he began to feed on slugs, grubs, fish organs and other exotica that it had settled down.

Gilhaelith had been out of harmony with the world and had to fight it every step of the way, though the world showed him only brutality or indifference. Always an outsider, his feeding habits made him an object of derision and disgust. He was ostracised and bullied, and the only way he could cope was with absolute self-control. Forced to master his feelings and emotions, he had gradually extended that control to everyone around him, and then to everything.

Once grown to manhood, that iron control had helped him to accumulate great wealth, which allowed him to retreat to a place he could control completely. He'd built Nyriandiol so as to be master of his own environment, though he'd discovered that, without perfect understanding of the world, he could never have complete control. Gilhaelith, a man determined to overcome all obstacles, had set out to do just that. And first he had to discover why the world was the way it was. His life's work was born.

He'd become a geomancer and, after a century and more of study, the greatest geomancer of all, but his goal seemed as far off as ever. He still felt threatened — some unpredictable event might still overturn his carefully constructed existence. Then it had: Tiaan had appeared, and her amplimet had opened up all sorts of previously inconceivable possibilities.

But Tiaan had upset his control mechanisms. At first, because of his attraction to her, he'd found that exhilarating. Soon, however, his carefully structured life had fallen into chaos, which he'd found increasingly difficult to handle. Vithis had come, and Klarm. His servants had begun to plot behind his back. Then Gyrull had abducted him and Gilhaelith's hard-won control began to falter. He'd felt like an orphan again. In Snizort he'd allowed his relationship with Tiaan to founder. Gilhaelith regretted it, both for the loss of her friendship, and the loss of an apprentice worthy of him, but at the time there'd been little choice.

Since being trapped in the tar his life had careered out of control. His health grew worse each day, he felt ever more stressed and panicky and there were signs of breakdown that he could not admit to himself. He'd never thought he could be so vulnerable. The panic exploded, choking him.

In an effort to calm himself, he began to recite a list of minerals and their properties. He'd previously found rote exercise to be soothing in times of stress. He'd listed all the properties of quartz and fluorspar and was about to begin on calcite when his mind went completely and unaccountably blank.

Calcite, he thought. Rhombohedral crystals, sometimes prismatic or .., or ... Nothing! He could not recall any of the dozens of properties on the list, not even the variety of its colours, only that calcite was mostly white.

He picked another mineral at random, barite. Nothing. Dolomite. Nothing. Sulphur. Nothing. Then, with a horror that could not be described, the entire catalogue of minerals faded from his mind. He'd known the list by heart for a hundred and thirty years, and in that time had never forgotten the smallest detail.

It's just exhaustion, he told himself. You're pushing too hard. Give yourself a chance to recover. He put the failure out of mind, or at least tried to, but the appalling thought kept returning. He hadn't been pushing at all — the recitation had been meant to be a comfort. And from there, only one conclusion was possible. During the escape from Snizort he must have damaged a part of his brain.

Gilhaelith did not try again; he was too afraid. In his long, long life there had been few problems he'd not been able to solve by intellect, geomancy or sheer will. He'd even found a solution to the vexation of human relations — he controlled everyone who came into his life. Those who could not be controlled he simply pushed away. Until Tiaan appeared, emotion had played no part in his existence, or so he liked to think. He was a man governed by pure reason, and if his intellect deserted him, what would he have left?

After a few more days' rest he was mobile again. Gilhaelith was tracing out the familiar journey to the privy for the third time in a few hours, hobbling like an old man, when a lyrinx fell in beside him.

'Would you come this way, please?' she said politely. 'The matriarch wishes to speak with you.'

Her tone gave no indication as to whether Gyrull was pleased or otherwise. He shuffled after her, unable to raise much interest either way. His illness preoccupied him all his waking hours. He had begun to wonder if he would ever recover.

Gyrull was standing at a stone table, an oval slab that rose from the floor on a tapered stalk carved out of the native shale. She was studying a collection of papers but put them aside as he entered.

'My people have come back from Snizort,' she said. 'You were right. There was a residue left behind by the failure of the node.'

