Two more soldiers hurtled out of the mist, but at that moment, with an enormous twang, one of the vertical cables snapped. The amphitheatre shook as if it had been hit by an earthquake and a hip-high wave passed across the canvas, tossing everyone off their feet. Before the soldiers could get up, the prisoners had swarmed over them. Red pooled on the canvas.

A smaller wave reflected back from the other side. Nish glanced up at the tethered air-dreadnoughts, which were just outlines in the mist. The one whose cable had snapped shot upwards and disappeared. Ghorr roared imprecations at the sky. Nish could not make out the words but Ghorr’s tone conveyed his alarm. The air-dreadnoughts had been moored so close together that uncontrolled flight was a danger to them all.

‘Any minute now they’ll rush us,’ said Yggur. ‘Nish, take your knife and cut out the canvas on three sides of a long rectangle, like this, but leave a strip at each corner.’ He made a shape in the air. ‘Round there and there.’ He gestured to his left. ‘Flangers, take one of the swords and do the same to the right, around to there. And remember where you’ve cut. Don’t fall through on the way back.’

‘What about behind us?’ said Flangers.

‘We’ll keep watch. Though, with the fires over there, I doubt they’ll attack that way.’

‘I’m sure they want us to think that,’ Flangers muttered.

Nish cut the canvas where Yggur had indicated, so the deck looked more or less whole. The cuts looked obvious to him, but might well trap a soldier charging through the mist, intent on gold and glory.

In the meantime, Yggur set out his other guards on either side of the holes, with barbed lengths of rope stretched on the deck between them. He had dispersed the remaining prisoners behind the pen and wherever else they could find any cover. And then they waited.

‘What if we were to try and climb down one of the cables?’ said Nish, acutely aware that time was running out.

‘We’d fall,’ said Yggur. ‘Climbing down ropes is harder than it looks.’

Nish unfastened the naphtha flask and handed it to Yggur. ‘You may be able to do something with this.’ He had no patience for waiting. Judging by those earlier screams, Flydd could be dying now, or dead.

Nish slid into the swirling mist, keeping low and moving slowly. He wondered where Ullii had got to. Well, she could take care of herself. A pity he hadn’t got a better glimpse of the amphitheatre before Yggur brought the mist down – Nish wasn’t sure he was going the right way. A big man-shape loomed up to one side and Nish flattened himself to the deck. It was another of Ghorr’s guard, sword held out in front of him. The soldier didn’t look Nish’s way and disappeared again.

A sudden whiff of smoke caught in the back of his throat. Surely the remaining cables, tough and tightly woven though they were, must go soon. He moved on, looking around fearfully, only to crash his knee into an elongated object like a metal bathtub with a wide platform around the edges – the flensing trough. The mist was now so thick that he couldn’t see all of the trough at once, though he could see blood spattered on the bottom and stains running down to the plughole.

Behind him there were roars and the clash of sword on sword. The soldiers had attacked. Should he run back? No point – he was unarmed. If Yggur couldn’t stave off the attack, there was nothing Nish could do.

He heard a cry, trailing off. Someone had broken through one of the canvas flaps. Nish rubbed his throbbing kneecap as he edged around the bathtub.

He scanned the deck. He could hear fighting not far away, but couldn’t see a soul. He turned the other way and his eye fell on someone huddled under the flensing trough, wrapped in a bloodstained cloth. The face was so wracked that for a moment Nish didn’t recognise it. And when he did, Nish wished he hadn’t.

‘Xervish!’ he whispered.

The dark eyes turned slowly to him, though there was no recognition in them. ‘I am unmanned,’ he said and closed his eyes again.

Nish put his hands under Flydd’s arms and hauled him out. Flydd couldn’t stand up so Nish hefted the scrutator in his arms. He didn’t weigh much at all. He headed back to where he thought the punishment pen must be, but hadn’t gone far before he was thrown off his feet by another deck-shaking twang. The second cable had gone. If the fire was steadily eating its way around the edges of the canvas, it couldn’t be long before the whole structure collapsed.

The deck wasn’t nearly as taut as before; Nish now found himself walking down a perceptible slope. He carried Flydd back towards the pen, but as he loomed up out of the wreathing smoke, someone leapt for him.

‘Xervish?’ It was the small figure of Perquisitor Fyn-Mah, who looked almost as haggard as Flydd. ‘Is he all right?’

‘I don’t know,’ said Nish. ‘Would you look after him?’

Fyn-Mah took Flydd from Nish’s arms. There were tears in her eyes. ‘No man should have to suffer so, no matter what the crime. What has happened to our humanity?’

‘The scrutators devoured it to keep themselves in power,’ said Nish, and walked away before he wept with her.

TEN

Nish crept back through the brown miasma, moving carefully. He encountered several bodies – two soldiers and one of the prisoners – and then the barbed rope. ‘Don’t shoot,’ he yelled, keeping well down. ‘It’s me, Nish.’

Irisis was out in front of a small band of prisoners, swinging a length of barbed rope. Several more prisoners were armed but there were no attackers to be seen.

‘We’ve got to find a way down, and quick,’ said Nish, running towards them.

‘What if we made canvas slings and used them to slide down a cable?’ said Irisis.

‘Too dangerous,’ said Yggur.

Another cable went with a whip crack; a sinuous heave of the canvas threw bodies in the air and everyone off their feet. He felt as if the deck had smacked him under the chin. Screams from the far side of the amphitheatre trailed away to nothing.

‘They shouldn’t have been so close to the edge,’ said Yggur, shaking his head as the deck stilled; then it sagged beneath them to form a broad valley a couple of spans deep at the bottom. There were shouts of ‘Look out!’ from above, followed by the sound of breaking timbers. Two air-dreadnoughts had collided.

‘What if we cut a couple more cables?’ said Nish. ‘The deck might sag enough for us to slide down it onto the roof.’

‘It’d throw us off.’

‘We could cut holes through the canvas and tie onto the stay ropes. When the deck drops low enough we slide to safety.’

‘If we tie on, we’ll be helpless when they attack.’

‘If the deck’s that steep they won’t be able to come after us,’ Nish retorted. ‘Anyway, they’ll be too busy trying to save themselves.’

‘It doesn’t pay to underestimate the scrutators!’ snapped Yggur. ‘Nonetheless, it’s the best plan we have. Nish, take one of the soldiers’ swords and hack the cable away over to your right, past the last burning one. Flangers, do the same on the other side. If the deck still stays up, sever the one after that, but be quick about it. If the air-dreadnoughts cut us loose first, we’re dead.’

‘Surely they won’t do that while they still have hundreds of soldiers and servants down here.’

‘And still you underestimate Ghorr,’ growled Yggur. ‘Once the Council have been winched to safety, they’ll happily abandon everyone else before they risk their own lives. Tie on securely – and watch for backlash when the cables go.’

‘I’ll give you a hand,’ said Irisis, turning to walk with Nish. She slipped her left hand into his, swinging the barbed rope in her right.

They crept through the uncanny mist, which was thicker than ever near the deck, though it did not extend far up. Nish caught occasional glimpses of the air-dreadnoughts through it. The soldiers and crew were hanging over the sides, calling down, and men stood at windlasses to wind the scrutators and important witnesses up, though no one had yet been raised more than a few spans. ‘They seem to be having trouble with the winches,’ said Nish. ‘Is that also Yggur’s doing?’