Orlind

by Charlotte E. English

  Three down, only one to go! Llandry felt like cheering in spite of her bruises, but something else was wrong. Ori was shouting something.

  Something about Avane.

  ... caught under the wing! She’s down!

  Cold fear clutched at Llandry’s stomach. She angled in the direction of Ori’s voice, gripped with dread. If Avane had fallen from this height, she couldn’t possibly have survived. And she wasn’t answering...

  She saw Ori and Pense ahead of her, pelting into the trees. Llandry followed close behind. The foliage hid them from their draykoni pursuers, which was a blessing, but it also threatened to hide Avane from them. A minute inched by as the three of them searched, ignoring the activity of the Lokants below as the white-hairs worked on the downed mechanical.

  Then Ori gave a cry of mingled horror and triumph, and dived. Following his lead, Llandry saw Avane a little way below. She had fallen onto the cap of a moderately-sized glissenwol, and she was in human shape. She must have lost her grip on her bird-shape when she lost consciousness, but had the tree broken her fall enough?

  Ori reached her first and shifted into his human form. She’s alive, he reported. But she’s unconscious and badly hurt.

  Ori, stay and get her some help, said Pensould. Llan, we have about two minutes to finish this.

  Why two?

  Because the rest of the draykoni are on the way.

  She didn’t ask how he knew. The two of them rocketed back into the skies and went for the collection point at a speed that felt sufficient to rip Llandry’s wings from their sockets. She was so damned tired; her muscles screamed their objections, and she was seriously beginning to fear that they wouldn’t hold her for much longer.

  Oh well. All the more reason to finish this, and fast.

  Only two explosives! Where to? The wings?

  No. That will bring it down, but it won’t wholly incapacitate it. The Lokants will be in trouble. We’ll have to aim for the mouth, Minchu.

  The mouth?! she shrieked. That’s insane.

  It is, he returned grimly. But it’s the only way to be sure. Both devices in the jaws.

  Llandry didn’t even have time to feel afraid. The two draykoni had taken up stations on either side of the mechanical, and behind her she could feel a host of draykon minds bearing down upon them.

  See, they’re waiting for us to go for the wings, Pensould observed. How did he sound so calm! You first, Minchu. Watch the teeth.

  Llan’s brain was shrieking expletives at her, but she ignored it. She focused on the mechanical’s jaws, suddenly grateful for its habit of snapping at anything mobile. All she had to do was get close enough, and time it perfectly... shoot inside, drop the device and get out.

  Simple.

  Before she had time to think about it further, she was through into the mechanical mouth, only narrowly dodging its metal teeth. The rest happened without her being aware of it; somehow she loosed her grip on the baton, waited until that enormous mouth opened and shot out again.

  Fine. Now Pensould...

  But she didn’t have time to wait for him. The draykoni roared and charged her as one; she dived and dropped, using her superior agility to the utmost to evade them. She just had time to swerve around and check... yes! There was Pense emerging from the maw, device delivered.

  Then the teeth snapped down and Pensould’s cry of pain split her mind. He’d misjudged his exit. She could only watch, helpless, as the bright blue bird fell from the mech’s mouth and disappeared from view.

  PENSOULD! she shrieked.

  No reply. All sound was drowned out by the twin explosions as their two devices were detonated. Llandry didn’t wait to see if their ploy had worked; she could think only of Pensould.

  Llan? What’s happened? Ori sounded harassed. Had he got Avane out of danger?

  Pensould’s hurt. Ori, I’m going to need you!

  But Avane - I can’t - she’s still under.

  Llan didn’t answer him. She had found Pensould. It wasn’t hard to spot him, in fact, as like Avane he had lost his assumed shape as he lost consciousness. Only for him, the natural shape was his draykon form.

  No glissenwol could have broken that fall. He was too big, too heavy. He lay on the ground, motionless; even from the skies Llandry could sense the extent of his injuries.

  She landed beside him and turned human, sick with fear. Calling his name both aloud and in her mind, she dropped to her knees beside him.

