Sixty

The months had gone by slowly in the bastion of Nennifer, set in a highland where summer was short and cold, winter long and bitter and, in the shadow of towering mountains on all sides, it had not rained in twenty years. The ground was a barren grit less than the depth of Ullii's thumb, covered in black stones so smooth and shiny they appeared to have been melted in a furnace. Nothing grew there, save in the valleys where moisture from summer snowmelt supported the pastures, gardens and fish ponds that supplied Nennifer. Even the tallest mountains bore little snow, for higher ranges lay in every direction. The utter, uncompromising aridity suited the bleak souls of the scrutators.

Ullii hated Nennifer with all her angry little heart. There was nothing of beauty in the whole vast building, and little kindness either. The people who laboured there, whether mancers, artisans, artificers or common servants, were all of a type — cold, mechanical and closed off from their fellows. In all her time in the scrutators' citadel, Ullii saw no love, little passion save for their grim work, and precious little generosity or selflessness, just a desperate efficiency driven by terror. Everyone lived in fear of their superiors, and they of theirs, all the way up to the scrutators. And even the Council members, those who had not remained in Lybing to direct the war, kept one eye out for their dark and deadly chieftain.

Of all the people in Nennifer, Ullii was the only one who had any kind of freedom. Ghorr had tried to study and school her lattice-twisting talent, to understand how she had done such marvels in her previous escape with Irisis. Despite much labour and cunningly conceived punishments, it had proved an abject failure. Ullii could neither explain nor duplicate what she had previously done in extremis. Finally Ghorr passed the problem to his cleverest mancers and let her be. He had another use for Ullii and could not afford to damage her. Not yet.

He barely spoke to her for months afterwards, for she was too far beneath him to be worthy of his time. Ghorr was busy forging a mighty battle fleet, not to attack the enemy but to hunt Flydd to his refuge, whether in Meldorin or elsewhere, and to expunge him from the earth.

Though she was allowed outside, Ullii seldom went into the barrens. She loved nature in a romantic, idealised way, but there was no nature here, just cold desert. And as the seasons turned towards winter the land grew ever colder, windier and bleaker.

Once, Ullii's life of the mind had been all she'd needed, but the events of the past year had broken that mould. Other realities kept butting in, and other memories. Of Nish making love to her that day in the balloon basket, after she had driven off the nylatl. Of the nylatl attacking him again, after Scrutator Flydd had appeared in the air-floater. And her terror as Nish had blown the creature to bits with the flask of tar spirits, then been carried out of her life on what had been left of the balloon.

Something had died in her then — she'd seen it as an abandonment. For months Ullii had been sure that Nish was dead. When she finally found him again, at Snizort, he seemed to have forgotten her.

No matter how much she dwelt upon his previous kindnesses, Ullii kept coming back to that, and to the deaths of Mylii and Yllii. She blamed Nish for both and it constantly recharged her rage. She might be little and weak, but there was one thing she could do — take just retribution for her lost brother and son. It was all that kept her going.

Finally, in late autumn, the great battle fleet was ready. Ullii knew Ghorr was building one, but had no idea what form it would take. She had seen, in her lattice, the slow creation of all sorts of unpleasant machines and devices of war, but the testing had taken place in a vast walled yard. Only those who had business there were admitted through its guarded gates. Everything had been planned to perfection. An army of clerks had checked the lists and made sure nothing that could possibly be required was left behind. Another small group of mancers and officers had been appointed to take every plan apart, to look at all the ways it could fail, and develop contingency plans for when it did.

Ullii was asleep when Ghorr came to her door. He flung it open so it crashed back against the wall, shocking her awake. She cowered under the covers, blocking her ears. He tore the blankets off.

'It's time for you to earn your keep, Seeker! Gather your gear.’

She had been provided with new clothes in Nennifer — half a dozen undersuits of the neck-to-knee spider-silk that protected her sensitive skin, as well as outer garments, coats, boots, scarves and hats. His artisans had made her several pairs of goggles and earmuffs, and all were to hand. Ullii stored all her possessions in two small packs beside her bed. It provided her with the only security she had.

A servant picked the packs up. Ullii snatched them from her and sat on them to get dressed. Already wearing an under- suit, she pulled on her boots, coat and hat, and made sure a set of goggles and earmuffs were in the pocket. While wearing the spider-silk undergarments she could better tolerate life's assaults on her other senses, though she still could not go out in the bright sunlight without her goggles. 'Follow me,' said Ghorr.

