Tetrarch

The skeet was gliding towards the rear of the building. Ullii was on the floor of the cabin, searching for her mask. Irisis got down with her.

'What is this place?' she called.

'Nennifer is the hidden bastion of the Council of Scrutators, and I don't expect they'll be pleased to see me. Or you, for that matter. Get a move on.'

'Ullii's lost her mask.' She added, 'I've never heard of Nennifer.'

'It was the most secret place in the world until M'lainte invented the air-floater. I believe it's come as a shock to the Council that Nennifer is no longer hidden.'

'Must have made it difficult for them to rule,' she said, 'being weeks journey from everywhere.'

'They've had plenty of practice. They use hundreds of skeets, as well as… never mind. The querists and perquisitors do most of the work, and not all of the scrutators dwell at Nennifer. Only those on the Council.'

'Here it is.' Irisis jumped out, reaching back for her pack.

'You won't need that,' he said. 'We won't be staying. Or if we do, you still won't need it!'

She flinched. 'Sounds ominous.'

'I didn't mean to alarm you.' He linked his arm through hers. 'Don't look nervous. That's a sign of weakness and as such is deadly here. At the Council of Scrutators you must laugh in the face of death.'

'Is that how you got your scars?'

He chuckled mirthlessly. 'I laughed at the wrong moment. Hush! They're coming.'

A big man strode towards them, scarlet robes flowing behind. Broad-shouldered and handsome, with a noble mane of dark hair and a full beard, he looked everything Flydd was not.

'That's Ghorr,' said Flydd. 'Chief of the Council. He is not my friend.'

Ghorr looked thunderous. Another group of robed individuals appeared on the broad steps behind him, ten in all. They were all sizes, shapes and races. Four were women, the rest men. None were young, but neither did any look ancient, though some, including Ghorr, were well over a hundred years old. But what every one of them did have was power. Irisis did not have to touch her pliance to tell that. They exuded power and unchallengeable authority and Irisis, whose contempt for authority ran deep, despised them for it. Authority was the first weapon of the Council and there was not a soul on Lauralin who had not felt it.

'You've got a damned nerve!' said Ghorr, 'coming here after what you've done. Guards!' He signalled over his head.

'Hear me, Ghorr!' Flydd said with magnificent arrogance. 'I may just save the war for you.'

'That's a claim we're accustomed to hearing,' Ghorr retorted. 'From frauds and liars.'

'You've not heard it from me before.'

'You don't have a lot of credibility left, Flydd.'

'If I haven't more than that charlatan, Jal-Nish -'

'I'd advise you not to take that tone,' said Ghorr.

'Are you prepared to listen or not!' Flydd snarled. 'If not, get out of my way and I'll be off again.'

Irisis caught her breath. His arrogance was breathtaking. She prayed he knew what he was doing.

'You won't be going anywhere, Flydd.' Ghorr gripped his arm.

'I would hear what he has to say,' said a small, dark woman named as Halie.

'And I,' said another woman, old and dumpy. Her sandy hair had been teased up into a nest which could not conceal that she was going bald. 'We can't afford to pass up any opportunity, no matter how…' she studied Flydd like a small worm on a large hook, '… disreputable the messenger.'

'Thank you, T'Lisp.' Flydd bowed in her direction, obsequiously low.

'Don't bother!' T'Lisp snapped. 'I'll be the first to see you flayed should your story fail you.'

'Very well,' said Ghorr. 'I'll give you leave to address the Council, Flydd, though I don't see it doing you any good. Who the hell is this?'

'This is Crafter Irisis Stirm, as you very well know.'

'The woman who slew a mancer though she is not one herself? I will speak to you later about that, crafter. And the other?'

'The seeker, Ullii.'

'Ah! Even so, they must stay behind, Flydd. No outsider may enter the Council.'

'Then we'd better meet on the front steps. Irisis and Ullii are vital to the story and there's no time to waste on pointless formalities. The war can be won, or lost, while we're standing here arguing.' They met on the cold steps, and the displeasure on the faces of the scrutators was manifest. Except for one, little dark Halie who, if not exactly looking pleased to see Xervish Flydd, at least did not appear hostile.

'We have discovered the secret of why the nodes are failing,' said Flydd without preamble.

The group muttered among themselves.

'The Council is listening,' said Ghorr finally, 'but we will not be swayed easily.'

'We have investigated three failed nodes,' Flydd said. 'The first, at Minnien, we found to be regenerating its field.'

'What?' cried Halie. 'This is very good news.'

'Should it prove to be true,' said Ghorr. 'What more have you to say about Minnien?'

'Only that we saw a lyrinx there. It removed an object that had been placed at Minnien some time ago. Afterwards the field quickly grew stronger. It would appear that they have built, or grown, a node-draining device.'

'It is as I suspected,' said Halie. 'Show us this object, Flydd.'

The scrutator faltered. 'I… don't have it.'

Suddenly every eye was on him and Flydd was no longer a worm on a hook; he was an insect being pinned to a board by a throng of cold-eyed philosophers.

'Why not?' Ghorr said with icy calm.

'They took it away.'

'And you allowed them to?'

'I did not realise the lyrinx had taken anything until later, when the node began to regenerate.'

'A costly failure. Had you brought back such a device, we might have reconsidered your position. As you have no evidence that it even exists, I can only assume you're lying to try to regain your standing. No one has ever found a node-drainer.'

Flydd restrained himself, though not without a struggle. 'They've been looking in the wrong place. It doesn't have to be close to the node.'

'In which case it can be anywhere, and impossible to find.'

'Ah!' said Flydd. 'But we did find one.'

That created a sensation. The scrutators began to chatter among themselves. 'He's lying,' said Ghorr.

Halie stood up. 'Where is it, Xervish?'

'In good time, my friend,' said Flydd. 'I must be allowed to give you the full tale.' He called upon Irisis to tell her version of what had happened at Minnien, which she did. One part aroused the interest of all, including the chief scrutator.

'Fields like two planes at right angles,' said Ghorr, glancing at his fellow scrutators. 'Can it be -?'

'We'll come back to that, if you please,' said Flydd.

'So the only evidence of a node-drainer was a few dried-up shreds of leathery plant,' said Halie. 'Not enough, Flydd. Did you do any better at the second node?'

'The one inland from Fadd we found to be completely dead. There was not the least trace of a field.'

'No news there,' said a short man with a black spade beard and a cross-shaped bald patch at the top of an ovoid head. Snake eyes glittered. 'You're not telling us anything we don't know, Ex-Scrutator Flydd.'

'I'm giving a damn sight more than you ever have for your councillor's badge, Fusshte!' said Flydd, so vehemently that the short man drew back. 'It was at Fadd that Crafter Irisis made the breakthrough. Tell them, crafter.'

'I merely wondered,' said Irisis, 'that if a node-drainer was at work, what was happening to all the power it drained. Wherever that power was going, there had to be proof of it.'

'Ahhh!' sighed Halie. 'So I was right after all. They do have a node-drainer.' She cast the others a bitter glance. 'Had the Council listened, we might have solved this problem years ago.'

'We hear a dozen crack-brained ideas every week,' said Ghorr. 'And without evidence, that's all they are. Get on with it, crafter.'

No one interrupted as Irisis told her story, after which the Council questioned her. The process was calm and measured, yet Irisis knew she was being weighed by eleven of the sharpest minds on Santhenar. And not just her words. Every flicker of her eyelashes, every drop of sweat on her brow, was evidence in their interrogation.