FIFTY-FIVE

They set down in the mountains a few leagues away to discuss tactics. Nish was unharmed, though a crossbow bolt had dented the metal above the back of his head.

‘If your head had been touching the metal it probably would have killed you,’ said Irisis, hugging Nish. The dent was half the depth of her thumb.

‘If Tiaan hadn’t insisted on the hood you’d be scraping my brains off the platform now,’ said Nish. ‘So which opening was it?’

‘The fourth – I could see all the way in. The others were blocked off.’

‘Do you think it’s possible to make a second attempt?’

‘Let’s think it through. We’ll give it a while. They’ve probably closed that opening off as well, in case we come straight back, but they can’t close all the openings off for long. If the others have been closed since the attack yesterday the air will be getting bad by now.’

They had something to eat and drink, washed their sweaty faces and hands, and sat down to plan.

‘There’s just one chance left,’ said Tiaan, looking up at the sky. The thunderheads were joining up to form a continuous mass of storms, just east of the escarpment, with lightning flickering inside them. ‘We drop out of one of those clouds and fly at the cliff head-on, then swerve between the pinnacles, straight into the air vent and chuck out the spores.’

‘It’d better be big enough,’ said Nish.

‘It should be, and a little to spare, but there won’t be any room for error.’

‘Or another rock that knocks us out of line,’ said Irisis. ‘Anything short of dead centre and the thapter will be wrecked.’

‘And we’ll be killed,’ said Nish.

‘And then what?’ said Irisis to Tiaan.

‘Straight out again, backwards, and try to get away.’

‘Be surprised if we can.’

‘We don’t have to have another go,’ said Irisis. ‘Flydd doesn’t expect us to commit suicide. More importantly, he won’t want to lose another thapter.’

‘I think we can do it,’ said Tiaan.

Nish and Irisis looked at one another. ‘If you think so, that’s good enough for me,’ said Irisis.

‘And me.’

Tiaan went south and lifted up into the clouds, flying in and out of their black and chilly tops so she could see where she was going. She looked at Irisis, who nodded. ‘Nish’s ready too.’

Tiaan gulped. ‘If the air currents don’t move us too far out of line we’ll burst out of the cloud about five hundred spans above the opening and the same distance from the cliff. I’ll line up and head for it as fast as I can possibly go, slowing only as we approach the pinnacles. They won’t have much time to get ready for us, but it’ll be enough. They’ll hit us with everything they’ve got. I’ll try to dart through between the pinnacles but, the more I think about it …’

‘Then don’t think about it,’ said Irisis. ‘It’s too late for that. Just do it and if we don’t make it, well, I’m glad we’re friends now.’ Impulsively, she reached forward and hugged the smaller woman.

Tears came to Tiaan’s eyes and she hugged Irisis back, one-handed.

She turned away, wiping her eyes. Lightning flashed to the right, rather close. Tiaan wondered what would happen if the thapter was struck. Don’t think, she told herself. Just go. She headed down at a steep angle, ridding her mind of the negative thoughts and just flooding it with her mental picture of the cliffs, the pinnacles and the approach she had to take to slip between them into the air vent. She allowed her hands to do the flying.

A spatter of hail rattled on the hood and the skin of the thapter. A chunk slid down the back of her neck, startling her at first, though the cold was not unpleasant. The clouds billowed around her. Can’t be far to go now, she thought, and then the thapter exploded out of the cloud and the pinnacles were below and ahead, lined up perfectly.

She streaked for the opening and made it halfway there before the lyrinx reacted. They must have been expecting her to approach along the cliff, as before. The pinnacles loomed up and Tiaan could feel the tension coming from Irisis. Tiaan felt no anxiety now, nothing but a gritty determination to get the job done and survive it if she could.

The lyrinx were spreading out, fanwise, as they realised that their formation was wrongly oriented. So was the hood, Tiaan noticed belatedly. It gave no protection at all, head-on.

She plummeted towards the pinnacles, slowing so she could dart between them. The lyrinx were lining up their weapons. She swerved left, then right.

‘Keep your head down, Irisis!’

Irisis ducked just in time as bolts spanged off the sloping hood. She made a muffled noise in her throat and let go of the hood, pulling her hand down to reveal the blood welling from her wrist. The bolt had gone straight between the arm bones, leaving a hole that she could have slipped her little finger through.

The hood slammed up and tore half-off, flapping back and forth against the hatch cover. Tiaan almost allowed herself to be distracted, almost hit the pinnacle. She slipped between it in a positive cannonade of bolts and flashed towards the vent.