A swarm of knots grew in Ullii's lattice, like those made by the controllers of clankers or air-floaters, though these were much larger. Her stomach formed knots of its own.

Taking up her packs, Ullii trotted after Ghorr, up the stairs, along the corridors, out through the vast double doors and down the broad steps onto the paved area, as large as a parade ground, that ran from fortress Nennifer to the towering cliff that fell into the Desolation Sink. She stopped in shock. The paved area was crammed with monstrous air-floaters, reaching above the topmost storey of Nennifer, which was five floors and a steep roof above the ground. Each was supported by no less than five cigar-shaped balloon bags as long as the trunk of a forest tree. Four were arranged at the corners of a diamond, one each at front and rear, another out to either side. A fifth, smaller balloon was suspended in the centre. The vessels slung beneath the balloons were more than twenty spans long and their side decks were packed with weapons whose design was unknown to her, though each looked deadly.

The machines were painted in brilliant reds and yellows, like poisonous reptiles, for they were intended to be seen and feared. Barbaric designs decorated their prows — vicious creatures with gnashing teeth and bloodstained tusks, or devices spitting fire or venom.

There were sixteen of the air-floaters, and drawn up at the front of each stood a squad of heavily armed soldiers, in a rank of five by five, with two officers before them. There were almost as many mancers, artisans, artificers and servants.

'What do you think of our air-dreadnoughts?' said Ghorr beside her. 'Aren't they the most magnificent sight you've ever seen?'

'I hate them,' she said fiercely, for their auras reeked of violence.

He smiled patronisingly. 'It doesn't matter what you think, little Ullii. Just find Flydd and Irisis, and we will have your revenge for you.'

In a flash she understood just how badly she had blundered. She didn't want revenge, but retribution, and it had to be with her own hands. Taking that away rendered it meaningless, vicious.

Ghorr shouted orders. People ran in all directions, in what appeared to be confusion but was carefully orchestrated, then she was urged up the ladder into the first air-dreadnought of the fleet, and ushered inside.

With a flourish of cornets, Ghorr's machine loosed its tethers.

The great triple rotors began to tick, then whirr, its nose lifted and it rose into the sky. She could feel the drain on the field, which manifested itself as a swirling yellow pattern across her lattice.

The others followed, one by one, taking care to keep their distance. When all were in the air they manoeuvred into formation, signalled to each other with flags and then turned towards the west, to pick up the rest of the scrutators in Lybing. And then, on to the hunt.

The journey took days, though it was mostly uneventful, for which Ullii was glad. Used to shutting the world out, she found the proximity of so many hard, relentless people unbearable. She could not sleep in the great cabin, as the racket of chatter, snoring, belching and farting never stopped. On the second night she climbed onto the roof, found a recess sheltered from the wind and spent the night there, wrapped in blankets and coat. It was miserably cold but she was used to that. The air was fresh and the constant wailing of the wind blurred out the sounds of the fifty people below.

Only once during that journey did anything of note happen. It was about a week after they had departed Nennifer — Ullii did not count the days — and the fleet had just sailed high over the Sea of Thurkad, heading towards Meldorin Island and the ancient city of Thurkad, whose fall had heralded the loss of the west.

Ullii was standing at the bow, where the air streaming in her face protected her from the stink of unwashed humanity, when her keen hearing picked up Ghorr's voice, just outside the forward cabin door. He was talking to Scrutator Fusshte.

'Are you still going to give a demonstration?' Fusshte asked. His sibilant tones always made Ullii shiver, and the way he looked at her was worse.

'When I find the best target,' said Ghorr. 'I'll send a warning to our enemies not to take us too lightly.'

'And to our friends!' Fusshte chuckled nastily.

'Indeed' said Ghorr. 'There's not a single person on Santhenar who should not know what I can do, and beware! Fusshte took a step backwards, just managing to control his alarm. 'Quite,' he said smoothly. 'People have come to doubt the power of the scrutators. After this, they'll be in no doubt at all.'

Ghorr called the captain of his personal guard. The man listened carefully, saluted, then gave orders to his signalman, who began to pull his coloured flags up and down. After checking the acknowledgment with a spyglass, he reported back to the captain.

The air-dreadnought turned slowly. The others followed it, maintaining their formation, until they were heading directly for the southern section of the city of Thurkad. Ghorr consulted a plan and gave further orders, which the signalman relayed.

'Just there,' he said to the captain, pointing. According to my intelligence, many lyrinx house themselves in that one.'

