As if in sympathy with his dismay, another deep rumble rolled through and the earth shook, a little longer this time. My heart was beating fast and every muscle cried out to be gone from this place, but having come this far I could not leave her there.
I sped into the cavern and noticed this time that my wings, folded tight, still brushed the sides of the entrance to her chamber. We would not be able to work together to lift her out.
Dhretan must have noticed as well, for as I ran to Nikis he nuked, "How are we to do this, lord?"
I got my first good look at Nikis—strange how you notice such detail when time is of desperate importance. She was a lovely young creature, her delicate new scales the colour of dark iron, her soulgem like a deep yellow topaz. She was only a few kells older than Dhretan, which was a blessing, but she was still larger than I could carry easily or for long. "Help me turn her over," I said. "Swiftly, swiftly!"
Together we managed to get Nikis on her back. "Fold her wings in carefully," I said, "take care that they lie to the side and not under her. Now let me get hold of—"
I was interrupted by a loud explosion. Too close! It was swiftly followed by another earthshake, which began as the slightest of movements and grew worse. And worse.
I could barely keep my feet, but I managed to grasp Nikis's shoulders under her wing-joints and cried out to Dhretan. "We must get out now, we are too close to the fire- fields! Look to her wings!"
I dragged Nikis backwards, scrambling as swiftly as I could, desperate to be out of there. I fell onto her twice, thrown off my feet by the movement of the ground. It was terrible and hideously slow; I knew her hide was being scored and her wings bruised and battered, but as long as I got her out of that cavern I did not care.
When I finally reached open air I could pull much faster, putting my back into it, and she was out in moments.
However, moments were all we had. The earth had stopped moving but the smell struck me as soon as I had emerged. When Dhretan followed Nikis out he too smelled it. "Eldest, what is that on the air?" he asked. "And the sound—it roars, Lord Shikrar!"
"It is fire, youngling," I said, trying desperately to remain calm. "Help me turn her on to her chest that I may lift her." As we struggled with the dead weight I added, "And whether it is earth or forest that burns, we have very little time before it reaches us." I shuddered, for the stench was growing thicker by the instant, and Dhretan seemed to be moving at a snail's pace. "Her back legs are tangled— quickly, Dhretan! We have no more time."
"But the smell," he said as together we rolled Nikis back onto her chest. "That is not wood."
"No. It is rock. Now get aloft, I am going to have to lilt her." What I would give for a cliff top to leap from, I thought longingly. It was hard enough to lift myself from the flat ground, and Nikis must weigh a third of my own weight. I sent a swift prayer to the Winds and wrapped my forearms about her chest. I could only just reach so far. However, I managed to interlock my talons in front of her.
A crash from far too close, the acrid smell of molten stone far too near, a gleam of yellow-red moving through the wood.
"The fire is upon us! Fly!" I cried. Inspired by terror I crouched, gave the greatest leap of my life with my back legs and flapped as hard and as fast as I could.
To my everlasting astonishment, I felt myself lifting from the ground. "Get underneath the instant you can, Dhretan, take some of this weight for me." I gasped out in truespeech, fighting for altitude. "Quickly, quickly!"
Dhretan maneuvered underneath Nikis as soon as I had lifted the two of us clear of the trees. He managed to take some of her weight, allowing me to fly a little more steadily. I glanced back to see where the molten stone was, and where it had come from.
We were barely two wingspans above the ground and still Happing madly when the fire-rock covered the clearing behind us, hissing violently and sending up a cloud of steam when it took the pond I had drunk from moments before. "Faster, Dhretan, 'ware the downdrafts!" I cried. For twelve hundred years I had taught every one of the Kantri how to fly: better than anyone I knew what would happen if we were too close to the ground, so desperately unstable, and were hit by the downdraft ahead of the swiftly approaching thernial created by the molten rock.
We managed to fight our way to a decent height and establish a kind of rhythm. Never before had I so blessed my wingspan, but that was all there was to be thankful for. I glanced behind me just for an instant, and in that glance I saw where the molten rock had come from.
The southern cliffs stood sentinel no longer. There was a stream of fire pouring over the edge at the lowest point, and the stream widened even as I watched—a red-gold firefall. A great pall of smoke was rising from the forests as they burned. It was like seeing the death wound of one I loved.
"My people, we have no more time. Fly! The southern cliffs are breached!" I cried, broadcasting truespeech to all who could hear. "The fire comes! Trizhe, what news?"
"Good news, Teacher Shikrar," replied an unexpected voice, and with a deep sigh of relief I realised it was Gyren-tikh. "My cousin has wakened me. It is as well he has the gentle voice of a rockfalt,for I slept sound."
"Welcome, Gyrentikh, praise the Winds you are with us. Idai?" I called.
"Peace, Shikrar, I am wide awake, I thank you," came Idai's wry comment. "l am aloft with nearly all of our folk. I can see the island—and I can see you. Name of the— Kretissh, swiftly, with me!" she called out.
"I would not have asked, Iderrisai," I said softly to her alone as she rode down the wind to where Dhretan and I struggled, "but I will be glad of your help."
"And should I have left you thus?" she asked. "Move, Dhretan, you have saved this old idiot, more honour to your courage, but Nikis is too great a burden for you. Join the others."
"As you wish, Lady. Brace, Lord Shikrar, I am diving," said Dhretan.
"My thanks for the warning," I replied with a grunt as he left and the full weight of Nikis hung from my locked forearms. Name of the Winds, but she was heavy!
"We have caught the thermal that rises from the eastern cliffs, Shikrar," said Idai, coming up under me and taking much of Nikis's weight on her back. "I thought you would be glad to hear it."
"If I had the breath I would laugh, Iderrisai," I replied. "Are we all here?"
"Tdklurik has not yet bespoken me, but it is a long flight to the northwest where Roccelis lived—Shikrar, between us two, have you any hope for them?"
"None, Idai, and I do not believe Toklurik does either, but the heart must follow its own path. Roccelis was kin to him. Perhaps he only hopes to recover their soulgems. Soulgems! I take it—"
"Enough, Hadreshikrar!" Idai said acerbically. "I appreciate your concern, but the rest of us really are quite capable of looking after ourselves. Yes, the soulgems of the Ancestors and of the Lost are safe. Even KMra's daft idea of bringing hlansif trees is being attempted." Her mind voice softened. "A few small artefacts, some seeds, and a small stone brought from the Summer Field: those will be all we have to show for five ceats in the Place of Exile."
I managed to hiss my amusement. "Those and the lives of every soul of the Kantri now living!"
"Well, if you put it that way," she said. The air of quiet amusement in her voice was a great relief to me. I looked back and down. It was hard to see past Idai's wings, but I could just glimpse the island where I was born. It was half covered in a pall of dark smoke, and in the northern half, even in bright sun, I could see patches of vivid red that must be vast firefountains to be seen from so far away.
Idai glanced up at me. "Shikrar, my friend, have done," she said sadly. "We know it is gone. There is no need to watch the last of the destruction. Remember it as it has been, not as it is. The deep truth of any living thing is in its life, not its death."