“There must be ways,” she said. “On a day like this, with so much at stake, we have to take every measure.”

Bealeen made a raw little sound.

“I am no expert,” Prima continued. “But I can’t help but notice that our suspect has that second arm, his writing arm, still sitting happy in its socket.”

In little places, where boughs and foliage made tangles, there lived pretty little creatures named whiffbirds. The papio aircraft was named after them. Like their namesake, the machine was ferociously hungry, able to fly only brief distances before gulping down more fuel. Diamond had read about them. He remembered a big book and the specific page. This whiffbird’s body was tilting, long bone propellers carrying it closer to the corona-hunter, and three papio soldiers filled its open hatch, guns pointed at the machine shop and the crew inside.

None of the crew moved now, everybody staring at the apparition. Diamond was staring. The soldiers were big papio, two women and a man. In the last moments their smiles had become something else, more toothy and much more serious. They wore identical uniforms, blotchy gray fabrics and tall boots and glass masks over their long-jawed faces. Rubber cords kept their bodies pinned to the cabin floor. Every soldier was shouting. They were shouting in a language they barely knew. Bountiful was still rising and the odd craft was keeping pace, propellers screaming in the air, and Father shouted something to someone—an order, maybe—as the whiffbird slipped around an overhanging limb and then moved closer, offering the harpooner one perfect shot.

The long spear leapt out of the barrel, out through the open air. The papio had no time to react. They screamed commands that couldn’t be heard over the roar of engines, and the world felt thick and slow, and Father was turning, turning fast and shouting, “Don’t fight don’t fight,” as one hand started to wave at his son.

The steel shaft plunged into the cabin. A fourth papio soldier was standing back from the hatches, and then he was gutted and dying, and the bright razor nose of the harpoon dug into the hull behind him, that jarring impact detonating a charge meant to kill one gigantic creature.

The whiffbird’s backside was shredded.

Diamond watched the force of the blast shove the doomed machine towards them. It seemed as if the whiffbird might get shoved against the airship’s body. But Bountiful kept rising while the other ship began to fall, its tail dropping fastest while the propeller on the nose tilted until it was nearly vertical.

That propeller had four blades of carefully shaped bone, mounted on a metal hub and spinning toward the opened doorway.

Merit was running for Diamond.

The boy knew what would happen. In perfect detail, he saw everybody being sliced apart. His legs made the decision. On instinct, in panic, he turned and started to run, maybe to do nothing but save himself. Except he couldn’t die, not this way, and that simple thought pushed away the ugly rest in what he was thinking.

Tar`ro had his pistol out.

Master Nissim was standing beside Tar’ro, reaching for the running boy. But the butcher’s hand had already missed.

Elata was standing with Seldom. They weren’t moving. His friends looked as if they were posing for a fancy picture, the kind of image taken with cameras and expensive chemicals, with sunlight focused on the children while tense invisible parents begged them to surrender their feelings and smile.

The propeller struck the open doorway and the rubberized floor, its hub shattering with a hard sharp crash. Each blade had been carved to cut at the air, and now every shard flew across the shop.

Diamond managed several full strides, arms outstretched.

Too late, his friends began reacting to the catastrophe.

The racket was enormous and much too complicated to decipher. The only good fortune was how the blades smashed into the floor and ceiling and back into the floor again, losing momentum. The ceiling was armored. The shop was built to contain accidental explosions. Bone and fancy alloyed metal exploded, and Diamond collided with Elata and grabbed Seldom, shoving them down hard on the floor as a bright white piece of corona spun through the air, perfectly aimed to cut off every head but too slow, missing all of them in the end.

Diamond was on top of Elata, and then big hands pulled him up.

Father had grabbed him.

“You’re all right,” said Diamond.

Father cursed. He looked tearful, touching himself, sure that he would find blood. Except he was fine, and Tar`ro was on the floor, alive, and so was Master Nissim. But the harpooner was in two big pieces, and part of his head was missing. Two other crewmen were dead, another man had one leg, while the young man who flew with Father was cut through the middle and noisily bleeding to death.

Fret called out to somebody.

“You saved us,” Seldom said weakly.

Diamond needed to walk. His legs wanted to walk.

Elata came up to him. She was hunting for words, but she saw Fret on his back with his pink insides sliding out, blood coming faster each time his heart pumped. Then she backed away again.

Karlan ran from somewhere. Stepping in front of Diamond, he carried a long crowbar in both hands. The giant seemed unsure who needed to be hit, but he was angry. He was wild and furious and ready for any good battle. Maybe he considered battering the corona’s little boy, but there wouldn’t be any satisfaction there. So he settled on striking Diamond on the shoulder, just enough to make him ache, saying, “Stay behind me. I’ll protect you, you little shit.”

A second whiffbird had appeared, hovering just beyond the shop door.

More papio shouted in at them, demanding that every gun was tossed to their wood-loving feet.

Master Nissim stood beside Karlan.

Tar`ro stepped in front of both of them, his pistol held high, as if ready to shoot the ceiling. Then to Karlan, he said, “If you think you can drop that ship with a piece of iron, do it. Go on.”

“I might,” Karlan said, almost laughing.

“Drop the bar or I’ll shoot you here,” Tar`ro said. “Otherwise, they’ll kill everybody and let one of us heal.”

“Yeah,” said the giant boy. “That’s what they should have done to begin with.”

Father was kneeling, holding Fret’s pale hand.

The crowbar hit the floor, and then with an underhand motion, Tar`ro tossed his gun toward the open air.

Bountiful had stopped climbing. Diamond felt it hovering, and after a few moments it began to drop, another pair of whiffbirds settling on top of its frame.

Fret said, “This.”

Father asked, “What?”

Diamond stepped around the blood. The man ate fruit today, chewed pieces showing inside the opened stomach. Fret looked sick but calm, weak but not quite uncomfortable. Life meant pain, but he was gone from life in too many ways, and Diamond studied his face and the open mouth, waiting for his father to tell him to not look, to back away.

Father did nothing of the kind.

The two of them kneeled, keeping their knees out of the gore, and then Diamond said, “I wonder if I could help. If I gave him my blood, or something.”

Father didn’t react.

The body beside them managed one good breath, and then death was everywhere inside a piece of something that wasn’t Fret.

“They tried that,” Father said.

“Tried what?” Diamond asked.

“Your blood.” Father’s face was pale, his eyes red and sorry. “The samples from your last physicals. Remember them?”

Teams of doctors had given Diamond a day full of tests, stealing away huge vials of blood.

“I agreed to those experiments,” Father confessed. “We thought . . . your mother and I decided . . . that if your blood could restore life or cure illnesses, it would just be another blessing for having you . . . ”