Behind them the rest of the force churned the dry soil to powder as they battled to escape the trap. The lyrinx rained missiles on them with catapults. Less than half the force escaped back into the smoke-wreathed lines.

Tham stalked away, grim-faced. Soon a messenger came running. 'Field's dropped suddenly, surr.' He pa.s.sed Flydd a sealed packet. 'And there's this from Eiryn Muss.'

'I can see that,' Flydd said gloomily. 'They've divided and demoralised us, made us fear the solid ground beneath our feet. What now? All-out attack, or more of the same?'

'Depends what they want,' said Irisis, handing around mugs of black, sweet tea.

Flydd read the message, then drank the hot tea in a single gulp. 'According to Muss, they are determined to complete their secret project and then annihilate this army so they can move on all the eastern lands.' Flydd thrust the message into a nearby brazier. 'It's no good. They're taking too much from the field. Our clankers can barely go half-pace.'

'Even so, with the support of the Aachim ...'

He spat on the ground. 'Vithis is only making a token effort, though his constructs have all the power they need. And I suspect ...'

'What?'

'Once we look like losing he'll make a strategic withdrawal, unscathed, and still demand his share of the bargain. By then we really will be powerless to stop him. I've got to act now.'

'How?'

'It's all or nothing.'

'So you're saying '

'We're going in to block the node-drainer. Tonight.'

'I thought you said there was no way to get in, secretly?'

'Muss has found one.' His meagre lips were compressed to purple. 'Through the front door, you might say. It requires a particular kind of scrutator magic.'

'I'm delighted to hear of it.'

'You shouldn't be.'

'Why not?'

'I haven't discovered any way of getting back out.'

'What did you mean, we we? You can't be spared, Xervish.'

'The Council ordered me to. Besides, no one else could get you in there. We're going as soon as it's dark.'

He scribbled a new set of orders and sent them off.

Irisis, Ullii and the scrutator were in the air-floater, hanging silently well above the thorn-covered southern wall of Snizort. It was a dark night with a heavy overcast. The new moon might bring some light when it rose, after midnight. They'd gone up at dusk. The army was supposed to make a diversion but it was nearly midnight and they were still waiting for it.

'I wish they'd get on with it,' said Irisis, looking over the side at the lines of tar fires, and camp fires beyond them.

'You won't once we begin.'

'You keep making these gloomy p.r.o.nouncements. It quite puts me off my adventuring.'

'I won't dignify that with a response.'

'You used to be fun, Flydd. In a dark, twisted sort of a way.'

'There's no fun left in the world.'

Irisis gave up.

The onslaught began on the eastern side, evidenced by flares and screams. Ullii pressed in her earplugs and covered her eyes, but her face was screwed up in torment.

Irisis stirred. Not yet! Another battle began on the western perimeter. Still Flydd did not give the word. He was waiting for the third. Now it came with a cl.u.s.ter of blazing missiles arcing across the sky from the north.

'That's it,' whispered Irisis. 'And already people are dying to ease our way in.'

'A lot more will die if we fail.' He uttered words of power, scrutator magic she had no comprehension of. The air-floater and everything in it faded until just the faintest edge-shimmer betrayed it. In fog or mist, which they hoped for near to the ground, even that would be invisible.

Flydd gasped. 'Quick now. This is painful magic. I can't hold it long.'

The air-floater drifted high over the southern wall of Snizort, hanging in the dark. Lyrinx swarmed on the wall but did not see them. The battles on the other three sides were picked out by thousands of flares, the blazing tar fires and burning catapult b.a.l.l.s, beautiful in the darkness.

'How are we going to find it, surr?' Irisis said.

'Ullii must get us there. You and I will block or destroy the node-drainer, if we can, and we'll try to get out again.'

'With the air-floater?'

He hesitated. 'Possibly.'

Irisis did not like the sound of that. It probably was was a suicide mission. She said nothing about that to Ullii, who was curled up under the bench, as usual. Irisis felt guilty enough already. Ullii was not speaking to her or Flydd. The meeting with Nish at the Aachim camp had added injury to her previous feelings of betrayal. a suicide mission. She said nothing about that to Ullii, who was curled up under the bench, as usual. Irisis felt guilty enough already. Ullii was not speaking to her or Flydd. The meeting with Nish at the Aachim camp had added injury to her previous feelings of betrayal.

The air-floater was now motionless in the still air, invisible in the mist. 'Come out, Ullii,' ordered Flydd. 'Show the pilot where to go.'

Ullii brushed past him, stormy-faced, and stood next to Hila. She said nothing, simply held her arm in the direction they had to go. The air-floater drifted that way. After a few minutes Ullii's arm swung straight down.

The machine dropped through the mist into clear air, settled and rocked gently on its skids. Outside it was as dark as the tar pits. The a.s.sault fires were just dull glows beyond the walls. The barrage of blazing b.a.l.l.s had stopped.

Ullii moved two steps and disappeared.

'Seeker,' Flydd hissed. 'Stay with us.'

She came back. Ullii knew where they they were. 'Hate you both,' she said audibly. were. 'Hate you both,' she said audibly.

'I beg your pardon?' said Flydd.

She did not deign to reply.

Flydd clipped his cord to her belt. Irisis did the same to his. The air-floater lifted, its rotor just ticking over. They felt its wind but could not see it.

'No sound,' warned Flydd. 'They can still hear us.'

