‘That’s the broadside,’ said Nish, looking up. ‘We’ve got about thirty seconds until they reload. Come on – through to the next alley.’
They ran through the gap, emerging just as the thapter appeared at the other end. The mechanism shrilled as it shot towards them, stopped, and the hatch sprang open. They scrambled up the ladder.
Nish was coming up, one-handed, when he realised that Irisis wasn’t behind him. Had she been shot as well? He leapt down, looking around frantically. She was staggering down off the pile with a limp and bloody Flangers over her shoulder.
‘You imbecile!’ Nish wept. ‘He’s dead. Leave him.’ Both air-dreadnoughts were turning into position, carefully maintaining a safe distance from each other in the wind, which was pushing them to the east. He threw himself up the ladder. ‘Malien? Have you a crossbow?’
She handed it out to him, carefully, for it was already loaded and cocked. Irisis wouldn’t make it before the archers were ready to fire. Nish hooked a leg inside the hatch to brace himself, steadied the bow with his splinted arm and aimed, trying to do deliberately what he’d once done by accident.
He fired at the left-hand rotor of the upwind air-dreadnought. It was more than a span across and at this distance he could hardly miss, though that wasn’t what bothered him. His worry was that the bolt would pass straight between the blades of the rapidly spinning rotor and out the other side.
Fortunately it did not. It struck one of the wooden blades, which shattered, and the unbalanced rotor immediately tore itself to pieces. With the other rotor going full bore the air-dreadnought slewed around, caught the wind and drifted towards the downwind machine. Its pilot turned as hard as she could, the outer airbags touched but unfortunately did not tangle, and it raced out of the way, downwind.
The damaged craft was full-on now, and the soldiers might have fired their broadside, had they not fled from the near collision. By the time their officers had cursed them back to the rails the craft had been carried out of range.
Nish climbed down, keeping a wary eye on the third air-dreadnought, now racing their way. He assisted Irisis up the ladder as best he could and Yggur helped her to carry Flangers below. Nish clambered in last.
Malien lifted the thapter off and curved away from their pursuer, raising an eyebrow at Flydd. ‘To Fiz Gorgo?’
‘Not while Fusshte is alive,’ he said grimly.
‘I don’t see what we can do about him.’
‘Just circle round while I think. Make the thapter go erratically, as if there’s something wrong with it. Nish, get ready with the crossbow.’
Malien shrugged and did as Flydd had asked. The damaged air-dreadnought rotored away, then dropped grapnels onto the far wall of the yard, holding the machine in place while the crew tried to make running repairs. The other two air-dreadnoughts were circling, keeping their distance for the moment, watching the thapter.
‘Which one is Fusshte’s?’ said Flydd, holding himself rigidly upright. His eyes glittered and a muscle was twitching at the corner of his mouth.
‘The one on the left,’ Nish said carefully, realising that Flydd was so angry he was barely in control. He wound the crossbow awkwardly.
‘Are you sure?’
‘I can see him standing at the bow.’
‘Would you go closer, Malien?’ said Flydd.
‘The thapter isn’t invulnerable,’ she said. ‘A heavy javelard spear, fired from close range, could smash right through the mechanisms.’
‘I know!’ he snapped, ‘but we’ve got to finish the old Council, utterly and forever. Go closer.’
She circled around Fusshte’s air-dreadnought. He stood boldly at the rail, watching them with a contemptuous sneer. Fusshte knew Malien wouldn’t dare come close enough to shoot him and, armed only with a crossbow, they couldn’t do appreciable damage even if they fired into an airbag. The huge floater-gas generators would make up any loss from a tiny hole in the fabric of one of its five airbags.
Malien circled again. Fusshte gave orders to his signaller, who began to wave a series of flags. The two air-dreadnoughts turned in the thapter’s direction, approaching from either side. The javelard operators readied their weapons; the archers raised their bows. The third machine had rigged a canvas rudder behind its remaining rotor, and now it cast off its grapnels and came at them from a third quarter.
Malien began to turn away.
‘Stay!’ snapped Flydd.
‘They’ll shoot us down,’ said Malien, giving him an imperious Aachim stare.
‘Stay, damn you,’ said Flydd.
She ignored him. ‘When I’m in command I take orders from no man.’
Flydd jerked his hand out of the pocket of his cloak, thrust it in Malien’s face, and snapped. A glass phial burst in his hand with a white spray of light and an acrid stench that burned Nish’s nose for a moment.
When his eyes had recovered, Malien was sagging at the controller, barely able to stand, and the thapter was zigzagging across the sky.
‘Surr!’ Nish cried in horror. ‘What are you –?
Flydd thrust him out of the way and slammed his hand down on Malien’s right hand before it slipped off the controller. He jerked it over so hard that the thapter turned on its side.
Malien slammed into the wall, eyes closed. She reached up blindly with her free hand, caught the rail and tried to pull herself up. ‘Nish, stop him before he kills us all.’
What was he supposed to do? Nish wasn’t going to attack the scrutator. He uncocked the crossbow and dropped it behind him so there could be no misunderstanding, then stepped towards Flydd, uncertainly. ‘Surr,’ he said.
‘Get out of the way, Nish,’ snarled Flydd. ‘I should have done this the first time and no one is going to stop me.’ The thapter’s mechanism spun up to a roar and it shot forwards.
‘Nish!’ Malien said frantically. ‘Stop him. He’s gone mad.’
Nish reached for Flydd, but Flydd kicked sideways, striking him in the knee. Nish went down, but managed to catch Flydd’s foot and tried to pull him down as well.
Flydd fought him off. His teeth were bared in a savage grimace; he was like a man possessed. He kneed Nish out of the way, pinned Malien’s other hand, turned the thapter and roared straight at Fusshte’s air-dreadnought.
‘What are you doing?’ cried Nish, sure that Flydd had gone out of his mind.
Flydd didn’t answer. There came a clamour of voices from the lower hatch and Irisis came running up the ladder, but Nish couldn’t tear himself away from the sight in front of him. They were approaching the stern of the air-dreadnought at frightening speed. Flydd was flying directly at Scrutator Fusshte and he wasn’t going to stop.
Fusshte realised it and a spasm of terror crossed his face. For Nish it was almost worth it, to see Fusshte turn and run, then understand that there was nowhere to run.
One or two bolts struck the thapter though most of the archers couldn’t shoot for fear of hitting the huge rotors. The thapter hurtled towards the air-dreadnought. Fusshte glanced over his shoulder; Nish saw the whites of his eyes and, caught up in the madness of the moment, felt a surge of savage glee. The thapter wiggled at the last second and shot past the rotors, its slipstream making them flutter. Flydd twitched his hand and the machine struck the side of the air-dreadnought, knocking it sideways in a hail of shattered timbers and shredded ropes and canvas. The archers were thrown off their feet; three went over the side.
Flydd moved the controller again and the thapter smashed into the bow of the air-dreadnought, tearing part of it off and sending more of Fusshte’s troops plunging to their deaths. The thapter turned so sharply that Nish was crushed against the side. He got to his feet in time to see Fusshte dive into the central cabin.