Tiaan waggled the lever but nothing happened. The machine arced down toward a patch of trees on the far side of the camp. The impact would turn her to jelly. She could not see the strong force at all. Tiaan reached under the binnacle and popped the cap, thrusting her hand in until her index finger touched the amplimet. The field flashed before her eyes and the thapter whined into life. She climbed away from the camp while she tried to work out what had happened. The blue ray fingered the sky as if they were trying to cook her alive. She hurled the thapter around to avoid it.

The mechanism stuttered but came to life again. Was that ray interfering with the machine, or the field? She couldn’t think straight. Why, why hadn’t she slipped quietly away as soon as she was seen? Her attack had been an insult to the pride and might of the Aachim, and to Vithis personally. She had brought disaster upon herself, risked everything for a moment of self-indulgence.

This thapter, and the secret of how it worked, was worth a nation. Flight could win the war; the world. What warlord, general, scrutator or Aachim would not kill to get it? She was friendless in a desperate world, and every time she set down to sleep or buy supplies, she would be in peril.

The first priority was to get well away and pray she did not lose the field again. Then, find a general or scrutator, and give him the thapter as well as her intelligence about what the Aachim were up to. That was her duty and she must do it. And then plead for her life. What she knew might be enough to save her.

She headed north along the Great Chain of Lakes, which ran up through the Borgis Woods before curving north-west to the Sea of Thurkad, a couple of hundred leagues away. To her right loomed the southern arm of the Great Mountains. To her left, up ahead, stood the jagged white pinnacles of the Peaks of Borg. Between them she made out the vast elongation of Parnggi, second-greatest of the lakes. Cloud covered this area and she passed into it gratefully, guided only by the thin disc of the sun above.

Tiaan felt numb. They had tried to kill her. Now that Vithis knew about the thapter, he would hunt her to the four corners of the globe. Everyone else would do the same. She was doomed. Why, why had she been so foolish as to let him see her? Why hadn’t she heeded Malien’s warnings? Every time she allowed her emotions to govern her, it made things worse.

The Aachim had shown that Haani’s death was not accident, but policy. She wanted to hurt Vithis and Minis, to humiliate them and, beyond all else, to thwart them in their plans for Santhenar. Most of all, she wanted to repay Malien’s confidence in her.

But first she had to find a scrutator and work out what to say. Tiaan flew on, making plans and rejecting each. All foundered on the same reef – how to find the right person, and tell her story, without being attacked or seized as a renegade.

She finally passed beyond Parnggi around the middle of the night. Moonlight showed her the way. Forest still clothed the hills in all directions, though through a gap in the clouds she saw clear land well ahead and, some way to her left, a cluster of volcanoes dominated by one much larger and taller than the rest. Its flanks were covered in dense forest, part of the endless Worm Wood. She checked the map. It was Booreah Ngurle, the Burning Mountain. It seemed to call to her, but she would not find a scrutator there.

Further back and to her left she made out a road – the Great North Road again – cutting through a rich and fertile land that must be Borgistry. Its principal city was Lybing. Surely it would have a scrutator.

There was no way out of it. Time to give up the thapter, and herself. She moved the controller to turn left. It moved back to centre. She tried again but the thapter was set on its course and would not turn the way she wanted.

It was flying north-west, quite slowly, for as the day passed it had grown ever more sluggish. Dense forest passed beneath. The thapter seemed to be heading for the cluster of volcanoes; for Booreah Ngurle. What was the amplimet up to now? Whatever it was doing, she could not prevent it, for there was no place to land. Nothing but forest in every direction.

The moon was hidden now. At least no one could see her. Unfortunately she could not see either. She dropped low over the shadowy trees, still flying toward the distant mountain.

Twice more she tried to turn away, and twice the controls refused to answer her. Just after dawn, the thapter approached the peak of Booreah Ngurle. She saw a great building off to her left, on the inner rim of the crater, and tried to turn towards it. The controls jammed. Why had it brought her all this way only to thwart her again? The node, of course – an unusual one here, a double with one centre larger than the other.

Her fury flared again. She was not going to allow it to master her this time, or ever again. Tiaan looked for a place to set down, planning to take out the treacherous amplimet and smash it against a rock, and curse the consequences!

The ground was steep here, extremely rugged and clothed in dense forest – the worst possible place to land. Spotting a tiny clearing, Tiaan hovered above the trees, planning her route down. As she nudged the lever forward, the field vanished. The thapter fell like a rock and crashed through the treetops in a cloud of leaves and shattered branches. It bounced off a leaning tree and hit a fallen trunk with an almighty thump. Tiaan was hurled against the binnacle and after that felt nothing, not the fall down the ladder, nor the impact with the floor below.

A long while later she came to. Something was running into her eye. She wiped blood off her forehead. It did not feel like a major injury, though her head had begun to throb and her ears were ringing. She could not work out what had happened, but she had an alarming suspicion that the amplimet had cut off the field. She prayed that the construct could still be made to hover.

Tiaan tried to get up, and that was when she realised that things were badly wrong. She could not move her legs. Tiaan lifted her head. Her pants were torn from hip to ankle and there was a long gash on her thigh, but she could not feel a thing. Again she tried to move her leg. She could not even wiggle her toes.

Her back was broken.

FOURTEEN

Nish checked the balloon, which was nearly inflated. He crammed in as much fuel as would fit and opened the damper all the way. Flames roared up the flue. Racing down the ladder he began hacking at the cane floor where it encircled the trunk.

‘What is the matter, Nish?’

‘Someone’s coming!’ He pointed in the direction of the yellow floater. ‘Can you sense anything about it?’

‘No, Nish,’ she said, giving him sweet and loving looks.

He was too panicky to reciprocate. ‘It can’t be lyrinx, or you would see them in your lattice.’

‘I can’t see anything in my lattice.’

‘What!’ he roared.

Ullii slapped her hands over her ears, her face screwed up in pain.

He lowered his voice. ‘What do you mean? Is it gone?’ Had their lovemaking destroyed her talent? There were folktales about that kind of thing but he had always sneered at them.

‘My lattice isn’t gone.’ She smiled a secret smile. ‘I just can’t see it. I’ll have to make a new lattice.’

Nish cursed, but under his breath. What a time to lose the only talent that could help them. He looked up. The balloon was taut. The danger would come when it lifted, for the stripped trunk went up through the neck. If anything caught, it would tear the flimsy fabric apart.