"Ishbel, I think we ought to --"

Axis broke off. There had come a cry above him -- not of horror or despair or even anger, but of sheer exultation.

It hadn't come from any member of the Strike Force.

Axis risked a glance upward through a break in the shield canopy. It was getting dark now, darker than he would have expected for this time of afternoon.

"Stars ." he muttered.

"What is it?" Ishbel said.

Death came a whisper, and then laughter.

"The rest of the Lealfast have arrived," Axis said, grabbing Ishbel by the upper arm and pushing her forward as fast as he could. "Bingaleal and his fighters. Twenty thousand at least, unless he lost a few thousand somewhere. s.h.i.t, Ishbel. s.h.i.t. We can't withstand the kind of barrage they can direct down on us. We have to get inside. Now"

"But there are still many thousands of Isembaardians waiting to cross into Elcho Falling, Axis! We can't abandon them!"

"We must," Axis said. "We can't save them, Ishbel." He was pushing her forward now, despite her protests, and shouting orders at the Emerald Guardsmen to cover them.

"I'll get you inside, Ishbel," Axis said, "then I'll do what I can for those remaining. You can't be lost."

"Don't be ridiculous, Axis. We can't lose you, either!"

"For all the G.o.ds' sakes, woman," Axis muttered, "get moving!"

He pushed her bodily through the men in front of them, not caring who he shouldered aside.

The next moment they were cringing close to the ground, pushed there by their Emerald Guard escort as a torrent of arrows stormed down. Axis tried to move, to say something, but then two of the guardsmen collapsed on top of him, dead, and Axis had to struggle to try to dislodge their weight.

Stars! They were still eighty or ninety paces from the entrance to Elcho Falling!

Men were screaming, shouting, dying all about them.

Then, suddenly, stunningly, silence.

Axis dared to push the dead guardsman on top of him to one side and look around, staring in wonder.

All the shields of the soldiers on the causeway, and of those waiting on the sh.o.r.es of the lake, had wondrously lifted into the air and were welded together, with what looked like bands of glowing turquoise, to form an impenetrable canopy above the Isembaardians.

Axis struggled up on one elbow, as did most of the men around him who were left alive.

"Maxel," Ishbel said, sitting up.

"What?" Axis said. "How?"

"This is Maxel's doing," said Ishbel. "He is back from the Twisted Tower."

" This," said an Emerald Guardsman close by, now rising to his feet, "is a memory from the Veins. Lord Maximilian once did something similar there."

" This," said Maximilian, stepping through the scores of men now rising to their feet, "is an adaptation of a trick that Drava, Lord of Dreams, taught me a long, long time ago. Quick now, Axis, look lively. I cannot hold this forever and it will take a good hour to get the rest of the Isembaardians inside."

Axis looked at Maximilian, quelling the urge to ask a mult.i.tude of questions, then gave a nod and moved back down the causeway, urging men forward. They could move much faster now that they did not have to try and shelter from arrows at the same time, and within minutes, once the injured and dead had been carried inside Elcho Falling, Isembaardians were trotting six abreast along the causeway.

Insharah appeared by Axis' side, and together they helped the remaining Isembaardians to reach Elcho Falling, with no further losses.

The final few score men had brought horses with them, dragging the terrified animals by the reins along the causeway. They must have cut the horse lines before they'd left the encampment, because the ma.s.s of Isembaardian horses from the camp followed their companions into the tunnelled archway, forcing both Axis and Insharah to flatten themselves against the walls to avoid the stampede.

"Are you sure Elcho Falling can take all these?" Insharah said.

"Elcho Falling is an amazing place," Axis replied.

Chapter 9.

Elcho Falling.

At the sound of Elcho Falling's ma.s.sive portal closing behind him, Axis sank down on his haunches, resting his back against one of the giant columns of the vast ground floor chamber. He was exhausted. He had not slept in almost two days, he had been driven to the edge both physically and emotionally, and he simply had no strength left with which to think, or plan, or solve.

And yet he had to do all three.

Somehow.

There were men and horses milling about, but they were gradually being sorted and redirected by Emerald Guardsmen, some of Georgdi's Outlander men and by the citadel's silent servants.

