Moon didn’t argue. If the Hians, or something else, was down there waiting to trap them, Jade would be expecting him and Shade to keep the path clear for the warriors to escape.
Jade dropped off the rail. Stone reached out a hand for Merit to climb into, then followed. Balm, Saffron, and Briar dropped after them, then River and Deft. Moon nodded for Chime to go ahead with Lithe, then he and Shade jumped off the rail.
As Moon swept down to the land on the first ledge inside the shaft, he caught a dark shape at the edge of his vision. He almost yelled an alarm, then realized it was Kethel again, dropping to cling to a ledge not far above them. Shade hissed in exasperation. Moon considered telling Kethel to get out of here, but he doubted Kethel would listen. And if something awful was living in the ruin, maybe Kethel would be a deterrent.
Jade had already leapt down the ledges to the spot where the shaft narrowed. There weren’t a lot of perches down there, so Moon waited. He flexed his claws impatiently, noticing the material the structure was made of felt more like stone than metal. There were streaks of dark blue under the coating of ice and grime.
Stone slipped down into the narrowing shaft first, vanishing into the darkness in a way that made Moon distinctly uneasy. Then Jade and Balm. As the other warriors dropped down to follow them, Chime waited with Lithe.
The wall under Moon’s claws shuddered. Below, Chime jolted forward and caught hold of the ledge with one hand. Lithe’s head turned to look up at Moon, her frills catching in Chime’s nervously flicking spines. Below them, Deft and River hesitated, still clinging to the ledge just above the twist where the shaft narrowed. Moon couldn’t see the others, already vanished into the dark opening.
“The whole thing moved,” Shade whispered. He was right, it felt like the whole structure, and whatever it stood on under the water, had jerked a few paces. “You think the Hians—”
The jolt was so hard it knocked Moon off the ledge. He skittered down the wall, his claws screeching on the surface until he caught a rough spot and managed to stop. He was only a pace above Chime and Lithe. Lithe had reached over Chime’s head and hooked her claws on the ledge above.
The wall shook so hard it felt liquid under Moon’s claws. He looked down for the others but River and Deft had disappeared. Shade shouted a warning as the shaft rippled like water, like a wave, and it was coming toward them. Moon yelled, “Go, go, Chime, up!”
It wasn’t coherent but Chime obeyed instantly, scrambling up the shaft toward Shade. Moon climbed after him, sparing another desperate look down. The narrow part of the shaft buckled, the material bent and crumpled, closing off the opening. They got through, Moon told himself in horror. They had time to get through.
He made it up to Shade just as Chime and Lithe took the leap to the flying boat. Kethel had one clawed hand on the railing, holding the boat closer. With Shade, Moon leapt for it and felt the deck roll under him as he landed. He staggered into Shade, who had caught hold of Chime’s arm and kept him and Lithe upright.
That was when Moon realized the sky spun overhead, that the whole huge docking structure below had started to turn. Kethel swung aboard the flying boat and clung to the bow, but the anchor lines gave way with a sound like something’s spine snapping. The deck came up and slammed into Moon; he sunk one set of claws into it and held onto Shade.
The moss boat tumbled, bounced off something, then slammed into something else. Moon shoved himself upright, hooking his claws into Shade’s collar flange to keep them together.
The wind roared in his ears and most of the flying boat was gone. The whole starboard side had sheared off from a few paces in front of them to the stern, only two walls of the upper cabin left. The stem-beams stuck out from the hull, bare and broken, and moss came off in chunks. The boat had hit one of the metal ship’s huge sails. To Moon’s relief, Chime and Lithe had managed to hold on, huddled against Shade’s other side. Kethel’s big dark shape still clung to what was left of the bow.
Everything was moving and Moon’s sense of direction and of up and down was useless. He squeezed his eyes shut briefly, trying to center himself. No, it wasn’t his sense of direction that was confused, it was everything else. The docking structure had started to rotate and was dragging the huge metal ship along with it. Moon’s throat went tight and he thought, did the Hians do this?
The rest of the flying boat could come apart at any instant. They were lucky the moss hadn’t unraveled yet and tangled in their wings.
Moon twisted around and spotted the curve of a wheel, attached to a mast. He tugged on Shade. “This way!”
Shade shoved upright and pulled Chime with him. Chime swayed, dazed, Lithe keeping him on his feet. Shade pulled her against his chest and passed Chime to Moon. Moon pulled him close and Chime instinctively clung to his collar flanges. “I think I hit my head,” Chime muttered woozily. “What happened?”
“Tell you later,” Moon said, as a crack appeared lengthwise down the deck. He leapt to what was left of the railing, then told Shade, “Go!”
Shade said, “Watch the sail,” and dove off the boat. He snapped his wings out to get lift from a gust, then in again to miss the sail and land on top of the wheel just past it. He swung down to brace himself in the wide groove below the rim.
“He’s been practicing,” Chime said, then made an oof noise as Moon leapt into the air.
The wind caused by the motion of the ship and the docking structure made the air into a rapidly changing maze. Moon had to drop sideways twice, tossed like a puffblossom, before he landed on the wheel and swung down next to Shade. He clung there, breathing hard. Looking back, he saw Kethel push off from the flying boat, barrel roll past the sail and drop onto the lower part of the wheel. The shift in weight was enough to push what was left of the flying boat free. It hit the sail and burst into pieces, torn away by the wind. It could have done that earlier and killed us, Moon thought. They were lucky. Sort of lucky.
Voice raised to carry over the rush of air, Shade said, “Did you see what happened to the others?”
Moon moved his spines in a negative. “They were inside. River and Deft went after them.” They had to be alive. He had to think that or he wouldn’t be able to do what he had to do.
“What was it? What did this?” Lithe asked. Then answered her own question. “The weapon?”
“Has to be,” Chime said, and his voice sounded stronger, less woozy. “The Hians must have figured out how to make it work.”
Jade climbed down inside the narrowing shaft, tasting the air for any sign of the Hians. The ledges continued to wind down the sides, but the interior walls were embossed with flowing wave-like designs, that vanished into the darkness as sunlight from above faded. Dim blue illumination, part of the flowing pattern along the walls, provided just enough light to see. It reflected off slender curving pillars that supported the interior. If they aren’t too far ahead of us, she thought, we can—
A sudden jolt knocked Jade into the nearest pillar. She snapped her wings in by instinct and caught herself, her claws scraping across the silvery stone. She lifted her head to see Balm hurtling toward her. Jade let go of the pillar and caught her. The force of it slammed them backwards.
But Jade had control of their fall now and landed them both on the curve of a lower pillar. She gripped it with her foot claws, supporting Balm, and looked frantically for the others.
She spotted Stone first, his tail and one set of foot claws wrapped around a pillar on the opposite side of the shaft. He had Briar in one hand and Merit in the other. Above him, Saffron perched next to River, who had Deft under one arm. Jade didn’t see anyone else. And something had cut off the light from the top of the shaft. She hissed in terror, then tightened her spines down. Panic wasn’t an option.