Part 34 (1/2)

'Don't make a sound.' He crawled backwards to the trapdoor.

Within a minute, the storeroom had been returned to its previous state. The trapdoor was not visible. He checked everything with an egg-shaped scanningstone, then wiped his dusty hands and went to dress for his visitors.

Gilhaelith put on the most extravagant mancer's robes he could find, scarlet and black with diagonal threads of gold. He selected a wide-brimmed hat of the same material, with a crown of crumpled scarlet fabric. With his lanky frame it gave him an air of lofty dignity, but also of harmless eccentricity, the image he hoped to cultivate.

Before he was b.u.t.toned up, Gilhaelith had a thought that led him to run all the way to the lowest level, where the thapter lay hidden. It had taken most of one night to lower it down on a pair of winches, ease it in through the window hole and put the window back. He had since paced out the entire path from the forest, checking with his scanningstone and using his Art to erase all trace of the thapter's aura. Now Gilhaelith withdrew the amplimet and the other crystals, slipped them into a lead box and sealed the lid. You never knew what emanations, or auras, the Aachim might be able to detect.

They might also scry for wisps of aura that could indicate the amplimet's present location. He scuttled across to the organ chamber and, selecting a crystal that bore a close physical resemblance to the amplimet, pa.s.sed it back and forth across the frosty gla.s.s sphere, scrying for traces. He found none, nor did the organ sound when he put the crystal into the eighty-one-point star. That did not mean all traces of the amplimet were hidden, but it would take more than casual scrying to find it. At the least, a room-by-room search of Nyriandiol. He had a plan for that contingency too, but hoped he would not have to use it. It involved dead Aachim, the destruction of Nyriandiol and flight through secret forest paths to a distant refuge.

'They're coming,' Nixx shouted.

Gilhaelith followed him to the front terrace. He waited there, restraining the urge to glance up at the gable behind which Tiaan lay hidden.

The three machines came whining and puffing dust around the corner, onto the gravelled expanse outside the front door of Nyriandiol. Swinging into an arrowhead formation, they stopped as one. At the back of each machine a soldier sat behind a kind of javelard in a turret. The weapons were armed most discourteous. Nothing happened for what Gilhaelith recognised as a carefully calculated minute. Good. It was a warm day and his robes kept him cool, but it must have been sweltering inside the black machines. Had they considered the much hotter climate of Santhenar when they built them?

The top of the first machine cracked open, followed by the others. A lean, hatchet-faced man appeared. There were black circles around his eyes and deep creases etched into the sallow skin of his face. He leaned on a platinum-topped cane.

'Are you the master here?' he said. He employed a deceptively slow manner of speaking. Arrogance showed in every word, every gesture, in the tilt of his head, the way he thrust himself forward, and the down-curving of his upper lip as he glanced around him.

'I am,' Gilhaelith said, putting on a merry smile. 'Gilhaelith is my name. And who may you be, master, with your gleaming new clankers?' He used the word deliberately.

'Don't confuse our our constructs with your primitive war carts,' the man snapped. 'Surely even in this backwoods place you've heard of us by now?' constructs with your primitive war carts,' the man snapped. 'Surely even in this backwoods place you've heard of us by now?'

'No, master,' said Gilhaelith. 'I can't say that I have.'

'I am Vithis, of Clan Inthis, First Clan of Aachan.'

Gilhaelith took a calculated step backwards and threw up his hands. 'Aachan, master? Surely you are having a joke at my expense. Even I know that the Way between the Worlds has been closed these two hundred years and more, and cannot be reopened.'

Two more people appeared on the platform, holding what seemed to be a wire and gla.s.s dish about the size of a large plate. They moved it slowly, scrying for traces of the thapter, or perhaps the amplimet. It was a dangerous moment. Gilhaelith tried to remain calm.

Vithis turned to them, his words carrying, as no doubt he intended. 'The man's a d.a.m.n fool.' He spun on one heel, military fas.h.i.+on. 'Aachan is dying,' he said to Gilhaelith. 'I command a mighty force of constructs and there is nothing on your world that can resist them. You would be well advised to cooperate.'

'I am happy to cooperate,' said Gilhaelith, spreading his empty hands, 'should you state what you want of me. It's not necessary to use threats. And if you say you are from Aachan, of course of course I believe you.' He put all the doubt he could muster into those words. 'How may I help you, master? Please, come down. You must be sweltering, cooped up in those little rattle boxes in the blazing sun. This is the hottest spring I can ever remember. Take a chair on my terrace, and a cool drink.' I believe you.' He put all the doubt he could muster into those words. 'How may I help you, master? Please, come down. You must be sweltering, cooped up in those little rattle boxes in the blazing sun. This is the hottest spring I can ever remember. Take a chair on my terrace, and a cool drink.'

He clapped his hands. An attendant came running. 'Ale, man, from the deepest, coolest cellar! And if there is any ice in the chest, crush a few buckets. Bring platters of my favourite favourite tidbits. Hurry!' tidbits. Hurry!'

'I am perfectly comfortable,' said Vithis, though sweat was running down his face.

