She knew that the others felt fear, too. She could feel it, no matter how well they had concealed it before. But none of them hesitated. Waeverleyne was hopelessly outclassed: if the four of them could uncover the means to destroy the constructs, the risks would be fully worthwhile. Llandry swallowed her fear and flew on, scarcely faltering even when the gigantic airborne forms of the mechanical draykoni appeared on the horizon ahead of her.
Once they were in range, the four wordlessly split into pairs: Ori and Avane veered away to the left, and Llan followed Pensould straight into the path of one of the strange, metal-and-hide draykoni.
The construct they had picked was much more terrifying up close, and so much larger than Llandry in her gwaystrel shape that she felt as though a mountain had ponderously taken flight. The first thing she noticed as she neared the thing was its flexibility. Such a monstrous, oversized construct ought to be slow and awkward in its movements, but this one was not. Pensould strayed too close to the thing’s head; the mighty jaws instantly opened and snapped shut again, and Pensould missed being swallowed by a hair’s breadth.
Keep clear of the head! Llandry shouted. Pense, please be careful.
I am always careful, he retorted, in spite of obvious evidence to the contrary.
The two of them sped away from the creature’s head, mapping the thing’s body from neck to tail. Llandry noted black hide that gleamed with a dampened, oily sheen in the Glinnery sun; real muscles that bunched and flexed under that strange hide; the sense of metal and oil beneath the surface, bones of some impossibly strong alloy. No discernible weaknesses there.
We need to know how that flame-throwing thing works, Llandry said privately to Pensould. That’s the dangerous part. We need another go at the head, but watch out for the teeth!
Pensould didn’t reply. He veered out to the left, circling around the thing’s jaws, and Llan went the other way, darting in and out too fast - she hoped - for the construct to have time to react to her presence. Each one of its eyes was as big as she was; she wanted to get a look at those, too, to decide how sensitive they were. Gathering her nerve, she flew in fast and settled on the creature’s head, clinging hard with her small claws. She’d placed herself right above one eye, and now had a clear view of the shining orb.
Glass, that’s what it looked like, but it wasn’t normal glass. It looked like the stuff that made up the lenses in Eva’s light-reduction spectacles. Behind the glass, the eye looked real. That is, biological in nature. If so, this might be the first weak point they had identified, but it wasn’t enough by itself. Large these eyes may be, but how could they hope to hit such a target from the ground? Or even from the air?
The flame comes from a device in the throat, Pensould said to her. I can neither see nor sense any kind of fuel, but do you feel the energy?
Llandry did. It pulsed and buzzed through the construct’s hide, making it hot and harder to hold onto. What do you think that is?
The mechanical parts must have some manner of fuel to operate. It is my guess that it is using sunlight, absorbed through the hide. It will take a lot of this energy to power the flame function, so we may find that it will have to stop and recharge sometime soon.
Llandry remembered Devary’s explorations in Nimdre, and the warehouse full of devices he’d said were probably using the sunlight in some way. I think you must be right!
Her next sentence was cut off when the construct gave its great head a violent shake, its jaws flexing. She was shaken off, and those heavy jaws snapped horribly close to her wings. Invisible she might be, but the creature had senses of some kind with which to see or feel her presence.
We’re spotted, she cried. Time to go!
Right behind you, Pensould replied.
Llandry flew hard, blessing the small size that allowed her to duck and weave away from the construct’s attempts to catch her. She was fast, but the damned thing was fast, too, in spite of its size and it took her too many terrifying minutes to escape from the thing.
But that gave her another idea.
Pense? she called, taking refuge in a tall tree.
Still here, Minchu.
While that thing was chasing us, it wasn’t setting fire to any more trees.
I noticed that too, yes. Perhaps we can find a way to distract them for longer. A safer way.
Llandry spread her wings again and launched herself into the air. Let’s find the Commander.
Then Avane shot by her nose, almost colliding with her. Llan! She yelled in Llandry’s mind. More of them on the way!
What? More of what?
More draykon-things! Ori and me, we had to run and we got chased out beyond the city. We saw at least one more away on the horizon, maybe more.