  He wasn’t breathing. His heart wasn’t beating. There was nothing left here but a mountain of inert draykon flesh. Llandry could only stare, struck dumb and helpless with grief and disbelief, hollow despair stealing her strength and her presence of mind.

  Llan? Ori’s mind-voice was frantic. Tell me what’s going on.

  He’s gone.

  Gone? You mean the draykoni have –

  I mean he’s dead, Ori. Pense is dead.

  Chapter Twenty Three

  Given the outcome of their previous attempt, Ana was understandably reluctant to take Eva and Tren to Krays’s Library again. They had to waste precious time talking the stubborn and frightened woman into granting them a return passage. In the end, Eva had to promise that this would be the last time. She did so with discomfort. Only one more chance at Krays’s secrets? They would have to make sure that nothing went wrong this time.

  Maintaining a stubborn, disapproving silence, Ana took them to a quiet, little-used room in the Library. The chamber was deserted, but still the woman was extremely tense. She kept hold of their wrists for a full minute after they arrived, standing still and alert as she listened for alarms.

  To Eva’s relief, nothing happened. She, too, had suffered doubts about the efficacy of the devices she and Tren carried. After all, Iwa had said they “should” be up to date, but hadn’t been able to confirm that with perfect certainty. A sigh of relief escaped her when another minute passed without the alarms sounding.

  ‘I’d be fast,’ Ana said, speaking in a half-whisper. ‘Krays isn’t the only dangerous one around here.’

  ‘Superfast,’ Tren agreed.

  Ana chewed on her lip, staring at each of them in turn in some kind of indecision. Then she reached into her cloak, unfastened something from her belt and handed it to Eva. It was a collection of small metal objects like the ones Krays had worn. They didn’t look like any keys she had ever seen, but somehow she recognised their function.

  ‘That’s it, now,’ Ana said, looking like she already regretted the action. ‘If you’re found with those, it’s all over for me.’

  ‘Thank you,’ Eva said, with true gratitude. Ana was taking a risk indeed, and a useful one, for they wouldn’t get far in here without keys.

  ‘They won’t get you in to everything, mind,’ Ana warned. ‘You will have to find your own way into the more secret areas.’

  She vanished without waiting for a reply.

  ‘Hold still,’ Tren said. ‘I’m doing the invis.’

  Eva held still, watching with fascination as her own body gradually disappeared. Then Tren faded out too.

  ‘The difficult part will be keeping together,’ she mused. ‘Already I have no idea where you are.’

  Tren’s hand slid into hers and gripped tight. ‘Stay close,’ he said, and she could hear the smile in his words. ‘That’s the best way. Ready to go?’

  ‘Almost. Can you hide Rikbeek too?’

  ‘Ah, good thinking.’

  Eva plucked the gwaystrel off the fabric of her coat and held him out. His small, fur-dusted black body hovered weirdly atop her invisible hands, until he too disappeared.

  I need you to check for dangers, she said to him.

  His refusal was immediate, and emphatic. He was busy... sleeping.

  Not negotiable, Beek. She threw him into the air, unsettled by the fact that she couldn’t see if he took flight or not.

  A quick, sharp pain lanced through her ear. Putting up her fingers, she found the dampness of blood.

  Yep, he was
on the wing.

  Be alert, Beek. We’d like to stay alive, if at all possible.

  He sent her his grudging assent, bit her once more for good measure and winged away. She kept part of her mind with him, tracking his progress as he headed for the door.

  ‘He’s in flight,’ she told Tren. ‘He’ll warn me if he sees any mechs. Or people.’

  ‘So what’s the plan?’

  ‘Limbane said this Library is smaller, but otherwise a faithful replica of his, didn’t he?’

  ‘I remember something like that, yes.’

  ‘Then we know where to go.’ Eva started walking, but Tren’s grip on her hand held her back.

  ‘Eva, wait. You’re not thinking of the reading room, are you?’

  ‘Why not? I wouldn’t be surprised if his study is in the same place as Limbane’s, and that would be where to find the best information.’