Axis closed his eyes, wondering if he could s.n.a.t.c.h just a few minutes sleep before he had to attend to that one thing that had been nibbling away at the back of his mind all day.

Inardle.

"Axis?"

He opened his eyes wearily. Maximilian and Ishbel stood before him, Ishbel leaning on her husband's arm for support.

"Come up to the command chamber," Maximilian said. "We need to talk." He offered his free hand and Axis sighed, took it, and allowed Maximilian to pull him to his feet.

They filed into the command chamber where, so it felt to Axis, this current crisis had begun over a thousand years ago -- and he'd been awake for all of it. Was it only a day since Maximilian had been murdered; only a day since he'd thought Inardle trustworthy, since he'd thought he'd loved her?

She was sitting in here now, on a stool against a far wall, her hands folded in her lap, her eyes downcast.

The perfect pose for the repentant traitoress.

Axis couldn't look at her. He averted his face, choosing to move to a chair as far distant from her as possible.

The Outlander general Georgdi was here, too, as was Insharah, Egalion, StarDrifter, StarHeaven and a dark, handsome man Axis did not recognise but who he supposed must be somehow a.s.sociated with the Isembaardians, perhaps a commander under Insharah.

He didn't care, he was too fatigued. Axis exchanged a brief word with StarHeaven and then his father, then slumped down in the chair.

Maximilian and Ishbel sat down where they had a clear view of everyone else, and Maximilian gestured at those few still standing to take seats as well.

"We are safe enough for the moment," Maximilian said, "although I cannot guarantee the morrow." He gave a brief smile. "The moment shall have to do for now. There is something I need to tell you, but first, perhaps, we need to review what has happened here. Georgdi, Egalion, how stands security within Elcho Falling?"

"Good, so far as I can tell," Georgdi said. "But who is to know what other traitors lurk in the shadows?" He glanced at Inardle as he spoke.

"Everyone who has entered Elcho Falling has been a.s.signed quarters," Egalion said. "Garth and Zeboath are attending the wounded as best they can, but many more will die from their wounds."

"For your part this night," Maximilian said, "I need to thank you, Egalion, and your guardsmen. We may all have been lost, had it not been for you."

Egalion nodded, like so many others, too tired to waste energy on unnecessary words.

"What other threats lurk, Axis?" Maximilian said.

"The Skraelings are coming," Axis said, rubbing at his eyes with one hand, "and they will be here as soon as they may. Eleanon has been reinforced with Bingaleal and his twenty thousand." Axis sighed, thinking. "Kezial and some few score thousand Isembaardian soldiers are roaming the Outlands somewhere, but who knows if they are a threat or if they'll be overwhelmed by the approaching tide of the Skraelings. But who am I to talk of what threats and treacheries we face? For that we have Inardle to ask."

He looked at her then and she raised her eyes and caught his gaze. Inardle's eyes were distraught, and Axis thought her a most talented actor. He hoped everyone else in the chamber saw through to the treacherous soul that she tried to hide.

"I will speak here," Ishbel said. "Inardle is no traitor, not to Elcho Falling. If she had been, she would have been spattered with the blood -- the blood of murdered Maxel -- that I cast from the Goblet of the Frogs. It did not stick to her. She did not betray Elcho Falling."

Axis banged his fist on the table, his exhaustion forgotten. "What? Have you not seen the murdered bodies of the Strike Force, Ishbel? Did you not see Isembaardian after Isembaardian cast down into death from the causeway? Could you walk the few paces to the window and look out on the waters which surround us and not see the corpses floating so thick the water is hid? Is Inardle not responsible for all --"

"No," Ishbel said.

"She knew this was going to happen!" Axis shouted as he rose to his feet, now joined by StarDrifter, who had leapt to his feet also, sending Inardle a look of implacable hatred as he did so.

"She knew it," Axis said, "and she said nothing."

"She was torn by twin loyalties," Ishbel said. "She was --"

"Sent here to betray us," StarDrifter said, "and this she did perfectly."

"Sit down, StarDrifter," Maximilian said, his tone moderate. "Both of you. And Axis, take a deep breath and calm yourself. I understand your anger, everyone here does --"

"Don't patronise me," Axis snapped, remaining on his feet.

