'Leave me,' said Flangers. 'Can't walk.'
'Then crawl — I'm not leaving you behind. That was a mighty heave, Flangers. Any idea how we get out of here?'
One finger pointed to the right.
She discerned a series of ledges between the pitch spears, which might have been close enough together to form a track, though it would be a dangerous one.
'I'll carry Fyn-Mah. Bring the bag and the rope.' Unknotting the phynadr bag, she handed it to him.
'Don't think I can.'
'Just try,' she said. 'I can't get it back without you.'
Once more the appeal to duty lifted Flangers beyond what any normal man could have achieved. What a hero he was. And what a waste that such courage should be directed to so bloody an end.
It buoyed her up as well, and Irisis found the strength to lift Fyn-Mah onto her shoulders. She set off, trying not to think about the path ahead. It was killing work. Several times she had to hoist the perquisitor onto a higher ledge, hoping she would not fall off while Irisis clambered up herself. After a desperate twenty minutes they reached the other side. The black mouth of the tunnel was just above them. She pulled herself up into it and smelled fresh air.
'It's not far now, Flangers.'
They lurched along like two bloody wrecks, turned a corner and emerged halfway up a deep but narrow mine pit. The sky was just growing light, though not enough to illuminate the pit. 'At last,' said Irisis, limping on bloody, pitch-stained feet. She turned the other way. 'Where's the air-floater?'
"This isn't the pit we came down,' said Flangers, who, astonishingly, appeared to have rallied a little. 'We're in the wrong place.'
Irisis put Fyn-Mah down on the ledge. 'Then we'll have to climb.'
Flangers was staring at the rim. 'I can see something moving up there.'
They stepped back into the tunnel entrance. Fyn-Mah said, more clearly than before, 'Go round base of pit .., through tunnel . . , other side.'
'You're conscious!' Irisis wished she did not have to pick her up again.
The perquisitor did not answer. Hefting her, Irisis followed the path to the bottom of the pit, around the base and in through a tunnel that had not been visible in the black wall. They were underground for only a few minutes before emerging in a larger pit. The air-floater was waiting across the far side, right where they had left it, its four guards with their crossbows ready. Irisis pushed Fyn-Mah through the ropes, fell through herself and lay on the deck without the strength to rise. Two of the guards carried Flangers aboard.
Muss was already there, gazing up at the rim. He had assumed his old persona — the slim, middle-aged man she'd first met in Gosport — though he still looked frustrated and unhappy. So he didn't get what he went in for, Irisis thought. I wonder what it could be?
'Where were you when we needed you?' she snapped. 'On other duties,' he said, impassive again.
'Where are our mates?' cried a young soldier.
'Dead!' Fyn-Mah tried to sit up but sagged back against the wall of the cabin. 'Go up,' she whispered to Pilot Inouye. 'Out of crossbow range.'
The grapnels were pulled aboard. Inouye twisted a knob on the floater-gas generator and gas whistled up the pipe. The air-floater shot up out of the pit, rising above the hummocks and tar bogs of Snizort, and just in time. A detachment of some hundred soldiers had come through the broken eastern wall and were advancing towards the pit. They stopped and someone waved. Pilot Inouye turned to Fyn Mah. 'They're signalling. I think they want us to land.'
'Keep going!' said Fyn-Mah, forcing herself to her feet. She hung onto the rope mesh, swaying dangerously. 'I have other orders. Guards,' she said to the four men, 'ready your weapons. We cannot be taken.'
The soldiers looked uneasy, but complied. Irisis felt the hairs rise on the back of her neck. She took a crossbow for herself. The loyalty of these men had already been tested. Surely it would take little for them to mutiny — if Fyn-Mah was taken, they would be condemned with her.
On the ground, there was a flurry or activity at the front of the detachment. A black-robed figure waved its arms, a perquisitor Irisis did not recognise. A soldier put a speaking trumpet to his mouth.
'Land at once, whoever you are,' he boomed.
'Go higher!' hissed Fyn-Mah. Clinging death-like to the ropes, she shouted down. 'I may not. I'm on a special mission for Scrutator Xervish Flydd.'
The robed figure snatched the speaking trumpet. 'There is no Scrutator Flydd, only the condemned criminal, Slave Flydd.'
Fyn-Mah let out a muffled cry. She turned to Irisis and Flangers. 'What do I do now?'
'Follow your orders,' said Flangers unhelpfully.
'Muss?' she called.
Eiryn Muss was squatting on the deck, deeply immersed in his own thoughts, and did not answer. Whatever was bothering him, it was more important than their imminent demise.
'Land immediately, in the name of Acting Scrutator Jal-Nish Hlar!' shouted the figure on the ground.
'Perquisitor Fyn-Mah,' said Inouye, 'I must go down. I have a direct order from your superior.'
Fyn-Mah covered her face with her hands.
If the scrutator had fallen, what hope was there for any of them? 'You're risking everything on Flydd,' Irisis said. 'Do you think he can possibly rise again?'
Fyn-Mah groaned, then mastered herself. 'Scrutator Flydd ordered me to go on, no matter what happened to him, and so, I must. No matter what the consequences.'
Irisis felt Death look up from his work on the battlefield, rub a testing thumb down the blade of his scythe, and smile grimly.
The scrutators will torment us all,' cried Inouye, desperately defiant.
'I'm taking the air-floater,' Fyn-Mah gritted. 'If you won't cooperate, we'll throw you down to join your friends and Crafter Irisis will take over your controller.'
Irisis doubted that she could operate it, or that Fyn-Mah would be so ruthless, but the pilot did not know that.
Inouye licked her wind-chapped lips. The bond with the machine was intense, and pilots, like clanker operators, had been known to go insane after their craft was destroyed.
'They'll slay my man and my little children,' she said in a barely audible voice.
'Not if you're forced to it.' said Fyn-Mah in more gentle tones. 'Flangers, make a show.'
Flangers liked it no more than the pilot did, but he took Irisis's crossbow and pointed it at Inouye, in full view of those on the ground.
'This will ruin us all,' wept little Inouye. She obeyed and the air-floater lifted.
'Go north, with all speed,' said Fyn-Mah.
The soldiers on the ground fired their crossbows but the air-floater was out of range and the bolts fell harmlessly back. Someone ran to the broken wall, climbed it and began to signal frantically towards the command area.
'I feared this was going to happen,' said Fyn-Mah. 'With the scrutator lost, there's only one option left.' She groaned and slumped to the canvas deck.
Behind them, three black air-floaters rose from the mound next to the army command area, and followed.
'Or maybe none,' said Irisis, picking the perquisitor up and carrying her inside.
Part Two
Tears
Eleven
Gilhaelith was slipping ever deeper into the bottomless pit of tar and there was nothing he could do about it. He'd tried everything, but his geomancy was useless without some kind of a crystal to serve as a focus, and he had none. He'd even attempted to use one of his ever-troubling gallstones, but under the strain it had burst into jagged fragments that were causing him agony. Before they passed, should he live that long, he'd be wishing he were dead.
His only other resort had been mathemancy, that strange branch of the Secret Art Gilhaelith had developed long ago. It proved singularly useless. Mathemancy was a philosopher's Art, ill-suited to any kind of direct action, much less such immediate peril.