'And smell us too,' Irisis muttered. She could feel her heartbeat in her temples. They were going to be caught. They were going to be eaten eaten.

'Lead the way, Ullii.' Flydd murmured words that took the spell off the air-floater, restricting it to them alone.

The seeker led them on a meandering route, like a snail trail across a brick path. Most lyrinx appeared in her lattice, so she knew how to avoid them. Most, but not all.

No one saw the lyrinx and of course it could not see them. It came running from the left, hit the cord between Irisis and Flydd, stumbled and fell. The impact sent them all flying. The creature sat up, a shadow that seemed to be feeling its ankle as it looked around in the dark. It had no idea what had happened.

Irisis held her breath. If she moved, it would hear her. She prayed that Ullii would not cry out. She could hear the creature sniffing, trying to work out what was wrong. She hoped it could not pick up their scent in the tar-laden air.

A knife shimmered as though moving by itself. It disappeared; the lyrinx gurgled; she smelt blood. It toppled forward.

'We need to keep a better watch,' said Flydd, wiping his blade on the corpse.

They crept across an open s.p.a.ce, holding their staves in front to probe for pits and mires. Ullii's talent could not always pick out physical objects.

'Bog!' She stopped abruptly, extracting her little foot with a sucking sound.

Irisis caught a stronger whiff of tar. There were many tar bogs in this saturated ground. One step too far and it might take five minutes to get out again. If alone, you would never get out.

'What the h.e.l.l's that?' hissed Flydd, staring back the way they had come.

'Looks like an attack on the southern wall,' said Irisis.

'That's not part of the plan.'

'Maybe it's the Aachim.'

'It had better not be. That'll ruin everything. Hurry, Ullii. I can't hold the cloaking spell much longer.'

Irisis might as well have been blind again; in the next hour she saw nothing at all. Only Ullii knew where they were going, for she was navigating by her lattice. But knowing where they were going was not enough. She had to find a way to get there and that was harder than it seemed. Ullii's mind had a unique and tormented logic.

Fortunately, Flydd had an uncanny grasp of directions and had memorised all the maps they had of Snizort. 'We must go down,' he said as they crouched in the concealment of two spindly thornbushes. 'From the way Ullii's pointing, the location is deep underground.'

'We already knew that.'

'How do we get underground?'

'There are steps down into all the old tar pits,' said Irisis. 'And tunnels leading underground off them.'

'But which pit?' he mused. Flydd stood for a moment, then squatted again. His knees popped in the still night.

A light grew in the sky behind them. A flaming catapult ball swished overhead, to thump into the ground close enough that they felt the impact. Irisis held her breath but the flames went out.

'I thought you gave orders about not firing into Snizort tonight?' she said.

'I did. b.l.o.o.d.y rabble. No wonder we're losing the war. Let's try the main pit. Can you find that, Ullii?'

'Yes,' she said almost inaudibly.

It was easy to forget she was with them. They skirted sucking bogs and the edges of pits that quaked like jelly underfoot. They walked trails of sticky tar before descending 741 steps into the biggest of the many pits on the map; they entered a cavern or tunnel that had an eye-stinging, bituminous reek. Irisis could feel the walls with her outstretched hands.

Flydd stopped just inside. 'I'd expect most of the lyrinx to be outside the walls, in the battle,' he whispered into the absolute dark. 'But not all. There will be guards within the tunnels, and other lyrinx moving about. Maybe hundreds. We have to be absolutely quiet.'

You're making all the noise, Irisis thought irritably. She was desperately afraid of this place.

'I'm having trouble holding the concealing glamour,' he went on. 'We'll have to be quick. If I lose it ...'

They went forward. Most of the tunnels were unlit. Irisis had no idea where they were and she knew Flydd was just as lost.

Ullii saw clearly and moved steadily on. She saw the enemy too. Thrice she alerted them just in time and they huddled in a pungent crevice or dripping hollow while lyrinx hurried by. They wandered a maze of tunnels until Irisis, without touching her pliance, began to feel feel the field swirling all around her. She had never experienced that before. They had been underground well over an hour. the field swirling all around her. She had never experienced that before. They had been underground well over an hour.

'How far, Ullii?' said Flydd.

She did not answer.

'Surely the place will be guarded,' Irisis said.

'From what? There are twenty-five thousand lyrinx outside. How could any intruder get this far?'

'We have! And we guard have! And we guard our our precious things.' precious things.'

'Lyrinx are not like us. They do not steal from each other; they do not sabotage or vandalise. Besides ...'

She detected an ominous note. 'What is it, Flydd? What aren't you telling us?'

'You would not station guards close to a node-drainer. If they were there too long it would begin to ... disrupt disrupt them.' them.'

A memory flashed back. 'Like the way it disrupted the rock of the mine at the manufactory?'

A long pause before he whispered, 'Precisely.'

'So this is going to kill us. It'll take our bodies apart.'

'Not if we're quick. Jal-Nish survived it, if you recall.'

She took him by the shoulders. 'How long before it disrupts us us, Xervish?'

'How the blazes would I know?'

'Ten minutes? An hour? A day?'

'Maybe an hour. Maybe two. Depends how strong it is, and how close we have to get to it.'

She stood in the corridor, unmoving. 'Irisis?' said Flydd.

'So be it.' They continued, but shortly she stopped again, allowing the seeker to move around the corner out of hearing.