‘That was close,’ said Irisis, seemingly unperturbed.
Tiaan’s knees had gone weak. ‘Thirty seconds.’ You trust me more than I trust myself, she thought.
She lined up with the cleft between the cliff and the pinnacles. At this speed there was no room for error or, hopefully, for a successful counterattack. Two lyrinx on the pinnacles had rocks above their heads, the third a javelard. The sphere of lyrinx in the air were armed with crossbows or other weapons.
‘Ten seconds.’ Irisis relayed it to Nish at the same moment, then counted them down.
‘Five, four, three, two –’
‘No!’ Tiaan screamed, pulling the thapter up so hard that her stomach churned. ‘No, Nish, don’t throw the spores.’
She flicked a glance at the openings as she passed. With an almighty crash, a boulder struck the left flank of the machine, which lurched sideways towards the cliff. There was a lyrinx right in front of her, aiming a crossbow. No time to turn or climb; the thapter ploughed straight into the creature as it fired. Purple blood streaked the screen but Tiaan had no idea where the bolt had gone. A clatter-clatter at the back told her that the machine had been hit several times. She prayed that they hadn’t got Nish.
She shot through the circle of lyrinx, up and over the cliff, streaking away, wavering because her hand was shaking so much.
‘Report!’ she said roughly.
‘I’m all right,’ said Irisis. ‘And I think Nish is, though his hood was hit by crossbow bolts a couple of times.’
‘Did he throw out the dust?’
‘No. What was the matter?’
‘I knew something was wrong,’ said Tiaan. ‘It was a decoy. They were waiting outside a shaft they’d already closed off.’
‘It’s going to be mighty hard to make a second attempt,’ said Irisis.
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.