  ‘Probably, but it’s also the most dangerous place for us to go, because the chances of finding Krays there are high. Also, how are we going to get in? Even if we manage to enter the room, Krays will have separate locks on anything important, and there’s no way Ana’s keys will work on those. It would be futile, and borderline suicidal.’

  Frustrated as she was, Eva couldn’t argue with that. He was quite right. ‘What else do you suggest?’

  ‘Well, all of this began because of Krays’s machine design projects. That’s what Limbane wanted to look at. If he’s moved them all here, they’ll probably be in the labs and the workshops. Why don’t we head there?’

  ‘Agreed. Let’s go then, quickly.’

  By the time they reached the door, Tren had somehow managed to get in front of her. He kept her behind him as he opened the door and checked the corridor outside. Then he led her out of the room, still maintaining his protective stance in front.

  ‘You don’t have to do that,’ she whispered, annoyed.

  ‘Yes I do.’

  ‘I’m quite capable of-’

  ‘Don’t bother arguing,’ he muttered. ‘If we run into a whurthag mech, it will have to go through me to get to you.’

  ‘But-’

  ‘I’m not budging!’

  One of the downsides to being female was her relative lack of height. She was tall, but Tren was several inches taller, and he had a stride to match. Trying to get ahead of him was futile.

  ‘We’re going to talk about this, later,’ she hissed.

  ‘Won’t that be fun.’ Tren strode on, unmoved.

  Defeated, Eva turned her attention to Rikbeek. He was still on the wing, maintaining a station fifteen or twenty feet ahead of them. His senses were really marvellous; he was building a picture of his surroundings in sound, bouncing his high-pitched voice off all the objects he encountered to determine their shape and distance. That was why he was such a good spy: no invisibility spell could fool him. He could “see” her and Tren as well as everything else, in spite of Tren’s invisibility enchantment.

  He was currently mapping something tall, slender and in motion...

  ‘People up ahead,’ she whispered. Instantly she and Tren moved to the wall, flattening themselves against it without losing their grip on each other. They waited, breathless, as footsteps became audible and then two figures appeared at the turn of the corridor, both male, white-haired and unmistakeably Lokant.

  They were walking two abreast, which was unnerving. The corridor wasn’t that wide. Eva held her breath in earnest as they passed by, so close that she feared they couldn’t miss her. It was hard to believe in her own invisibility when she could still feel her own physical form perfectly well, even if she couldn’t see it.

  The one closest to her was reading something, and to her relief he remained absorbed in it as he passed. The other was closer to the far side of the passageway, too far away to be in danger of touching her or Tren. They moved past without appearing to notice anything, and disappeared around the next bend in the corridor.

  Eva took a shaky breath.

  ‘Close,’ Tren murmured.

  ‘Thank goodness for Rikbeek.’

  ‘I’m getting him a present when we get out of here,’ Tren said, moving away from the wall and tugging her gently after him.

  ‘What did you have in mind?’

  ‘Blood, of course. Pints of it.’

  ‘Yours?’

  ‘Well... some of it. I don’t think I can spare a few pints all at once.’

  Eva was silent for a while after that, shivering too much to talk. She wasn’t afraid, she told herself. She was... cold. Yes, that was it. Her coat was thick and warm, but this damned Library seemed to have no heating at all. Even the brisk pace Tren set wasn’t enough to combat the chills that repeatedly shook her. She grumbled about this in her own mind, cursing the name of Krays all over again. Couldn’t he at least have a warm sinister hideout?

  Twice more they were obliged to evade Lokants wandering past. Both passed without incident, thanks to Rikbeek’s prior notification, and Eva’s trepidation quietened down a little. So far, the plan was working well enough. They had angled north through the Library and steadily downwards, aiming for the lower levels where Limbane kept the labs and machine factories in his own Library. Their Lokantor wasn’t nearly as committed to machinery as Krays, so Eva wasn’t surprised to find that they reached this part of the Library sooner than she expected. Where Limbane’s labs gave way to book rooms, Krays simply had more, and bigger, manufactories. The level of background noise increased, which was a mixed blessing: on the one hand it would make it harder for anyone to hear the intruders; on the other, it made it harder for she and Tren to talk to each other.

