Catching Nish under the arms, Minis strained, and slowly Nish’s feet emerged from the tar.
‘You bloody fool!’ Tirior handed him her knife. ‘Scrape it off. Remove your boots and trousers before you come inside.’
Nish set to work. Tirior went down the hatch and soon that familiar whine returned. ‘The field’s back,’ she said over the edge. ‘At least, part of it. Let’s see if we can get ourselves out.’
The whine rose in pitch, until the construct shuddered and pulled free. They continued through the strangeness, which was stranger than ever. The walls oozed and bulged. Layers of soft tar flowed down them, and across, and sometimes up. Clots of tar drifted in the air; hot tar dripped onto the closed hatch.
‘How close are we?’ Nish yelled.
‘There’s no need to shout,’ she said. ‘Another few minutes and we should be there.’
‘To Tiaan?’ said Nish.
‘No, to the node-drainer.’
Minis spun around. ‘But, Tirior …’
‘We’ve got to stop the scrutator first, Minis.’
‘It seems awfully hot in here,’ said Nish, mopping his brow. ‘It wasn’t hot before.’
Something burst through the wall in a spray of sparks. The tunnel vibrated visibly, then the side wall pushed in until it reached the construct. Further ahead, the walls were almost together.
‘We can’t get through,’ said Nish. ‘We’re going to be –’
A shockwave passed through them. Up ahead the tunnel touched, then peeled apart with a grotesque squelch. The whine disappeared; again the construct splatted to the floor. This time Tirior could not get it up.
‘We’re stuck,’ she said. ‘The field is gone.’
They stared at one another. Nish could feel his claustrophobia, never far away when underground, rising like a skyrocket. ‘Got to get out,’ he gasped.
‘We’ll have to go the rest of the way on foot, if the floor is solid enough.’
‘But without the construct we’re –’
‘I know!’ she snapped, ‘but we can’t carry it.’
‘Was that the node-drainer going?’ Nish whispered.
She laughed scornfully.
‘Then there may still be time.’ He put his leg over the side, searching for a patch of floor solid enough to stand on.
Tirior dragged him back. ‘Look out!’
A great bulge had developed in the roof, like a wagonload of molasses hanging above him. He threw himself backwards. Tirior slammed the hatch and tightened the clamps. There was an interminable wait before the bulge came down with an oozing splat. It surged across the clear screen; then, with a thump, the rest followed, the level of tar rising until it covered the screen completely.
‘We’re buried,’ said Nish. ‘We’ll never get out.’
SIXTY-TWO
‘Where is the watcher?’ whispered Flydd urgently. ‘Around corner,’ grunted Ullii.
‘I told you so,’ Irisis muttered. ‘What are you going to do now, scrutator?’
‘Pipe down. Ullii, come here. You’re my eyes and ears into this device.’
He squatted on the floor, knees popping like little fireworks. Ullii crouched beside him, whispering. She seemed quite cooperative now, but Ullii usually was when she was in danger.
Flydd rose, rubbing his knees. ‘The watcher, or sentinel, is a kind of growth. If I attack, it will give an alarm.’
‘Can you conceal us from it?’ said Irisis.
‘No. It picks up the aura of the Art, and we all bear enough of that to set it off.’
‘Then we’ve failed before we begin.’
‘There are ways, crafter. I’m just running though a dozen or two. You might as well sit down.’
Looking at the tarry floor with distaste, Irisis leaned against the cleanest wall she could find. Time ticked by, and every moment of delay meant more bloodshed outside. She began to pace up and down. Ullii gestured at her to stop – the watcher might detect it. Irisis returned to her post. Her organs vibrated in her belly and the way the flesh shivered beneath her skin was uncanny. How long would it take before the unreality of the node-drainer pulled her apart?
Flydd’s eyes were closed but his lips moved as he ran through all the forms and adaptations of scrutator magic, searching for the right one.
‘The spell must disable it instantly, before it can send an alarm.’ He sought more precise directions from Ullii. ‘I think I have it.’ He held out his hands and uttered words in a language Irisis did not know.
‘No,’ said Ullii, after a long pause.
‘Are you sure?… Of course you are. Damn it!’ he yelped, holding his head.
‘What is it?’ said Irisis.
‘That hurt. I used a spell to freeze it into place. That’s a reliable way of attack, as a rule, but the spell hasn’t taken.’
‘Why not?’
‘I don’t know. It’s as if a similar spell was already at work nearby, but that makes no sense at all. Let me get my strength back and I’ll try another.’
Recovering from the spell took so long that Irisis thought it was not going to happen at all. Flydd looked like a man having his leg amputated with a broken bottle. Drops of sweat stood out on his forehead, though in the gloom they had a ruddy look like blood.
‘Aargh!’ he gasped, spitting gobs on the floor. ‘I think I can manage it now.’
He moved his hands and spoke his words of power. They waited, then a crack-crack-SNAP came from around the corner.
‘It’s gone,’ said the seeker.
Now there were drops of blood on the scrutator’s forehead. ‘Just as well,’ he gasped. ‘I could not have done that again.’
They went by a mushroom-shaped device that had split down the middle, unable to withstand his evocation that had instantly turned it to stone.
‘Anything else, Ullii? he said hoarsely.
‘No,’ she whispered back. ‘But I see many lyrinx.’
‘Coming after us?’
‘Not yet.’
‘Take us to the node-drainer.’
They turned the corner, passed down a wide tunnel and entered a grotto like the inside of a stubby cross. All was black. The walls were studded with ebony crystals, the roof hung with bituminous stalactites. The floor was strewn with lipped pools, each perfectly circular, that seethed and bubbled like boiling mud ponds.
Flydd stared in wonderment. ‘This is it, Irisis.’
In the luminosity of the node-drainer the cavern was eerily beautiful. The walls sparkled like black diamonds, the roof glowed like black pearls, the pools emitted ebony bubbles that drifted around the room, reflecting the light like mirror balls. The node-drainer was, from the vision back at Minnien, just as Irisis expected it to be. It resembled a broad leathery mushroom, white as death, with a circular cap rising to a peak. A hole in the centre, above the stalk, gushed forth energies that flowed and tumbled and shone.
‘It’s not quite what I expected,’ Flydd muttered. ‘It’s taking power from the node all right, and staggering amounts of it, but channelling most of it away. Where to?’
A hanging funnel made of the same leathery substances collected most of the flow. Irisis could not see where it led to. The leaking field created a foggy unreality at the back of the cavern that blurred everything into the walls.
‘I expect they’re using it for flesh-forming, and other Arts.’
‘No doubt, and if Snizort should survive, we’ll have to follow that up.’
Ullii gasped, doubled over and projectile vomited through her legs. Curling into a ball, she rolled forward until she struck the wall, toppled over and lay unmoving. Her eyes were wide open, her arms wrapped protectingly around her belly.
‘Myllii?’ she whispered. ‘Help me, Myllii.’
‘Ullii?’ whispered Irisis. ‘What’s wrong?’
‘Node-drainer is wrong. Wrong!’
‘What do you mean, Ullii?’
‘Tiaan!’
‘What about her?’
Ullii would, or could, say no more.