Llandry swore. Coming this way?
It was hard to tell. Llan, I’m not sure if they were coming here or - or going to Glour.
Llandry swore again. Where’s Ori?
Here, came Ori’s voice from somewhere above.
We have to tell the Commander, she said. Fast.
Iver wasted little time on recriminations, not once he’d heard their reports. At the news of the incoming draykon-constructs, his grim face turned a shade or two grimmer and he nodded once.
‘Right. We’re going to need help. Where’s your father?’
Llandry debated with herself for about two seconds. ‘He and my mother left the city a couple of hours ago, sir. Ma’s on her way to Irbel to beg for aid. Pa’s taking her out of Waeverleyne, then he’s coming back.’
The Commander’s eyes widened. ‘Irbel? What kind of help?’
‘I don’t know, sir. He said something about secret technologies.’
‘Let’s hope that comes through, but I daren’t rely on it. What of your friends?’
‘Which ones?’
‘The mysterious ones people are trying not to talk about. White hair. Habit of vanishing. Your father told me about them,’ he added at her questioning look.
‘They aren’t here, sir.’
‘You got a way to get in touch with them?’
Thinking of the voice-box, Llandry nodded. ‘Probably.’
‘Use it. These things are their province; we can’t deal with them alone.’
Chapter Eighteen
Eva sat with Tren, Ana and Griel in the latter’s house in Ullarn. The four had gathered there for a final discussion, prior to their infiltration of Krays’s Library. The conversation was not going well.
‘I want to emphasise how dangerous this is,’ Ana said, slouching into one of Griel’s armchairs. ‘If you two mess up, it will be me who is punished first.’ Her stare was unfriendly and devoid of anything resembling sympathy or fellow-feeling. ‘I still do not like this plan.’
Tren shrugged. ‘We’re open to other suggestions.’
‘I have none, of course,’ Ana snapped. ‘Otherwise I would never have agreed to this folly. Let me say again: the utmost care must be taken in everything, especially when you are going to places that you should not.’
‘Yes, yes,’ Tren sighed. Ana had gone over this multiple times already, and even Eva’s patience was running out.
Ana glared at him. ‘It has occurred to you, I suppose, that he will insist on tracering you both.’
Eva grimaced. Tracers seemed to be popular with the Lokant Libraries. The tiny tracking devices were embedded somewhere in the body, so that they couldn’t be removed or switched off by the bearer. Once tracered, the individual could be located at a moment’s notice, no matter where in the worlds they happened to be.
Eva hadn’t yet suffered that indignity, but she knew she’d have no choice. If she resisted the tracer, Krays would never consider her trustworthy.
‘It has occurred to me,’ she said coolly.
‘It hadn’t occurred to me,’ Tren muttered. If she didn’t know Tren better, she might have called his current mood bad-tempered. But since she did, she recognised it as anxiety. And no wonder, because on top of everything else he considered himself r
esponsible for her safety, too.
Don’t be separated from me, he’d said earlier, and he had made her promise to stay with him at all times. Nothing she had said could convince him to relinquish his self-appointed role as her guardian, so she’d had to accept it.
She just wished it wasn’t so obviously wearing on his nerves.
‘You will be tracered,’ Ana was saying with brutal bluntness. ‘You will not resist, because that will give away the game. You will be expected to report regularly on whatever duties you are assigned. You will not be permitted to argue with the Lokantor. You-’
Tren interrupted. ‘Lokantor? Isn’t that Limbane’s title?’
Eva was puzzled too. Limbane had never insisted on their using the name, but she’d heard the other Lokants addressing him that way, with the sort of respect that suggested it was an important term.
‘How should I know?’ Ana snapped. ‘I’m telling you that Krays uses that title and he will expect you to address him by it.’
‘Then we shall,’ Eva replied. Tren had eschewed the comfort of a chair and taken up pacing instead. The more frustrated and worried he became, the greater the speed of his ramblings. She abandoned her own chair and followed him, catching at his hands to make him stop.
