He had feared that the two would be too crushed by their life experiences to be able to learn anything new. He was proved wrong. They had, after all, been raised in an atmosphere of engineering, and the gravpacks were simple to use.
His second fear, that they would be frightened and bewildered by height, was also wrong. Their instinct to fly asserted itself almost immediately. He started with the man fairy, taking him into the air and showing how to use the single control, then he showed the girl. In less than an hour they had both mastered the whole thing.
Back on the ground, he solemnly made presents of the packs. “Go in that direction,” he said, pointing.
“Keep looking until you find people like yourselves. Explain your story to them and they will help you.”
They took to the air, circling one another and laughing with incredulous delight. Then they set off, low over the forest canopy.
Now there was nothing to do but wait.
The five-men commission came late in the day, spiralling down into the clearing to settle themselves cross-legged on the grass, where they confronted Laedo grim-faced.
Among them Laedo recognised Highbreeze, the air marshal he had met on the day of his arrival. But he was not at the head of the commission. This was a somewhat elderly figure announcing himself as Wafting Leaf. “The young woman whom your companion crippled has received the attentions of the healers,” he said, “but it will be a hundred days before she can take to the air again, if she ever does.”
He raised his eyes to the cargo ship and projector station before continuing. “By our laws your companion’s act is punishable by death. Also, we deduce that it was you who released the gnome prisoner and that you took him back to Gnomeland. This also is punishable by death. Against these crimes we are obliged to balance the fact that you saved the crippled young woman Red Petal’s life, and that you rescued two mutilated fairies from Gnomeland. We have questioned these two. There are legends that gnomes kidnapped babies long ago, but frankly we are shocked to learn that members of our race are kept by them as slaves, and in such horrible conditions.
“Before pronouncing judgment, I must ask why you went to Gnomeland in the first place.”
Laedo decided to tell something close to the truth.
“My only aim is to return home,” he said. “I had hoped the gnomes would help me repair my ship, and I took the prisoner with me to try to earn their good will. Instead they took me prisoner. Luckily I managed to escape.”
Wafting Leaf nodded and appeared to accept the account. “I can only observe that you badly misjudged the gnome character. Such ignorance supports your claim to belong to neither of our worlds. We now come to judgment. In your case, one act cancels out the other. But not in the case of your companion.
There is still the matter of poor Red Petal’s broken wings.”
“I can only apologise for my companion,” Laedo said. “She suffers from a mental illness. This causes her to act badly. I hope to have her condition treated by experts when I return to my own world.”
Wafting Leaf considered this. “If what you say is true, you should not have left her at liberty.”
Laedo lowered his gaze and was silent, recognising the truth of the other’s words.
Wafting Leaf spoke again. Laedo had been nervous that the fairies would ask him to enable an attack on Gnomeland, in an effort to rescue every slave there—an enterprise for which he felt more sympathy than the project proposed by the gnomes, but for which he had zero willingness, particularly in view of its impracticability. The elderly fairy’s pronouncement, therefore, came as a relief.
“It seems best that you should leave our land as soon as possible. We will defer the death sentence upon your companion for ten days, in recognition of your need to effect repairs. Meanwhile, you are forbidden to have any further contact with our people.”
With grave dignity the five fairies rose and launched themselves aloft to go winging into the distance.
Laedo sighed. Ten days. He reminded himself that he still had little or no idea of how he was to gain control of the station’s command system.
The only warning was a steely glinting of metal in the early morning sky. It was as if the flat upside down landscape had begun to sparkle and glitter.
Then the glints blossomed into tiny white flowers which grew as they descended. Soon gnome-crammed cabins were landing all over Fairyland.
And not just cabins. Batches, packets and tied-together bundles of materials floated down under the big parachutes, even components of the big catapult machines ready to assemble for communication back with Gnomeland.
It was the biggest gnome invasion Fairyland had yet seen.
One which Laedo, as he watched the wicked snowfall, was forced to recognize had probably been precipitated by himself. The gnomes, concerned that he would warn the fairies of their plans, had struck ahead of schedule.
One question was answered for him. The gnomes did have telescopes. They knew where he was. A cluster of cabins was targeting the clearing. As they came nearer he saw guide cords tugging at the edges of the parachutes, giving a measure of guidance.
It was only one day after the commission’s judgment. So far all Laedo had done was to affix his cargo ship atop the projector station as before, and remove some panels under the main board in the control room, hoping he could figure out some way to bypass the automatic control. He had just woken up after a night’s sleep and come outside for some fresh air.
A long shadow fell across him. A billowing parachute was sailing over the giant treetops and heading towards him.
A crossbow bolt hissed aslant and bit the turf near his foot.
Laedo yelped and ran for the projector station’s stair. He made it inside and sealed the hull as the first cabin was tumbling to the ground.
In the control room, he switched on the screens and yelled at the control board.
“Klystar is not here! We are under attack! Take us to Klystar!”
This time no parchment chattered out of the slot. The station shuddered slightly and lifted itself.
Crossbow bolts clanged on the outside hull. The station topped the forest canopy and soared majestically into the air.
Already the fairy militia had risen to meet the attack. He saw fairies winging about the descending cabins, exchanging shots with the cramped passengers. Some were armed with long pikes with which they tried to sever the parachute lines—a manoeuvre which usually was usually rewarded with a crossbow bolt through the chest.
Laedo saw one brave fairy charge in to jab between the bars of a cabin with a spear, only to become tangled in the parachute cords. The parachute collapsed and candled. Fairy and gnomes fell together to their deaths.
Still ascending, the station passed through a second wave of cabins, parachutes not yet released. Then it was heading for the gap between the two opposed horizons.
Where to now?
FIVE
A Map of Moods
The railway line wound through the broken landscape, curling round hills, clinging to escarpments and diving into valleys. The train of little box-shaped carriages climbed a steep incline by means of cogwheel and ratchet, then went rattling down the other side, swaying alarmingly on the narrow-gauge track.
To the relief of the passengers it adopted a more moderate speed on coming to a levelled embankment, its burnished engine puffing and chuffing. Munching a meagre meal of crispbread spread with fish-flavoured soft cheese, Adeptus Magus Harmasch and his apprentice Peadul stared glumly out of the window.
“Eh, Peadul, what a place,” Harmasch sighed. There was nothing to be seen but an oppressive grey sky, rocky crags and boggy ground pelted with cold, penetrating rain.