Irisis pulled away, her heart pounding. Something was very wrong. Even if she could tune the controllers to the node, she was afraid what would happen when she did.
Someone rapped on the back hatch. ‘What’s going on?’ came Jal-Nish’s cry.
‘Don’t let him in, Nish.’
The hatch was jerked open. ‘Well, artisan?’
‘It’s proving unexpectedly difficult.’
‘Why?’ There was a dangerous glint in Jal-Nish’s eye.
‘I’ve never worked with a double node before and I don’t think anyone else has either. If I get it wrong it may burn out the hedron and the clanker will be stuck here for the winter.’
‘Bah! Fyn-Mah always said you were a fraud.’
After some hours Irisis had worked out how to tune the controller to the field, though she had no idea if it would be able to cope with the dangerous fluctuations in intensity. She could not do the test herself, since she lacked the ability to draw power from the field. Irisis planned to have Ky-Ara do it. It was the only way she could think of to escape her fate. But if he refused …
Ky-Ara was eager to help. He would have agreed to anything to get her out of his seat. Irisis had been counting on that. It was the reason she had done his controller first. The other operators were tougher.
She was sitting beside Ky-Ara, explaining what to do, when Jal-Nish heaved Nish out of the way and pushed through to the front of the clanker.
‘What do you think you’re doing?’ he snapped.
‘I …’ A shiver went up her spine. ‘I’m showing Ky-Ara how to carry out the test.’
‘Be damned! That’s artisan’s work. I wouldn’t risk an operator on it if I had a dozen to spare.’
‘But he’s the one …’ she began desperately.
‘Never! I can lose you, if it goes wrong. I can’t lose him.’
Irisis swallowed. ‘Then I’ll need him to help.’
‘You’ll do it on your own, artisan. What’s the problem? You were acting crafter a few weeks ago. You must have done this a thousand times.’
‘It’s just … not this kind of node,’ she said, almost inaudibly. Irisis glanced at Nish as if for help, but he was looking down, picking ice off his boots. Well, this is it, she thought. My nightmare has come at last. If I could do it, I’d pull so much power from the field that it would blow the clanker apart and anthracise everyone in it. The apocalypse had a violent appeal, but it was just a dream.
‘Very well,’ she went on. ‘Everyone must stand well back, in case something goes wrong. I don’t think this kind of node has ever been used before.’
‘Just get it done,’ said Jal-Nish. ‘If you can.’
Was this a malicious game, she thought, to humiliate her in front of everyone? It was just the kind of revenge the perquisitor would go for.
Jal-Nish took her advice and moved a long way from the clanker. The querist remained where she was. Did she do that to mock Irisis?
‘You’d better go too,’ Irisis said to Ullii and Nish. Nish did not meet her eyes, as if trying to distance himself from the humiliation to come. She could not blame him.
He stayed, though, and Ullii did too, which was surprising. Or perhaps Ullii knew there was no danger at all. Irisis began, using the controller to sense out the fluctuating field. It was so much stronger than using her pliance. It had to be, to drive the massive weight of a clanker.
Allowing those baleful globes to orbit freely in her mind, but keeping well away, Irisis concentrated on the spirals of mist that whirled between them. She was searching for one that was strong but not too strong. Her missing talent might come back.
She passed by one, then a second, a third. The eyes of Nish and Ullii never left her face. Irisis imagined what was to come. Utter humiliation. Jal-Nish would not dispose of her here – her abilities could be needed on the way home – but once back at the manufactory he would make a public spectacle of her. Chroniclers and tellers would be imported from a hundred leagues to spread the tale of her downfall and to describe, in loving detail, her fitting punishment.
‘Hurry up, artisan.’ The perquisitor had his head in through the back hatch.
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.