He sighed. ‘Sorry. I think it’s the waiting that’s getting to me.’
‘Me as well,’ she said, gripping his fingers with gentle pressure. ‘It would be well to get it over with.’
‘Then let’s.’ He looked back at Ana, subtly assuming some of the commanding air he’d adopted for his role as a partial Lokant. His dark hair was hidden under Limbane’s white wig and he looked every inch the Lokant. ‘We’re ready to go, Ana.’
‘I will tell you when we are ready to go!’ she replied, her temper flaring. She jumped up and advanced on Tren, but whatever she might have said was interrupted by a soft, but penetrating, beep. Aysun’s voice-box, deposited in the pocket of Eva’s coat, gave a sudden shudder, knocking against her leg.
‘Please keep the shouting down for a moment,’ Eva said dryly as she extricated the device. ‘If you can.’ She pressed the activation button and held the box to her ear.
Llandry began talking at once, her words tumbling out in a blur of panic. Eva could barely understand two words in every five.
‘Llandry. Slow down, please, I cannot comprehend you. The draykoni have returned, am I understanding that correctly? And what else?’
Llan took a deep breath and slowed her speech right down, but the tremor in her voice remained. What she said next sent Eva straight to a chair, afraid her suddenly trembling legs would dump her ignominiously on the ground.
Mechanical draykons, Llandry said. Fire-breathing, bigger than Pensould. Waeverleyne was in flames.
A rare expletive fell from her lips, followed by several more. She was distantly aware that the discussion between Tren and Ana had stopped and all three of her companions were staring at her.
‘Your father?’ Eva queried. ‘Does he have a solution to this?’
That was a stupid question to ask: she realised that as soon as she’d said it. Of course he didn’t have a solution. How could anybody expect that he would?
‘He’s working on something,’ Llandry said breathlessly, ‘but it’ll take time and we don’t have any of that left. Eva, please. We need help. You need to get the Lokants down here.’
She was right: this mischief had to be generated by Krays and his Lokants. Only Limbane’s people would know how to handle this - if even they did. She had been right to suspect Krays’s involvement in the disappearance of the draykoni, but that gave her no satisfaction. In the event, she would much rather have been wrong.
‘I’ll do my best, Llan,’ she promised. ‘And yes, right away. I shan’t delay. But, Llan? Don’t call me again. We’re about to leave for Krays’s Library, and if he finds this box I’ll have a hard time explaining it. I’ll call you every chance I get.’
Llandry agreed, and severed the connection. Eva replaced the box in her pocket, too shocked to speak for a long moment. She hadn’t asked where Llandry was, or how the defence was holding up. Those questions were largely irrelevant: even if they were holding their own now, it couldn’t continue.
Summoning every bit of self-control that she possessed, Eva relayed the news to her silent audience as clearly as she could. When she’d finished, even Ana was shocked beyond words. The silence stretched intolerably and Eva stood up.
‘Limbane needs to be told.’
Tren grabbed her hand. ‘Does Glinnery hold?’
‘At the moment, but Llan thinks it’ll fall by the end of the day.’
‘And then...’
‘And then Glour is next. I know.’
‘Then we can’t go,’ he said, sounding anguished. ‘To the other Library, I mean. We have to get home. We could help.’
‘No,’ she said fiercely. ‘We couldn’t. What do you expect us to do in Glour City? Nothing that a hundred other people aren’t already doing, and to no effect.’
‘Your Lokant skills-’
‘What about them? There’s nothing I can do against three or more draykoni-mechs. Llan’s right: they need Lokant expertise.’
Ana still hadn’t said anything, not even when Eva flatly shoved aside her command of their expedition. Glancing at her, Eva saw she was paler than normal; ashen. She looked sick, and so did Griel. Neither of them came from Glour, of course; they were both from Ullarn originally, and that distant realm hadn’t been named as a target by the draykoni. But the power of the draykoni and the mechs combined was staggering. If they could reduce the Glinnish capital to ashes in the space of a day, would they stop after taking Arvale and Everum? They wouldn’t. Ana and Griel could see that as well as she could, and apparently they still cared for their old home.