They were now close enough for the largest buildings of Thurkad to be distinguished. Ghorr's outstretched arm indicated one of a series of tall wooden warehouses, built on the edge of the wharf city that formed the seaward rim of the city proper. Lyrinx soared in the air though, as yet, none approached them. This mighty armada would be the match of hundreds of flying lyrinx, and flew above the height they could reach.

Artificers now pulled the cover off a large metal mirror, the best part of two spans across, and swung it out. But it was more than just a mirror, for it had a complicated controller apparatus at the back, and an operator to use it. On the other air-dreadnoughts, similar devices were being moved into position.

More signals were sent. At the bow, a young woman in a green and grey uniform turned over a minute-glass. The air-dreadnought floated ponderously towards the target. The operator made continual adjustments to his mirror, reflecting the sunlight in a narrow beam across the bay, and then at the wharves ahead. The beams of the other mirrors followed the first, making a tight cluster of bright dots.

'Ten,' called the young woman. A man behind her raised a series of signal flags, one after another, as she counted down the numbers. 'Five, four, three, two, one. Now!'

The signalman swept down his red flag. The mirror operator stood up on his toes, drew power into the mighty controller crystals and pulled down a lever. The air-dreadnought shuddered.

Ullii felt a sickening feeling in the pit of her stomach as the field — what was left of it — tried to tie itself in knots. For an instant the rotors stopped completely, and there was silence, apart from wind whistling through the ropes and wires.

The beams of all sixteen mirrors converged on a single point, the top floor of the warehouse Ghorr had indicated. Suddenly they were amplified a thousand times by the power from the controller crystals. The bright spot became incandescent, burning straight through the tiled roof. The timbers erupted in flames and within seconds the roof, fifty spans long and twenty wide, was gone.

The bright spot moved down inside, fire leaping up after it, before smoke belching from the warehouse blotted it out. A single lyrinx fled out through the roof, one wing aflame, before wheeling down to smack into the water beside the wharf.

The smoke sucked back down momentarily; then, in a colossal explosion, the walls of the warehouse blew out, raining burning debris everywhere and setting fire to the neighbouring buildings. Burning lyrinx fled through the doors and windows.

'Must have been an old store of naphtha barrels in there,' Ghorr said with a grim chuckle. 'But we won't mention that in our reports, eh, Fusshte? Let the world think we did it all.'

The mirror operator was standing up in his seat, helmet askew, mouth agape.

'Marvellous,' said Fusshte in a choked voice. He cast a side-ways glance at Ghorr that told Ullii a lot. Suddenly, Fusshte was afraid of the chief scrutator.

Ullii became aware that the pilot was shouting. The rotors were still running irregularly and there was barely anything left in the field. Down below, a score of lyrinx tried to take to the air but none could get aloft.

Ghorr, Fusshte, and the pilot and operator had a hurried conference by the rail. With all the cheering, Ullii only caught part of it. They were worried by what had happened to the field.

'That'll have to be all,' Ghorr said regretfully. 'I'm not going to spoil a brilliant success by a failure. If there's no power there's no power. It'll look better if we just sail majestically on. Still, we've given them a shock they'll not forget.'

They drifted with the wind and, some leagues west of Thurkad, the operators picked up another field, though the rotors were still running irregularly. It appeared the surge of power had damaged something. Ullii was pleased about that. The ruin wrought by the mirrors had horrified her.

That night they passed over the mountains of Bannador, and the higher ranges beyond, which were covered in snow from top to bottom. 'Where do you think they are?' said Fusshte in the night. 'Shazmak? It lies south of our route.'

'Why would they go to Shazmak?' said Ghorr. 'They'll be somewhere where they can buy food, or hunt for it. Isolated towns survive in the north of Meldorin, I'm told, and on the west coast.'

In the morning they landed on a grassy plain, where they could see for leagues in any direction, though four of the air-dreadnoughts remained in the air, on watch.

'We're some little way north of the ruins of Chanthed,' said Ghorr, 'where the College of the Histories stood. The Plains of Folc lie north of us. To the west the plains run for fifty leagues into the Silbis Drylands. The western mountains lie beyond that, by the coast. Somewhere there we'll find them.

'Now,' he went on once the machine had settled on its triple keels, 'it's your turn, Ullii Find the traitor Flydd. Find Irisis Stirm, who lied to you and abandoned you. Find Cryl-Nish Hlar, the man who made you pregnant. The one who murdered your brother and destroyed your helpless baby. And then, lead us to them, so we can take your revenge for you.'

