‘Scrutator Flydd has been outvoted,’ said Malien. ‘The governors have decided that your people are to be expunged. We’re here because we cannot agree to genocide. Yet neither do we want another war the like of which the world has suffered. Accordingly, we have a proposal.’
When she did not go on, Liett said, ‘What is it?’
‘Tiaan?’ Malien prompted.
‘Vithis the Aachim built a tower on the pinnacle of Nithmak,’ said Tiaan, ‘some forty leagues south-west of here.’
‘We’ve seen this watch-tower from the air,’ said Liett. ‘What of it?’
‘It’s not a watch-tower. It was designed to create a portal, to bring Vithis’s lost First Clan home from the void.’
‘The decadent Aachim could not survive there,’ said H’nant in a purring growl.
‘Not even in their constructs?’ said Malien in a frosty voice.
H’nant sneered at the very idea.
‘It doesn’t matter,’ said Gilhaelith. ‘They were found in the middle of the Dry Sea – dead! However, the portal remains.’
‘Get on with it,’ said Liett.
‘There is a world called Tallallame,’ said Tiaan. ‘The third of the Three Worlds.’
‘We know of it.’ Ryll shifted uncomfortably, then glanced at Great Anabyng, who remained expressionless.
Irisis couldn’t help wondering why neither the matriarchs nor their truly great mancer were taking part in the meeting.
‘It is a paradise of forest, lake and meadow,’ Tiaan went on, ‘the most beautiful world that ever was, according to the Faellem. The Tale of the Mirror tells that Tallallame was also … invaded by creatures from the void when the Forbidding was broken. Thranx went there, as well as lorrsk and other savage creatures. Its native people, the Faellem, are no more. Or at least, they are civilised no more.’
‘Am I to take it that you’re offering us a choice?’ said Ryll with a savage smile. ‘To go to Tallallame and attempt to wrest it from the creatures that now possess it, or stay here and die?’
‘No creature could be better fitted for Tallallame than lyrinx,’ said Tiaan.
‘It’s a trick,’ said Liett. ‘They’ve come here to torment us – to offer us hope then snatch it away again.’
‘All we want,’ said Malien, ‘is for the war to be over with no more killing on either side.’
‘Words are always more convincing when they’re backed up by deeds,’ said Ryll. ‘How do you plan to demonstrate good faith?’
‘I have your sacred relics in the thapter,’ said Malien. ‘I would give you the first crate now, and the others at the gate.’
‘I didn’t know that!’ cried Tiaan.
Malien smiled. ‘It was such a short flight that no one went down the ladder. Gilhaelith and I pulled a little trick on the guards, though we had the devil of a job getting the crates down the hatch by ourselves.’
Ryll stood up to his full height, quivering with emotion, and his skin colours flared so brightly that they lit up everything inside the circle. ‘Show us the relics.’
Inside the thapter the lyrinx squeezed downstairs, in small groups, and the lids were taken off. Ryll, who came last, stared down into the crates, one after another, his skin muted now in consideration of the others. Finally he motioned for the lids to be refastened and clambered out.
‘We could take the crates,’ he said.
‘And what better faith could we show than by bringing them here?’ said Malien. ‘But if we gave them to you at Nithmak it would save you carrying them forty leagues. That would save lyrinx lives, I’m sure.’
‘What makes you think you can open this gate?’ said Liett in a low, disturbing purr.
‘Vithis gave me the key.’ Malien showed them the sapphire rod.
‘And how would you direct it to Tallallame?’
‘I know the way of old,’ said Malien.
‘I don’t trust them.’ Liett snapped her grey teeth. ‘They mean to send us back to the void.’
‘Why would they bother?’ Ryll said patiently.
‘To salve their precious consciences. Truly these weaklings would not survive a day there. Not even an hour!’
‘Not even the void would be as bad as being herded here, like beasts in our own ordure, until we die of thirst,’ said Ryll, whose skin showed truce-blue again. ‘We survived in the void before; if we must, we can do so again. But Tallallame, Liett.’ He reached out to her. ‘Just think of it! A beautiful world all for ourselves. For that, I would take the chance.’
‘And I,’ said H’nant.
Plyyr hesitated. ‘There are places in the void of unimaginable savagery; places that are worse than dying here. I mistrust this offer. They don’t want to salve their consciences; they seek the bitterest revenge they can inflict on us.’
Ryll looked to Great Anabyng as if for guidance. He glanced at the silent women, who nodded as one. ‘The former matriarchs do not vote, and neither do I. Our time has passed,’ Anabyng said in a deep growl. ‘For myself, my beloved consort, Gyrull, is dead and I will soon join her. I would not have our bones sundered by the void. You must decide – that is why you’ve been appointed.’
‘And swiftly,’ said Ryll. ‘We have little water left. Already our little children are suffering. In three days they’ll start to die. In five, only the hardiest will be alive. In seven days, none of us.’
‘You have been appointed leader, in defiance of all convention,’ snarled Liett with another snap of her magnificent wings. ‘You boasted of all the marvels you would do. Then lead us!’
‘What convention is that?’ Tiaan asked curiously.
‘That we be led by a revered matriarch, not an unmated, wingless monstrosity of a male.’
‘Matriarch Gyrull appointed me before she died,’ he said mildly. ‘Your own mother. You yourself told me so.’
‘She was out of her mind with pain,’ Liett said.
‘Great Anabyng confirmed her intentions. Besides, I did not boast. Matriarch asked me what I would do if I were leader, and I told her. I had no desire to be patriarch. We’ve not had one in three thousand years.’
‘So that’s how you see yourself, you unmated male dog!’ cried Liett in a passion. ‘The last patriarch was a disaster; that’s why we never took another. And you will be even worse.’
Ryll turned his back on her, saying to the others, ‘I know Tiaan and I trust her. Malien, too, I know to be a woman of honour.’
‘They’re the only two in all humanity!’ hissed Liett.
Ryll ignored her. ‘I will go through the gate, and if it leads me asunder, even to the most desperate recesses of the void, I will do all I can to lead us out again.’ His eyes shone in his fervour. ‘What about you, Liett?’
‘I will not follow any unmated male unless the vote is entirely against me.’
‘Since when do lyrinx vote?’ said Ryll mildly. ‘We do what our leaders, in their wisdom, have decided.’
‘You broke the custom,’ she snapped. ‘I demand a vote.’
Ryll’s gaze rested on each of the lyrinx, then he nodded. ‘And how do you vote?’
‘The past must not bind the future,’ said Great Anabyng. ‘I will not vote.’
The former matriarchs also declined. The other three lyrinx gave Ryll their vote. Liett did not.
‘Not just us,’ said Liett. ‘All the lyrinx must vote.’ She swept around the circle of lyrinx with one arm.
‘We are over half a million,’ Ryll said. ‘It would take days to count.’
‘So be it.’ Liett folded her arms across her breast.
‘Do you want the small children to die, and the old folk, because of this delay?’
‘In the absence of our matriarchs, I demand that convention be followed.’
‘Come with me. Look at the state of the children.’ Taking Liett’s arm, he led her away from the other lyrinx. He had to drag her for the first three steps, whereupon she cuffed him hard over the side of the head and, mollified by the display of aggression, went willingly.