‘Limbane will help,’ she said, trying to sound confident. ‘It’s Krays. He’s always delighted to thwart that man.’
She didn’t voice any of the questions that plagued her thoughts and weakened her confidence in her own pronouncements. Would Limbane help? It would be highly dangerous; was he so anxious to thwart Krays that he’d agree to take his Lokants into a warzone?
And even worse, what if he couldn’t help? What if these mechs were beyond even his knowledge?
Eva pushed these reflections away and grabbed Tren’s hand. ‘We’ll be back soon,’ she told Ana and the still-silent Griel. She was gone without waiting for a reply, darting through the Map back to Limbane’s reading-room.
Limbane did not like to be disturbed. All Lokants were therefore forbidden from travelling straight into his reading-room; instead they were expected to transport themselves to the corridor directly outside, and subsequently knock like civilised people.
Eva had disobeyed this stricture once before, when Tren had been stabbed and bleeding to death on the floor of Griel’s house. On this second occasion she was again going straight from Griel’s home to Limbane’s inner sanctum, and her news was no less urgent.
Limbane wasn’t alone when she and Tren arrived. Andraly was sitting with him, probably goading him about something judging from the wicked look she wore. Eva cut in upon their conversation without ceremony.
‘Limbane, have you ever heard of anyone building draykon mechanicals before?’
Limbane’s brows snapped down. ‘What? Of course not. Why would anybody want to do that? Such a thing would be monstrously oversized. Completely unworkable. And what have I said about interruptions?’
Eva ignored the last part. ‘Krays doesn’t seem to think so.’ Quickly she apprised both of them of recent events, stressing everything that Llandry had gabbled to her about the appearance and functions of the mechanical things. If she understood Limbane at all, there would be two things most likely to persuade him to help: the prospect of aggravating Krays would be the strongest one, and alongside that, sheer academic curiosity about his rival’s latest creation.
As she had hoped, Limbane instantly began to ask questions. Lots of them. �
��They are fully airborne? What is the size? What are they made from? You say they breathe flame?’
‘I know nothing else,’ she said. ‘I spoke to Llandry for only a couple of minutes. If you want to know more, you’ll have to go and look at them yourself.’
Limbane waved a dismissive hand. ‘Can’t do that, it’s far too dangerous. They’ll probably manage to destroy one at some point. We can pick it up later for inspection.’
‘Maybe they will,’ Eva said, fighting to keep hold of her temper, ‘one, if they’re lucky - before they are destroyed themselves. They need help, Limbane.’
‘They are grown men and women. They can manage their own problems.’
So much for her control over her temper. She could almost feel it break as pure ire bubbled up and threatened to choke her.
She went for Limbane, ready to lash him to pieces in her fury, but Tren got there first. He grabbed the old man’s shirt, hauled him out of his chair and pulled him up to face level. Tren was a few inches taller than the Lokantor, as well as younger and stronger; Limbane hung helplessly in his grip, toes barely touching the floor.
‘That isn’t good enough,’ Tren hissed. He dropped Limbane, all but hurling the man away from him. Limbane backed away but Tren stalked after him, inexorable.
‘I am the Lokantor,’ Limbane protested, sputtering with indignation. ‘This is not how discussions are held in my Library!’
‘Well, we weren’t having a discussion,’ Eva snapped. ‘This is not negotiable.’
‘Lady Glostrum,’ Limbane began with heavy sarcasm.
‘Don’t try to tell me this is not your problem!’ she shouted. ‘What have you and your miserable friends really been doing in our Cluster, hm?’
Limbane eyed her, wariness in every feature. ‘What do you mean?’
‘I hardly know! Nobody thought it necessary to explain to a mere partial what exactly it is about our worlds that you people find so attractive. But you’ve been hanging around us for a long, long time, haven’t you? Well, you brought this problem to us. Krays has given considerable assistance to the draykoni; whatever he’s expecting to get in return has something to do with you, I would bet any money on it. This is your fight as much as ours, Lokantor.’
Orlind Page 18