The scriers were still scanning the building. If their device was unusually sensitive it might pick up traces of aura he had missed. Gilhaelith grinned like a yokel, but his liver was crusted with ice. 'What can I do for you, master? I am at your complete disposal.'

'I seek news of a construct like this one,' said Vithis, indicating the smaller machine to the left of his own. 'It resembles it in every respect, save one. It flies! It flies!'

'It flies!' Gilhaelith echoed, his mouth hanging open. 'A marvel! How on earth did you make such a machine?'

'That is not your business,' Vithis said with a grimace. 'The construct was stolen from us by a young woman. Tiaan, her name is, a skinny, sneaking creature with black hair. The wretch tried to kill me and must be punished. I will pay well for information about the construct, or about her or about her.'

So she was was a thief. The twinge of disappointment surprised Gilhaelith. a thief. The twinge of disappointment surprised Gilhaelith.

'A young woman!' he exclaimed. 'She must be a resourceful la.s.s indeed, to have stolen your most prized machine.'

'How do you know it is prized?' snapped Vithis.

'Your constructs did not fly here. You came creeping up the road, eating the dust and sweltering in the heat. Ah, it is truly terrible today.' Gilhaelith went backwards under the shade of the terrace roof. The scriers had put away their dish. Was that good or bad? He could not tell. constructs did not fly here. You came creeping up the road, eating the dust and sweltering in the heat. Ah, it is truly terrible today.' Gilhaelith went backwards under the shade of the terrace roof. The scriers had put away their dish. Was that good or bad? He could not tell.

'But since you ask, I did hear rumour of a flying machine, some days back.' Gilhaelith was on dangerous ground here, especially after pretending to know nothing of the Aachim. Better to tell them straight out than deny everything and have them suspect him. 'Being well read in the Histories, I recognised its value. I asked my factors for news of this extraordinary machine.' This was true; he had sent people out to ask for news and to spread disinformation, but only after the thapter was safe in his cellar.

'Really?' said the Aachim. 'And what did you learn? Quick, man, out with it!'

'I will tell you,' Gilhaelith said slowly, 'if you allow me the chance. You are an impatient young fellow, surr!'

Vithis's face darkened, but someone put a hand on his shoulder and he restrained himself. 'Go on.'

'There was no news from nearby, though that isn't surprising. The forest surrounding us is dense. Only hunters and sap collectors dwell there, and they are a taciturn lot.' Gilhaelith held his breath. What he had said was mostly true, though if the Aachim already had reports to the contrary it would undermine what he said next. 'But north and east the forests thin, especially close to the great lakes of Parnggi and Warde Yallock. There are many small settlements near the lakes. At one of them, people saw the flying machine sweeping north.'

Vithis pounced. 'At its nearest point, either lake is a good thirty leagues from here. Considerably more, the way the forest paths run. You could not have walked there and back in time. So how do you know So how do you know?'

'My information came by skeet, of course,' said Gilhaelith. 'I have factors in the larger towns on the lakes. I trade in a number of commodities.'

'What is a skeet?' asked Vithis.

'A large, vicious carrier bird, widely used on Santhenar for carrying messages. Would you care to see my skeet house?'

'I would,' said Vithis, climbing down from the platform, probably as a face-saving way of getting out of the heat. He winced as he reached the ground, stabbing at it with his cane.

Gilhaelith led them along the paved pathway. The twenty Aachim were discreetly armed, a breach of courtesy which Gilhaelith ignored. His sentries were concealed in all manner of unlikely places. Their heavy crossbows could have sent a bolt right through the metal sides of the constructs, though to do so would have meant the end of Nyriandiol, Gilhaelith and themselves.

The path paralleled the outer rim before curving back to the rear of the villa. Gilhaelith talked all the way, pointing out the sights within the crater and without.

Vithis was sizing the place up. Nyriandiol was easily defended from a minor onslaught, the upper sides of the crater being too steep and rugged to be traversable by clankers or, Gilhaelith suspected, by these marvellous constructs. The road could be blocked if need be. The arrangement of terraces and walls that surrounded Nyriandiol on three sides was designed for defence and he could stop a sizeable force, though not an army.

The skeet house was a small stone building with metal lattice across the front and back. Leaning against one side, Gilhaelith noted that only sixteen Aachim had followed Vithis. The others would be scrying, and spying. He pretended not to notice, but inwardly Gilhaelith was smiling. Sixteen was the fourth power of two, a potent number in his mathemancy. The number of spies, four, also worked to his advantage. They would find nothing.

'We keep the birds in separate pens,' said Gilhaelith, 'else they would tear each other to pieces. This one still has the message pouch on its left leg.'

Inside the first pen was a dark-plumed, hook-beaked raptor, as big as a good-sized eagle. Its yellow eye was flecked with red and when Gilhaelith poked a stick in through the bars the skeet shredded the bark with a single swipe of its talons.

'Many a keeper has lost an eye or a nose to a skeet,' he went on. 'Or a throat! Unpleasant animals, but we could hardly conduct our lives without them.'

'Or the war,' said Vithis.

'I dare say. The war is not my business.'

'Ah yes, business,' Vithis said. 'You trade in certain commodities that could affect the course of the war.'

'If they were available to you and not to humankind?'