Ullii had had much time to dwell on her retribution on the journey here. Since the attack on Thurkad yesterday she'd thought about little else. Nish had done those terrible things, and deserved to be punished, but Ghorr was a wicked man, a brute and a liar. How could it be right to give up her former friends to him? She could not decide. She wanted to deceive him but did not know how. I won't give them up, she thought. But Nish does deserve to be punished . ..

'Well, Seeker?' growled Ghorr.

'I .., can't see Flydd in my lattice,' she said. 'Nor Irisis.' It was the truth. Lately her lattice had been ever harder to see and she could no longer deny it. She dreaded that it would go completely, taking her unique life of the mind with it.

'Have you ever seen them, or any other sign of them, since we came west?'

'No.' Sweat prickled in her armpits, in spite of the chilly weather.

He skewered her with his all-seeing eyes. 'Then we must go up. We'll fly in a square, south, west, north and east, and you'll keep watch.'

'Yes,' she whispered.

They flew south. 'Can you see them?' Ghorr asked, halfway across the traverse.

'No,' she gulped.

They flew west. 'Can you see them now?'

Ullii shook her head. They headed north, then east, and ever Ghorr asked, and ever the answer was the same. By late that afternoon he was growing impatient. 'If all this has been for nothing ..." he said menacingly.

Fusshte whispered in his ear. 'All right,' said Ghorr. 'You have my leave.'

Fusshte gave Ullii the look that always made her skin creep. Ghorr broke people like her, but Fusshte devoured them.

'Come inside the cabin with me, little Ullii,' Fusshte said in that voice as dry as the rustling of a snake's scales. 'I have some questions for you . . .'

'I'll try harder' she squeaked.

'I thought you might,' said Ghorr. 'Go east another two leagues,' he said to the pilot, 'then turn south and keep going, expanding the square by two leagues each circuit. If they're anywhere on Meldorin, we'll find them.'

Fusshte looked like a viper who'd had his dinner stolen.

It wasn't until the following evening that Ullii picked up a trace. She let out a little gasp and tried vainly to conceal it, but the chief scrutator missed nothing. 'You've found them.'

'I can see something,' she said in a tiny voice.

Ghorr was on her in three powerful strides. 'Who, Seeker?'

'I don't recognise it.'

Ghorr and Fusshte exchanged glances. 'It's a trick' Fusshte said in a low voice, but not too low for Ullii's keen ears. 'She's trying to protect them. If she picked up anyone, it would be Flydd. He's the strongest.'

'Maybe,' said Ghorr. 'And maybe not. Her talent defies analysis. It could be anything.' He turned back to the seeker. 'It's not lyrinx, is it?'

'No.'

'Not a node or field?'

'No.'

'It's human, isn't it?'

'Yes.' She barely exhaled the word.

'Where?' Ghorr seized her by the shoulders, but let her go at once. The time for threats was past. 'Which way, Seeker?' He put on a kindly voice but his eyes were like shards of glass.

Ullii gestured. 'A long way. As far as I can see.' South-south-west,' said the pilot.

What's down that way?' said Ghorr.

The pilot consulted her map. 'We're here at the moment.' Her pointed fingernail, which was tinted yellow, marked a range of hills that ran west from the mountains almost all the way to the Silbis Drylands. 'Below us, according to the map, there used to be towns and scattered villages, running to forest in the east, up against the mountains. To the west it's just empty desert. Further south the desert passes into scrub and then into the swamp forests of Orist, which run on for fifty leagues, though much of that is said to be impassable.'

'Not to us,' said Ghorr. 'I need more, Ullii. Where on the map do you sense this person?'

Ullii, after much prompting, drew a large circle with her finger. It covered most of southern Meldorin.

'That's not good enough!' hissed Fusshte. 'Seeker—'

'Leave her,' said Ghorr. 'The talent only gives direction, not distance. Strong talents, or strong Arts, she may pick up from hundreds of leagues away, while insignificant ones could elude her from the other side of the hill. We'll follow her path until the destination becomes clear, then wait for night. I don't want to alert them — if it is them.'

'What does it matter?' said Fusshte. 'We've got power enough in these sixteen air-dreadnoughts to overcome any enemy. How can Flydd's ragtag band trouble us?'

'They've given us trouble aplenty over the past year,' snapped Ghorr. 'If Flydd realises we're coming, he may find a way of hiding, even from Ullii. Take nothing for granted, Scrutator.'

The hunt continued, but the next time she looked Ullii found nothing at all. It was not that their quarry had disappeared but, rather, as if something was blocking that part of the lattice. By now she was so worn out with seeking that there was no choice but to stop for the night. Ghorr was furious.