The lyrinx were pulling a cover across it, a frame covered in fabric painted to match the colour and texture of the rock. They weren’t quite in time. Tiaan struck it head-on and fortunately the frame was timber, not metal. It smashed, the fabric tore on the sides of the thapter and they were in.

‘Nish,’ she shouted over the scream of the mechanism. ‘Do it now. Irisis, what’s going on?’

Irisis pulled herself up on the side and blood dripped on Tiaan’s cheek.

‘He’s down! Ah, Nish, Nish!’ Irisis scrambled up onto the back platform, heedless of her bloody wrist.

Tiaan clambered up as far as she could go while still holding the controller. The rear hood looked crushed against the platform, as if a boulder had been dropped on it, though Tiaan could have sworn she hadn’t heard any impact, and two javelard spears had gone through it as well, pinning it to the platform. She couldn’t see Nish, who was below the coaming around the platform.

There had been no dust flying past them in the suction from the bellows, so he hadn’t got the spores away. They’d failed and she couldn’t see the barrel. It was time to go.

Tiaan jerked the thapter backwards. ‘Hang on, Irisis!’

Irisis was inside the coaming, tearing at the crushed hood, trying to lift it, but couldn’t budge the spears. You’ll never get him out, Tiaan thought. Anyway, he’s better off there, if he is alive.

The thapter went backwards as Irisis came to her knees and she nearly fell off. She hung on, dragged the barrel out from under the hood and punched the top in with her fist. She hurled it over the side just as Tiaan accelerated backwards and shot out of the vent, the rush of wind buffeting three lyrinx out of the way as if they’d been hit with the end of a piston.

The barrel struck the rocky rim of the vent, letting loose a cloud of spores, but fell outside. Tiaan didn’t see what happened after that, for Irisis lost her footing as the thapter accelerated. She slid head-first down towards Tiaan’s flapping hood and managed to wrap her arms around it.

‘Hold tight!’ Tiaan screamed, spinning the thapter in a semicircle. Irisis’s legs were thrown over the side and Tiaan could see the strain on her face as she struggled to hang on.

There was nothing Tiaan could do except tilt the thapter the other way and pray, for lyrinx were coming from every direction. The gap between the pinnacles came into view and she went for it.

Clang, clang, smash. The binnacle that had been broken the previous day now shattered, sending glass, crystal and what she thought were drops of quicksilver flying in all directions. Fragments of glass stung her face and she closed her eyes, involuntarily.

For a second Tiaan lost sight of the gap and had to keep going from her mental image, praying that it would take her through. The gap wasn’t wide and she felt a horrible moment of panic that Irisis’s dangling legs would be torn off between the thapter and the stone.

She opened her eyes and Irisis was clinging grimly, desperately, to the flapping hood. The thapter was moving too quickly for the lyrinx to catch it, though it was still within range of their weapons. Tiaan didn’t dare weave around in case she threw Irisis off.

There were more crashes, thuds and spangs as the thapter was hit by everything the enemy could fire at it. At least one bolt ricocheted off the hood that partly protected her now.

It wasn’t protecting Irisis. What if the lyrinx targeted her? She had to do something. Tiaan put the nose down so sharply that Irisis’s legs went up in the air, and directed the thapter towards the canopy of the forest out of which the pinnacles rose.

‘How are you doing?’ Tiaan yelled.

‘I can’t hold on much longer,’ Irisis said through gritted teeth. ‘I’ve got no strength in my injured wrist.’

Her arms were wrapped around the hood, and she had managed to twist her bloody wrist through the rope that was barely holding the hood on, but her fingers were slipping as the hood flapped up and down.

What if it tore away? It looked as if it might. Tiaan reached up on tiptoe and took hold of her friend’s wrist, the uninjured one. It was more reassurance than security, but Irisis managed a smile.

‘Just a few seconds more,’ Tiaan said. ‘We’re nearly down. Just hang on a few seconds more.’

The crowns of tall trees loomed up. Tiaan slowed, directed the thapter towards a gap and risked a glance over her shoulder. A host of lyrinx were heading after her like a swarm of wasps, and she could see dozens more threading their way down the steep slope below the cliff. She’d have to be quick.

The hood pulled free of the fastenings Nish had fixed to the rim of the hatch. The wind threw it backwards, and Irisis with it, until it was brought up by the ropes. Tiaan lost her grip on Irisis’s wrist. Irisis slammed into the rise leading up to the rear platform, was held there momentarily by the wind, then began to slip inexorably down the side.

It was still a long way to the ground. Tiaan couldn’t reach back to Irisis now; couldn’t do anything but head for the steeply sloping forest floor and hope she got there before Irisis fell.

She didn’t quite make it. The thapter was still five or six spans up when Irisis’s fingers were pulled free and she went over the side.