Tetrarch

How could he turn this situation around? If he could not, better make sure the Aachim did not find Tiaan or the flying construct. That could be the most deadly game of all, in which case he must try to learn all he could about the Aachim, so that when he fled he would have some intelligence to take back. That thought afforded Nish bitter amusement as he followed Minis, whose construct was hidden in the trees some distance away. Nish's life kept cycling back to the beginning. It seemed he was to be a prober, the lowest of the spying rank, after all. He let out an involuntary snort.

Minis turned back. 'Is something the matter, my friend?'

'I was just thinking how hard this job is going to be,' Nish said evasively. 'I've no idea where to begin.'

'We've been looking for Tiaan for some time. There are many people we can talk to.'

'Can you not use your gift, Minis?

'What gift is that?'

'Of foretelling.'

'It is as much a curse as a gift, for it comes only when it wants. I have no control over it. Well, hardly any. There was a time…' He looked away.

'What, Minis?'

'It is not right to say.'

He strode ahead and Nish had to trot to keep up with him. Nish felt a creeping unease. 'It's about me, isn't it? You've seen my future. Minis, if you have, you've got to tell me.'

'It doesn't help, Nish. It never can. That is the failing of foretelling, no matter how much we want otherwise.'

'Please, Minis.'

'It's not you, Nish, but a friend.'

'Who?

'I did not see – only the end.'

'The end?'

'I'm sorry. I wish I'd never mentioned it.'

'You have to tell me now. You saw one of my friends die?'

'Yes,' said Minis sombrely, 'but I cannot tell you who, or how, or when. Do not ask me any more about it.'

Nish did not, but it was never far from his mind that day, and every day thereafter. Who could it be? An old friend or a new, or one not yet made?

As they reached the construct, Minis said quietly, 'Thank you for saying nothing to my father.'

'I beg your pardon?' Nish said, deep in the future.

'About Tiaan. He can never understand what I feel for her. All he can see is that I'm Aachim and she is old human.'

'Many such partnerships are mentioned in our Histories,' said Nish, 'though few were happy ones. And there is the matter of issue. Any children would be blendings, sometimes with unusual talents, but more often mad. And, of course, you live much longer than our kind.'

'None of that matters to me. It would be different with Tiaan; I know it!'

'I hope so,' said Nish, thinking what a fool Minis was. Tiaan would never have him back. Even if she did, Vithis would make Minis's life a misery. The liaison would be a disaster and a true friend would do everything he could to prevent it.

And also, if Minis did find Tiaan, and develop a relationship with her, Vithis would end up with the flying construct. No one could stop that. It could not be allowed to happen. The flying construct would make Vithis too powerful. For the sake of humanity, he, Nish, must prevent it, and so he had to thwart Minis however he could.

He thinks I am his friend, yet secretly I'm working against him. Maybe I'm more like my father than I thought.

F IFTY

'You knew my sight was going to come back all along,' Irisis accused. 'That's why you were so mean to me.'

'I did not, which is why I said nothing. Sight often does come back after that kind of burn. Equally often, it does not.'

'So why were you so mean?'

'Perhaps I thought the lesson might be good for you.'

'It wasn't!' she snapped.

'You managed to overcome that disability,' Flydd said meaningfully. 'Without you, we would have learned nothing about the nodes.'

They stared over the rail for a while; then the scrutator said, 'On the other hand, maybe I'm just a mean-spirited old sod.'

'Maybe you bloody well are.' Flydd came over the side. 'Done it – I've set Jal-Nish's skeets free. That'll give us a few more days. Where's Ullii?'

'Usual place,' said Irisis.

Ullii was still hunched up in the corner of the cabin, under one of the canvas benches.

'Come out, Ullii.'

Ullii shook her head.

'What's the matter?'

'Don't beat me,' she whispered.

'Why would I beat you?'

Ullii was not going to answer that question. 'Scrutator is angry with me.'

'I've never seen him more cheerful. Come on.'

Ullii emerged reluctantly. 'You look well,' said Irisis. 'I think you might have put on weight lately.'

'Been hungry.'

He put his head around the door of the cabin. 'Hello, Ullii. Have you forgiven me yet?' He chuckled at his own wit.

'No,' said Ullii. Irisis slept what remained of the night and most of the following day, waking to discover that Oon-Mie and Zoyl were gone. She was sorry not to have farewelled them.

Each time she woke the view was much the same – towering peaks clad in snow and ice. From the manufactory the air-floater ran north-west then north, along the rim of the Great Mountains for a hundred leagues. That took two days. They then turned west, to cross at the point where the mountain chain that ran up the east coast of Lauralin, all the way to Crandor, met the vastness of the Great Mountains. The peaks were higher than the air-floater could rise so they had to follow a zigzag course up the valleys and over the lowest passes they could find. It was a wild, rocking ride that left everyone airsick.

'Where are we going?' she asked Flydd on the morning of the fifth day out of the manufactory.

'You'll see when we get there. Pray that Jal-Nish didn't have another skeet hidden somewhere.'

'Why?'

'Because if his version of the tale gets there first, we're done for.'

The air-floater was travelling slowly now, for they were a long way from the nearest node and the field was weak. The machine had descended until it was just skimming the ground. Higher up, the wind blew so strongly from the west that they could not move against it. Down here the wind was erratic, sometimes tossing them on unexpected updraughts, as suddenly ceasing altogether or carrying them as fast as a racing yacht.

Early the following morning, the air-floater turned south and headed towards the ground. The country had changed in the night. There were still mountains all around, but below lay a sunken land, rifted on all sides, with a flat desert bottom upon which lakes glistened. The ones in the middle had dried to salt. Many rivers ran into this desolate lowland but none ran out.

'Kalithras,' said Flydd. 'The Desolation Sink. What a miserable place.'

They were heading towards a dark structure on the southern edge of the sunken land, an escarpment that might have been a thousand spans above the floor of Kalithras, though all around the mountains towered to twice and even thrice that height. Straining her still-sore eyes, Irisis made out an immense fortress or bastion.

'Nennifer,' said Flydd gloomily. 'Our destination.'

A pair of skeets wheeled in the air high above the building, one coming, the other going. Flydd ran up to the pilot, pointing at the descending birds. The air-floater dropped sharply, racing toward Nennifer. A vast square building, four or five storeys high, covered by a mass of steep roofs, it made no concessions to either environment or aesthetics. Plain rectangular windows ran across the front and the front door was set right in the middle. Everything was symmetrical. It looked out of place and was meant to. The scrutators did not have to fit in. They controlled.

Out the front, an area the size of a parade ground was paved with stone all the way to the edge of the escarpment. 'Land there!' Flydd indicated a spot near the brink.

The machine thumped into the ground. Flydd sprang over the side, his eye on the wheeling skeet. Attendants ran out, grasping the tethers and tying them to shiny new brass rings set in the stone.

'Come on, crafter.' Flydd was pacing back and forth, his single eyebrow twitching. 'Ullii, you too. Now we shall see what we see.'