‘Then it is a rot within the colony, that someone has dared such a thing,’ Claeon murmured, more to himself than Teornis. ‘Perhaps it was her they came for, after all, and they took away the landsmen just because they were there. I am betrayed. There are spies in the palace, there must be. Who can I rely on?’ He looked up keenly. ‘Your fellow prisoners, they knew nothing of Aradocles? You swear it?’
‘That name was unknown to all of us,’ Teornis confirmed.
‘And yet… perhaps they might now find him, if he remains alive to be found,’ the Edmir told himself.
‘As might I,’ Teornis put in carefully.
Claeon stood up abruptly. ‘I do not trust you,’ he told the Spider. ‘I will not trust you unless I must. Your comrades have escaped, but I shall regain them. My hunters seek them out even now. I shall have them back and, when I do, I shall rework them on my benches so that they shall not be capable of flight a second time.’
He stormed out, leaving Teornis rubbing his chin speculatively and feeling pieces of a plan begin to fall into place.
Heiracles’s face tightened on hearing the news. ‘In what form?’ he demanded.
‘Dart-cavalry are close. Our scout signed for Onychoi as well,’ his man reported.
‘Hold them off,’ the lean man ordered, and the messenger went running for the hatch, ascending the ramp in great strides. Heiracles looked round at Paladrya and the two land-kinden. ‘They cannot breathe water, I take it?’ he snapped, indicating the caul that Stenwold still held.
‘Boss, there’s precious little they can do,’ Wys told him.
‘I cannot carry them with me. My entourage and I rode here, and it were best they left here separately, so as to confound pursuit. Gribbern…’
The dark man sighed. ‘Don’t reckon I much fancy it but, then, Nemoctes would do it if he were here. Shame he’s not, really.’
‘Gribbern, just give me a straight answer!’ Heiracles held his temper with difficulty.
The other man gave a monumental sigh. ‘Reckon I might take one, just about. Just one, mind. My Pserry won’t fit more, is my thinking.’
‘I’ll take the little one,’ Wys put in quickly.
‘This wasn’t what I wanted from you-’ started Heiracles.
‘It’s what you need, though, right? We can talk payment when we meet again.’
‘Gribbern can hide in the weed. Your barque will never outdistance dart-riders.’
‘My barque, chief, can look after itself. They’ll hit rough waters if they come after me,’ she promised. ‘You, squib, you’re mine.’ She dragged at Laszlo’s arm, and the little man gave Stenwold a wide-eyed look.
‘Go with her. We’ll meet again.’
‘But where? These clowns haven’t even got a plan, Ma’rMaker!’ Laszlo protested, pulling against Wys. ‘Who’s going to look after you?’
‘Just go.’ Stenwold forced a smile. ‘Be safe.’
‘I’ll send word by the Pelagists,’ Heiracles told Wys.
‘Right, boss.’ She hauled Laszlo up the ramp, with her crew following. The last Stenwold saw of the Fly was a caul being dragged over his still-protesting mouth.
‘Paladrya, will you ride with me?’ Heiracles proffered a hand.
‘Do I have a choice?’
‘Under the circumstances, no.’
‘Then I would be delighted,’ she said pointedly. ‘Land-kinden.. .’ She turned her wide eyes on Stenwold, who was losing familiar faces by the second. For a second she stared at him, despite Heiracles’s obvious need to be gone.
‘Paladrya,’ Stenwold acknowledged and, to his surprise, she embraced him briefly, a moment’s clasp, her cheek to his, and then she was pulling away. ‘Good fortune.’
‘And you,’ Stenwold said. He turned to Gribbern, seeing little to inspire confidence in that dour, stone-pocked countenance.
‘Reckon you’d better come with me,’ the man grumbled, and headed up. Stenwold met Paladrya’s eyes once more before he followed.
In the water once more, back in the grip of the cold and the breath-stopping clench of the sea, Stenwold saw Gribbern kick off from the shell’s hatch and descend towards the bottom, his grey coat billowing around him like shabby wings. With no option, Stenwold did the same, paddling ineffectually at the water, while feeling a gentle current drift him towards the wall of tangled weed. He never really landed at all, only got close enough to the mud of the sea-floor to kick it into clouds of sediment, as he lurched and bobbed towards Gribbern’s waiting figure. The sea-kinden was gazing upwards, his arms dejectedly by his sides. Stenwold glanced up and saw shapes passing in the faint light of the shell-house’s lamps. They were swift, streamlined, and they were duelling as fiercely as any Exalsee aviators, darting against each other in a swirl of speed. Two clashed together, and he had a glimpse of riders crouched over couched lances, closing, then breaking apart in a swirl of dark blood.
Or ink? They were riding squid, he saw, and riding them bizarrely backwards, with the beast’s head and trailing tentacles to the rear. They carried nothing more than lances, no bows or thrown spears or anything like modern weapons, and he wondered how far a crossbow bolt would travel with any force, down here.
He saw Wys’s barque move off ponderously through the water, banking across the face of the weed. One of the darting squid made a pass at it, but turned abruptly as it got close, zigzagging wildly away and almost unseating its rider.
Something caught at his sleeve and he thought instantly of clutching tendrils, and tried to kick away. His eyes found Gribbern’s long-suffering face, though, and the sea-kinden was pulling him along, not swimming but walking over the seabed in great, bounding strides. Stenwold caught his breath, such as it was, when he saw their destination: the woodlouse-thing, grazing quietly at a stand of weed, with its long antennae flicking mildly at the water.
I’m running out of air already, Stenwold thought. I can’t just sit atop that thing while it waddles off. Gribbern’s tugging was insistent, though, and soon they found themselves in the shadow of the enormous creature. Abruptly, Stenwold was released, feeling himself begin to choke inside the caul. Gribbern had kicked off from the bottom, and vanished briefly behind the curved horn that was the near side of the monster’s head. Then he reappeared, gesturing urgently, and Stenwold made a tremendous effort, and jumped.
He made precious little headway, but it was enough for Gribbern to catch his outflung hand and pull him effortlessly the rest of the way. There was a gap there, like a vent or gill where the beast’s head joined the first segment of its body, and it was just large enough for a man to squeeze into. Gribbern seemed intent on forcing him through there and, with no other option, Stenwold pulled and grabbed and wriggled until he was suddenly inside a small chamber beyond. A moment later, Gribbern had joined him, not without some effort, and he ended up with his knees jabbing Stenwold’s chest, and Stenwold’s elbow in his eye. The chamber shook, and the wall at Stenwold’s back parted, spilling water into a further space beyond. He fell backwards, fighting to loosen the caul, and got it off with a great whoop of breath.
The air was stale-smelling in here, and there was only a single yellowish lamp. There was precious little for it to illuminate, either: a few seamless-looking lumps of shell that Stenwold guessed were containers, and a scattering of clothing that included another coat like Gribbern’s, a pair of thick leathery gauntlets and some long strips of cloth of uncertain function.
‘Where are we?’ he asked. The water that had come in with him was now draining away somewhere.
‘Home,’ Gribbern said shortly. The entire room pitched sideways, and then righted itself, and Stenwold realized that they were inside the monster, and that the monster was under way.
‘You… live in this thing?’
‘Pserry and I live together.’ One of Gribbern’s hands rose to stroke the room’s side with surprising tenderness. ‘Been forty years now, for Pserry and me. We’re too old for all of this chasing about, but we were the closest, more fool us, and Nemoctes and the others couldn’t get here in time. Our bad luck, that. Yours, too, otherwise you’d have had better quarters, no doubt. Still, you’re here now, so we’ll both have to make the best of it.’