  Now they ran into a problem. The manufactories were busy, far busier than either of them had expected. They looked to be working at top speed. Getting in wasn’t a problem, because most of the doors were not locked; then again, most of them had a steady stream of Lokants going in and out, and the view beyond the doors was not encouraging. Each workshop was buzzing with activity.

  ‘On to the labs, I think?’ Tren whispered, his breath warm on her ear. ‘Best to look for plans.’

  Eva murmured an agreement. It would be better to get a look at the machines in operation, but there were too many people around here. Sooner or later someone would bump into them, and then it would all be over.

  As soon as they were past the manufactories, the level of activity dropped fast. This was both encouraging and foreboding, to Eva’s mind. It was helpful to them, if most of the Lokants were busy in one area of the Library; they could explore the labs in greater safety. But why was there so much activity in Krays’s machine workshops? Whatever they were building must be needed soon, and in quantity. It struck her that perhaps the draykon mechs Llandry had described had been made here. Were they building more? If so, why? For use against the Seven Realms? That prospect turned her sick with trepidation.

  The laboratory sector looked similar to Limbane’s. A large, circular hallway was lined with six metal doors, all closed and probably locked. Eva followed behind Tren as he approached the first door, glancing through the small window that was set in the top.

  ‘Occupied,’ he whispered, and moved on to the second. This one was empty. Eva passed him the keys, then turned to locate Rikbeek. He was circling near the ceiling in the centre of the room, grumbling.

  Watch the main door, please, she asked him, directing him towards the entrance they had just come from. If anyone came into this hallway, she wanted to know about it.

  ‘We’re in,’ Tren whispered, and she turned back.

  If anything, this laboratory was even colder. She shivered so violently that even Tren felt it.

  ‘Such sufferings,’ he murmured, wrapping her in a quick hug and chafing her chilled arms. ‘Suffer on, brave soldier.’

  ‘Bastard,’ she muttered. ‘Just because you’re a walking heat source.’

  She couldn’t see his grin, but she could picture it as he turned away. The layout of this room was promising: several tall, wide work surfa
ces marched the length of the lab, probably designed to accommodate large sheets of paper (or something like it). The walls were made of the same glass-like substance as Limbane’s chart room, some areas displaying complicated diagrams. She could imagine this room full of engineers, drawing out their plans on the tables and transferring parts of them to the storage and display system on the walls.

  ‘The problem with this,’ she said, staring at the walls, ‘is that I have no idea what any of it indicates.’ The drawings were incomprehensible to her, and she couldn’t decipher the notations that came with them either.

  ‘Never mind those,’ Tren said, his voice coming from somewhere near the floor. Looking down, she saw that the tables were actually cabinets, with lockable doors on the front. Tren had got one of them unlocked; as she watched, the doors opened as if by themselves. Inside was a large, complicated-looking machine.

  ‘It’s heavy,’ Tren grunted as he lifted it out. ‘What do you think this is, a prototype?’

  ‘Makes sense,’ she agreed. Here they would experiment with the design until they’d got it right. Then the plans would be transferred to the manufactories for construction, leaving the original prototype behind.

  ‘This doesn’t make much more sense to me, I admit,’ she said, directing a frown at the odd thing that now sat atop the cabinet. It was a few feet wide and a couple tall, consisting of a sturdy metal base and a series of conduits made from that same strange type of glass. ‘Is that drayk bone?’

  ‘Looks like it, Tren said. The bone was fitted into a set of clamps at what she took to be the front of the machine. At the other end there was... nothing significant. It looked as though the system of conduits simply stopped.

  ‘Looks like part of something bigger,’ Tren said, confirming her guess. She followed as he worked his way around the rest of the cabinets, opening all the doors. Inside each was another similar contraption, each bearing a piece of draykon bone, each terminating abruptly at the back end.

  ‘They fit together,’ Tren said. ‘Look - see that bracket on the end of this one? I bet it would connect to one of the others.’