‘We will not give up the flisnadr,’ said the matriarch.
‘I know your deepest secrets,’ said Gilhaelith. ‘You’ll abandon everything else to recover the relics.’
‘You know nothing about us, Tetrarch.’
Nish couldn’t see how she found the strength to speak. And then a dozen lyrinx, diving out of the dazzle of the sun, plunged head-down straight for the thapter.
‘On the contrary,’ began Gilhaelith. ‘No! Kimli –’
She’d already acted. The thapter shot sideways, flinging Gilhaelith to his knees. ‘Bring the power patterner or lose everything,’ he shouted. The thapter shot away, soon to disappear into the northern sky.
The lyrinx in the air formed a circle and let out a series of shrill, wailing cries, echoed by the creatures on the ground. What would they do now? They’d been driven from their homes and lost the relics that mattered most to them, so what did they have to lose? Had he helped to precipitate Armageddon?
The lyrinx on the ground turned to attend to him, and Nish discovered that he was alone – the other soldier no longer had a head. He put up his hands, but the closest lyrinx seemed in no mood to accept his surrender, while another score of lyrinx were even now surrounding him. They landed heavily, puffing up more red dust. Nish had never seen such violent and threatening skin colours.
The nearest lyrinx caught Nish around the chest in a crushing grip. Its claws dug into his ribs, the enormous mouth opened and green saliva sprayed his cheeks. It was going to bite his head off. He closed his eyes.
‘Thlamp!’ said a female voice. ‘Inixxi rurr!’
The lyrinx dropped him on the ground and put its foot on him. Nish opened his eyes. The lyrinx that had spoken was unlike any of the others. It was slender, relatively speaking, with enormous pale wings that lacked pigmentation. Its skin was likewise uncoloured apart from the faintest tinge of green on its crest, indicating a mature female. Most unusual of all was the absence of armoured skin that protected the other lyrinx. Her soft outer skin, though coated with wax, was practically transparent. He could see her breasts through it.
‘I am Liett, daughter of Wise Mother Gyrull, who is now dying in agony because of you,’ the female said in the common tongue. ‘You are my prisoner and I’m going to see the colour of your blood.’
Liett’s wings caught the sunlight with a shimmering, pearly opalescence. Had he seen her before? Yes, he had. His eyes widened.
‘Do I know you, human?’ said Liett.
‘You slashed my balloon near Tirthrax, the winter before last. I was lucky to survive.’
‘Had I done the job properly,’ she said savagely, ‘we would not be here now. What is your name?’
He told her. She bent down and, though smaller and less muscular than the others, easily picked him up in one hand. Liett inspected him from top to toe. ‘There is a vague memory. You humans all look the same – like the squirming grubs we hooked out from under the bark of trees to feed the despised tetrarch.’
Liett tossed him into the dust. ‘Bind him tight,’ she said to the other lyrinx, though in the common tongue. ‘If he tries to escape you may eat his feet and lower legs, if you can stomach them, but no more. I don’t want him to die until after we have questioned him; and he has answered.’
Nish was bound hand and foot and left on the ground. Liett crouched beside her mother, spreading her beautiful wings to shade the dying matriarch. After giving Gyrull a drink from a canister on her hip, Liett spoke to her at length in low tones, in the lyrinx tongue.
She kept pointing to the northern sky and shaking one fist, as if counselling an all-out attack. The gathered lyrinx flashed the same aggressive reds and yellows as Gyrull had displayed earlier, but now Gyrull’s colours were muted pinks and purples, in swirling patterns that Nish interpreted as soothing or conciliatory. Acquiescence to Gilhaelith’s demands? More likely it would be feigned acquiescence until they recovered the relics, followed by an overwhelming onslaught to destroy the man who had so insulted them. And he, Nish, had been part of that sacrilege. He could expect no mercy either.
Liett glanced at him, her expression only marginally less threatening. She turned back to her mother, though this time she seemed to be presenting a different argument. She went to her knees, bowed low and spoke in a submissive way, looking up sideways at the matriarch.
Gyrull spoke so quietly that Nish didn’t catch a word, though Liett seemed vexed at her reply. She began her pleading anew but Gyrull only shook her head.
‘Ryll!’ she said.
Liett stood up abruptly. ‘Ryll?’ she repeated, as if dumbfounded.
‘Ryll.’
Liett turned away and stalked across the dirt, raising a storm of dust. She came back at once, trying to look contrite, and bowing until her head touched the ground. The matriarch said something in the lyrinx tongue. Liett called her fellows and they formed a tight circle, lifting Gyrull to her feet, supporting her and leaning over her with their foreheads touching. They began to chant.
Gyrull was beyond healing, as they must realise. He had the impression that they were combining their powers to broadcast a sending to their brethren, telling them of the theft, and Gilhaelith’s demand.
The chant built up until it became a thigh-slapping, foot-stamping roar. Finally, with a cry that went ringing across the plain, they broke apart and all flopped down, panting.
All but one. The matriarch swayed on her feet for a moment. She turned her head and her golden flecked eyes met Nish’s, but she was already dead. The air rushed from her chest with a sighing sound and she fell into the dust.
Liett enveloped her mother in her wings, held her for a minute then let her go. She stood up and signed to the group, who began to excavate a grave with their claws.
Stalking across to Nish, Liett lifted him again. ‘The call has gone out,’ she said between her teeth. ‘While we wait, I will talk and you will answer.’
SIXTY-THREE
Nish told Liett as little as he could without seeming uncooperative. Fortunately he had no idea what Flydd’s plans were.
After the interrogation was over, the lyrinx separated. Liett picked Nish up in her claws and carried him, dangling like a rabbit in an eagle’s talons, on a long flight north-west. She flew for the remainder of the day, stopping at dark in a nondescript range of hills where she tied him to a tree while she went hunting. He hung there miserably, the claw punctures in his back and sides throbbing. She soon returned with a small, black-haired goat which she skinned and ate, bones, entrails and all.
Once she’d licked the blood off her chin and hands, Liett freed Nish’s hands and tossed a freshly skinned rabbit at him. It hit him wetly in the chest and fell to the dirt.
‘What am I supposed to do with this?’ he said.
‘It’s all the dinner you’re getting.’
‘But it’s raw!’
She took it back and ate it with a few appreciative gulps, head and all. She retied his hands, lay down and went to sleep. Nish didn’t sleep a wink. Before dawn they were off again, and eventually he recognised the long expanse of Warde Yallock, the largest lake in Lauralin.
Near the northern end of the lake she wheeled over the water several times before flying into a cave among hundreds that honeycombed vertical cliffs a hundred spans high. At the entrance she set Nish down while she folded her wings. He looked over the drop and his stomach churned. It was possible to climb up or down, if you were a lyrinx with clawed feet and hands, or fly in and out. Since he couldn’t do either, the place was as secure as any prison.
Liett spoke to the guard by the entrance, who pointed around the corner to the next cave. Taking Nish under one gamy arm she climbed across the sheer rock face and inside. Not far from the entrance, working in the light, was a wingless male who was also vaguely familiar.