It was now or not at all. Irisis seized on one of those whorls and tried with all her strength to draw power. Nothing happened. Gritting her teeth, she wiped icy perspiration from her brow and tried again. Again nothing.
The perquisitor laughed. How Jal-Nish was enjoying this. 'You can't do it. You're a fraud, Irisis. You've always been a fraud. What a cautionary tale this is going to make. I can't wait to see the faces of the House of Stirm as the story is told.'
'I can do it!' she ground out. How dare he attack her family! Everyone knew his ancestors were upstarts who had whored and bribed and battered their way to the top. If she could have anthracised him she would have done it on the spot.
She tried again and again, until the sinews in her neck stood out like knotted cords. Irisis bared her teeth; a groan escaped, but not the least trickle of power came though into the controller.
Jal-Nish laughed aloud. Irisis wanted to smash his face in, but that had got her into trouble in the first place. She looked around wildly. The seeker had taken off her goggles and was staring at Irisis with frightening intensity. Strangely, it made the artisan think of scribbled marks on fans.
Closing her eyes, she prepared for one last try. Irisis plunged into a knot of that red mist, but now it was like a knot on a fan. As she hurled herself at it, the knot began to unravel, and then to open up like a rosebud, and a path unfolded inside that was unlike any path she had ever seen before.
Suddenly Irisis saw the way that had been closed to her and pulled so hard that she blacked out for an instant, cracking her head on the side of the clanker.
The clanker did not budge; the controller arms failed to flex in the slightest degree. She had failed. Irisis looked up for the cruel vindication on Jal-Nish's face.
The perquisitor had his head to one side. 'What's that?'
Her head was ringing; she could not tell.
'I don't know,' she heard the querist say.
'Flywheel spinning,' said Ullii.
The faintest ticking sound became a whirr, a hum, then a whine as the paired flywheels spun up to full speed. Somehow, incredibly, miraculously, the controller was drawing from the field.
'You did it!' cried Nish, hugging and kissing her on the brow. 'I knew you would.'
'It is her job,' Jal-Nish said sourly. 'I don't see why you're making such a fuss about it. Get the others fixed and let's get after the lyrinx.'
Irisis tuned the other three controllers to the field and instructed their operators on how to get them going. When that was done she went back to her clanker and touched Ullii on the cheek with her fingertips, silent thanks. She had no idea what Ullii had done, or how she had shown her the way, but that did not matter. It was done and she had a temporary reprieve. Nothing else had changed. Irisis knew she could no more do it by herself than before. Her need for the crystal was as urgent as ever. On the afternoon of the fifth day they caught a glimpse, when the weather cleared briefly, of a cliff-bound plateau not far away. From Ullii's latest directions, the lyrinx had gone straight toward it. They went carefully thereafter, not moving until dark and travelling though the night. Jal-Nish was working on a plan to take the enemy by surprise. He spent a lot of time with Rustina, the red-haired sergeant of the troop which had joined them at the river. The two squatted by themselves, he talking, she drawing with her knife on the snow. Whatever was decided Jal-Nish kept to himself.
'No doubt father is planning to spring another triumph on us,' Nish said sourly to Irisis.
'He has to keep proving his cleverness…' She broke off as Jal-Nish approached.
'What if they have a town there?' Nish said to his father.
'Up there? At most it will be a small clan grouping.'
They reached the cliffs some hours before dawn, having veered away from the lyrinx's path in case a lookout was kept. There was no danger at the moment, for the air was full of blown snow and the top of the plateau could not be seen. They camped in a fold behind a hill, a hiding place if the weather cleared suddenly. Conference was held at the base of the cliff. Everyone was called to it, even Ullii, though she was allowed to watch from the open hatch of the clanker.
'What do you know of this place?' the querist asked Arple.
'I've heard of it,' the sergeant replied, his hand upon the yellow riven rock. Wind had fretted it into little clusters of box shapes, outlined a deeper yellow-brown. 'People dwelt up there once, shepherds of mountain sheep and goats, but the weather turned cold forty years back and one year there was no summer at all. The flocks starved; the people died or left. Nothing can survive there now.'
'Except lyrinx!' Jal-Nish said sourly. 'And surely they do not eat the rocks. Who among you has been atop? Speak up and you will be rewarded.'
'I believe Wulley is acquainted with the place, surr,' said Arple after a long hesitation. 'Wulley…'
A hard-bitten veteran spoke from the shadows. His voice was as soft as butter and never rose above a whisper. Irisis's eyes sought him out in the darkness. A heavily muscled man, though with the legs of a dwarf, his face was scored with scars, clan marks. Another went across his throat, which explained the voice. She wondered how he had survived such a wound.
'I know it from when I were a kiddie, surr. Were a robber band there for a while. Brought terror and ruin to Yellow Nodey, Consummine, Tungstate and a dozen other villages nearby.'
'I did not know there were any villages up here,' said Jal-Nish.
'Aren't any more. Famine and plague got what the robbers did not, more'n thirty year ago.'
'What do you know of this plateau, soldier?'
'Garrihan it's called, surr, which means tabletop mountain in our dialect. Least, it used to. I'm the only one to speak it now, and when I'm gone…' He trailed off.
'What's on top of Garrihan, Wulley?' asked Arple.
'Top is shaped like an egg, surr. The pointy end faces us. It'd be a solid day's march across, in the snow.'
'It's about three leagues long,' said the querist, who was holding a map up to the light. 'And two wide. It would take a good force to watch all that edge. It's flat you say, Wulley?'
'Pretty much. There's gentle hills and gullies down the other end. No high places where they could keep watch, though.'
'Where would they camp if they were up there?' Jal-Nish asked.
'Down the round end. In the gullies you can get away from the wind, and there's water, when it's not frozen.'
'Sounds like this end is the best place to go up,' said Jal-Nish, 'if the weather stays bad. Show us on the map, soldier.'
Wulley came out, walking like a bear on its hind legs. Irisis pressed closer. Pointing to the eastern side of the round end with a battered, nailless finger, the soldier said, 'Was a stair here, when the robbers held it. That'll be guarded, if the beasts haven't destroyed it. Lyrinx don't need stairs. Village was here. Winds are perishing anywhere else.'
'Where would you go up in secret?' Arple asked.
Without hesitation, Wulley replied, 'Just here, across the tabletop from the stair, surr. The edge is all broken and there are rocks and boulders. Easy to hide but hard to guard. You can't see far. Bugger of a climb, though.'
'We're ready for that,' Jal-Nish said smugly. 'The troop that came with the fourth clanker are all climbers. I'm prepared for every contingency.'
Except my fist in your face, Irisis thought, taking some satisfaction from the damage she'd done. His handsome nose was ruined and every breath wheezed in his sinuses.
Jal-Nish's news was a surprise, even to Arple, for the new squad had kept to themselves.
'We'll move the camp down there, out of sight,' Jal-Nish continued, 'and my climbers will come to the base of the cliffs while it's still dark. Unless the weather clears they'll go up at first light, make reconnaissance and prepare the way for the rest of the force. By this time tomorrow the lyrinx will be history.'
T HIRTY -S IX