'Did they recover it?'

'Unfortunately someone found it first.'

'Who was it?' said Gilhaelith. 'One of the scrutators?'

'It would appear so.'

His idea about the residue at the node-drainer had been an inspired guess. Now that it had been confirmed, Gilhaelith was furiously thinking through the implications. Could the residue have had anything to do with Tiaan's amplimet, its communication with the node and those strange threads it had drawn throughout Snizort? Or had so much power been taken from the node that it had been unable to sustain itself and had collapsed into nothingness — nihilium? Much depended on the answer. And how might it impinge on his life's work, to understand the workings of the world, and control them?

'This residue may give humanity additional confidence,' Gyrull added. 'But then, knowing they have it will benefit us, in a way . . .'

'How so?' said Gilhaelith.

'Despite their near-defeat at Snizort, the human army is pursuing our Land forces towards the sea. We'll prepare a trap and wipe then out. What do you think of that, Tetrarch?'

'I would be sorry to meat an army' he said, 'whether human or lyrinx.’

'I regret the necessity, but we did not start this war, despite the propaganda of the scrutators. In the early days they rejected every peaceful overture we made. They regard us as abominations, even denying our right to exist. Now that we have the upper hand, and may soon win the war, I won't let the fate of their soldiers stand in the way.'

Gilhaelith was still thinking about the residue. 'SoJ was right about the node.'

'And I keep my bargains. I'll take you wherever you wish, within reason. I can't carry you far into Lauralin, nor to any place that would endanger my own life. Where do you wish to go?'

'I'm not sure,' he said. 'Because of. . .'

'Your betrayal of the scrutators,' she said helpfully. 'And the Aachim.'

He felt a momentary embarrassment. 'Quite. There are few places in Lauralin where I can live in safety now, unless I dwell in a cave as a hermit. I can't do that — my work is everything to me.' It had been and still was, though the earlier failure had shaken his confidence . ..

Gilhaelith realised that the matriarch was staring at him. 'I must have my geomantic instruments and be near a node,' he went on, 'preferably a powerful one. I'd prepared a refuge in the far south, but my health isn't good enough to go that far, without servants and loyal guards. Because of my, er, situation, suitable ones may be impossible to find. But. . .'

'Yes?' she said.

'Were you to give me a safe conduct, and a small number of your human prisoners to provide for my necessities, there's a place in Meldorin which would serve equally well. It's filled with ancient resonances and I could continue my work there.'

'You want me to provide you with servants?' she exclaimed.

'Now you're asking for more than the bargain. Should I agree, what can you offer in return?'

'My aid with problems you may encounter, of a geomantic nature,' said Gilhaelith.

'What makes you think I'm likely to encounter any?'

'I believe you will, as the war progresses. I imagine you may want to further develop your node-drainers, for example.'

'How can I trust a man who has betrayed his own kind in favour of an alien race?' Gyrull said reasonably.

'I'm descended from several human species, not just old humankind, so I don't consider I've betrayed anyone. Besides, you lyrinx are not as alien as you appear. And has not my word always been good?'

'Not always,' she said, 'since you make such a point of it. But it's enough, for the moment. You can't cause too much trouble in Meldorin, I think. Tell me — what is this place you want to go to, filled with ancient resonances?'

'It was called Alcifer, long ago.'

'Alcifer!' Slivers of yellow shone out on her flanks. 'Is that the limit of your needs, or do you demand yet more?'

Her reaction bothered him. 'It can't be more than a few days' flight from here. It was the great city built by Rulke the Charon —’

'Oh, I know all about Alcifer.' Gyrull began to laugh. Lyrinx rarely displayed amusement, but this became a great, sidesplitting guffaw that showed all her hundreds of teeth and made her sides heave like the bellows upstairs. 'Alcifer!'

'Is there some problem?' he said, anxious now. 'You did agree to do this for me . . .'

'I'm pleased to be able to repay you so easily,' she chuckled 'You could walk there from here. Oellyll is delved into the rock directly beneath Alcifer.'