'It is unlikely they will let you see him.'

'Nevertheless, I will go, my Lord.'

Jaspar stood motionless, looking up the next flight of the stair. He shook his head. 'I will not come with you, my Lord.'

'I will gladly go alone.'

Jaspar gave a snort. 'Even the lowest Lord of the Lesser Chosen would not appear at the Skygate without an escort.'

'I was hoping my Lord would see fit to lend me some of his people.'

'You did, did you?'

'Currently, I am one of the Lords Imago. As such, I would not wish to bring such shame upon your House.'

Jaspar's mask regarded him.

'If I have to, I will go alone.'

'Oh, very well! If you will insist on this ludicrous course of action I will not stop you.' Jaspar clapped his hands and one of his guardsmen came instantly to throw himself before his Master. Jaspar arranged an escort, then turned to Carnelian. 'You will need a household.'

'For one day I can do without one.'

'One day, my Lord?'

'A household is being sent up from my coomb.'

'Indeed, my Lord, and you expect it to be up there with you so soon?' He made a fist. They will not.'

'But Jaspar, how can I use your people?'

'Aaagh, the delicate sensitivity shows itself again like the horns of a snail. My dear, I will give you blinded slaves who will suffer no punishment whatsoever should you appear before them unmasked. Does that assuage your scruples?'

Carnelian nodded.

'Well, let us give thanks that at least we have managed that.'

Carnelian sighed his relief as the Sinistrals carried him away from Jaspar. Behind him came dragonfly-faced guardsmen leading two blind slaves. Once they were out of sight of the pool, Carnelian settled into the gentle rhythm of his chair. They had to pass other halfway houses with their encampments of retainers. When at last they had left these behind, Carnelian was isolated in the rushing wind, watching the graven gods slip by or gazing out over vertiginous views of the crater.

The air grew progressively cooler until Carnelian was forced to pull his robe tightly round him for warmth. The crater had become a remote floor. Several times when the stair doubled back at a northern landing, he glimpsed the disc of the Plain of Thrones. However high they climbed, there always remained a vast mass of the Pillar looming above.

In a keening gale, they came to the Rainbow Stair's last step. Towering up behind it, the Skygate was an immense oblong of bronze studded with turtleshell sky glyphs. Carnelian's Sinistral bearers put him down and backed away to allow his Imago guardsmen to flank him as he climbed out of the chair.

Carnelian felt a surge of euphoria. Strangely, even the thought that his father's death might soon be confirmed did not darken his mood. More Sinistrals appeared wrapped in flapping cloaks of green and black. Collared with tarnished silver, eyes averted, their half-black faces looked out from horned casques.

Carnelian was about to shout to them over the wind when they opened a path in their midst leading to the gate. Bending to keep his cowl from blowing off, he walked along it trailing Jaspar's men. He struck the gate and waited. Glancing up he saw one of the sky glyphs hanging over him as large as a chariot. The Skygate gasped open and a thick perfumed exhalation streamed past him. He walked through. The ground shook as the gate closed behind him, cutting the wind off like a tongue with a knife.

A cavernous hall ran off to what seemed to be the edge of a forest. Quilted with a tang of lilies, the air was pulsing. Carnelian thought he was hearing his own blood, but when he pushed his hand to his chest he found his heart was beating faster. Concentrating, he thought perhaps it might be a drum playing somewhere in the faraway forest.

'Seraph Imago, you were not expected till the morrow.'

The voice made Carnelian start. He turned to see the silver face of an ammonite beside him. He could not think what to say.

'Which of the Seraphs Imago are you?'

For answer Carnelian removed Khrusos' ring and handed it to the ammonite, who examined it, then returned it.

'Will he that is to be Imago be joining you, Seraph?' Carnelian shook his head.

'Fortunately, chambers have been made ready to receive you, Seraph. If the Seraph would deign to follow.'

Carnelian reached out to stop the man turning away. 'I must see the Ruling Lord Suth.'

The ammonite's silver mask regarded him as if he were mad. ‘Seraph, even if you were Imago, it would take days to arrange an audience with the Regent.'

The Regent? He is well, then?'

The ammonite shrugged. ‘Seraph, I do not understand.'

The man hunched his shoulders, beginning to fall into the prostration.

'I assure you that he will want to see me.'

The ammonite made vague gestures with his hands but would not look up at him. 'Seraph, perhaps I should go and fetch one of my Masters?'

'No,' Carnelian said, feeling a stab of fear. The Wise must not be involved. Carnelian thought furiously. 'If I had something that I wished to give the Regent, could you make sure that he received it?'

The ammonite took a step back. 'My Masters, perhaps…?'

Carnelian reached into his robe and pulled out the chain with his father's Ruling Ring. He snapped the chain to unthread the ring. This should be given to the Regent. It belongs to him.'

The ammonite hesitated. Carnelian grabbed his hand and forced the ring into it. The silver mask regarded the hand.

'Give it to your Masters if you must, but get it to the Regent.'

The ammonite put the ring away into his robe, bowed, and then led Carnelian and his Imago guardsmen down the hall. He found a door down the left-hand side. The Sinistrals who guarded it stood aside and the door opened into a corridor of more human proportions that curved out of sight, its left wall regularly set with doors. They walked down this until Carnelian had given up counting the doors.

At last the ammonite stopped at one, opened it a little, jerked a bow and moved quickly away. Carnelian pushed the door fully open. It gave into a long narrow chamber that had steps at the end rising to another door. He crossed to open it and found another similar chamber.

Seven such chambers brought him to a flight of steps leading up to a more imposing door. He climbed to open it and walked into a bedchamber. Over the rattle of shutters, he could hear the wind careening through the sky outside. He returned to the door and urged the Imago retainers to make themselves comfortable, then he closed the door and went to sit on the bed to wait. The distant heartbeat was the loudest sound in the chamber. He listened to it with the taste of copper in his mouth, wondering if this was a symptom of the sky sickness.

Carnelian skimmed sleep like a flying fish. Beneath its waves slid nightmare shadows, driving him to struggle out of the water's leaden coat up into the air. He longed for their mouths to swallow him and end the nausea of fear, but still with a slap and a flick he managed to evade each lunge and fly free, winnowing the wind, frantically rowing the air. He would see the fire in the chamber, perhaps his stone fingers, the gloom pulsing with his heart, and then first his head and then his spine would suck back into the sleeving sea.

He was shaken awake. All he could hear was his beating heart.

'Carnelian.'

Impossibly, his father's voice, his father's face quivering with the drumbeat of Carnelian's heart. It was his father sitting on the bed in the flickering firelight clad in some peculiar close-fitting garments. Carnelian reached out for him and they clung to each other.