"I am not patronising you!" Maximilian said. "I just want you to calm down so that we can hear what Inardle has to say! None of us has the energy to deflect such bitter anger, Axis. Please, just calm down and let myself and Ishbel talk to Inardle."

"I am not allowed to challenge her?" Axis said, his eyebrows raising.

"Not in the mood you are in now," Maximilian said. "Be quiet for the moment, Axis."

Axis hesitated, then gave a curt nod, sitting down and gesturing to his father to do the same.

"I think Inardle has a great deal to tell us," Ishbel said, "and I think she will. Inardle, you must have felt yourself in an impossible position."

Inardle looked at Ishbel, fighting back the tears. That single phrase of sympathetic understanding on Ishbel's part almost undid her. She had kept herself under such tight control from the moment she'd seen Axis walk into the chamber . . .

"Inardle?" Ishbel prompted.

"I was sent by Eleanon and Bingaleal to spy on Axis," Inardle said, her voice brittle and hard as she tried to stop herself from weeping.

"You put yourself through the horror at Armat's camp deliberately?" Axis said. "You allowed Armat to cripple you, and Risdon to rape you . . . all to get into my bed and my trust?"

Inardle could not look at him. She swallowed, then gave a tight nod.

"And look at her now," Axis said, his voice hard with hatred. "Her wings healed perfectly. Doubtless she could have healed herself any time she wanted, but no, she played the cripple well enough to engage our sympathies, and played BroadWing so that I would trust her above him. You are loathsome to me, Inardle."

She flushed and her entire body tensed.

"Leave it for the time being, Axis," Maximilian said. "For now it is information we need, not recrimination."

Axis grunted in disagreement, but he leaned back a little in his chair and stared studiously at the far wall, and the mood in the chamber eased a fraction.

"The Lealfast always meant to betray Axis, and Maximilian?" Ishbel said to Inardle.

"No," Inardle said, then cleared her throat to speak more clearly. "No. We were always undecided whether to offer our loyalty to you, Maximilian Persimius, as Lord of Elcho Falling, or to the One in DarkGla.s.s Mountain."

"You knew of the One," Maximilian said.

"Yes," Inardle said. "Always. We have known of the pyramid since the Magi first began its construction."

At the back of the room the dark, handsome man who Axis had noticed earlier, leaned forward very slightly, his eyes intense.

"We, the Lealfast," Inardle continued, "wanted power and we did not know who could best offer us that."

"Just power?" Maximilian said.

"We wanted also, want also, more than anything else, to be free of our half and half heritage," Inardle said. "Always we were half Skraeling and half Icarii, and both the Skraelings and the Icarii loathed us for it. We wanted our own ident.i.ty and purpose, not our half and half hatefulness. We wanted our own home, far away from the frozen northern wastes. We did not know who could best offer us all that we wished, Maximilian or the One."

"How did you know of the pyramid, and the One?" Ishbel asked.

"Two thousand years ago, give or take," Inardle said, "the pyramid known as Threshold, which you know today as DarkGla.s.s Mountain, was dismantled under the orders of the Magus Boaz and his half-brother Chad Zabryze, ruler of Ashdod. The gla.s.s was taken from its surface, the Infinity Chamber dismantled. Everything was buried, even the stone carca.s.s of the pyramid itself. Worship of the One was forbidden and his Magi were disbanded. The libraries of the Magi were burned."

Inardle's voice strengthened, and she looked about the room with far more courage than previously.

"But not everything in the libraries was burned and not all former Magi forgot their loyalty to the One, nor their learning and training. Five escaped northward. They travelled fast, and they travelled far, fearful always that somehow the soldiers of Zabryze would find them, or cause others to apprehend them.

"With them they carried the few scrolls and books pertaining to the One and Infinity that they had managed to save from the hateful fires of Boaz and his brother."

"I am descended from Boaz," said Ishbel. "You know this, yes?"

"I know this," Inardle said. "We were always wary of you."

"The Magi travelled northward," said the handsome stranger, "to your frozen wastelands? To the Lealfast?"