at once, for he didn’t want to aid the enemy. But then, Gilhaelith could also be an enemy. ‘Gilhaelith found a way to eavesdrop on your mindspeech, with farspeakers.’
‘Ahhh,’ sighed Ryll. ‘How did he know our tongue?’
‘One of your former slaves, called Merryl …’
Ryll grimaced. ‘We should have secured Merryl before we left Snizort. Alas, in the chaos, many vital things remained undone. What did Gilhaelith do then?’
‘He learned that your matriarch had the relics, but was dying. He kept it from everyone else, stole a thapter and fled.’
‘Stole a thapter? So he is an outcast among you. How did he find our sacred relics?’
Nish hesitated.
‘You can either tell me now or, with the greatest regret, I will torture you until you beg for death, and then you will tell me.’
The latter course seemed more virtuous, more noble, though Nish could not see a lot of point to it. ‘He scried it out with his geomantic globe.’
‘The same one he perfected in Alcifer using our maps – or thinks he did.’
Nish was not treated badly, though that did not surprise him. The lyrinx used torture where necessary to extract information, but did not torment for the sake of it, as humans did.
Ryll returned to his work, whatever it was, with a barrel-shaped device in a recess further down the cave. Nish didn’t learn anything about it, for he was carried back to the adjoining cave. There he was given a wooden bucket and a fly-covered chunk of raw meat, so torn and filthy that he couldn’t tell what animal it had come from. He felt sick just looking at it, but in the end he ate it, knowing that he’d get nothing else. He wasn’t questioned further, and discovered only that he was a hostage.
After about a fortnight in the caves, the lyrinx abruptly departed late one afternoon. Nish was carried up to the top of the cliffs, where Ryll and a large band of lyrinx had gathered. Ryll carried the barrel-shaped object on his back, securely covered. Liett was there too. He gave it to her and she flew north-east with a large escort.
‘We’re marching to meet our fellows at the edge of the Dry Sea,’ said Ryll. ‘I trust you’re well shod, Nish? You humans have such useless soft feet.’
‘What are you going to do with me?’ said Nish.
‘We may exchange you, and other prisoners held elsewhere, if we get our relics back.’
‘What if you don’t?’
Ryll made neck-wringing motions with his huge hands.
Nish’s boots were in good condition, though he wasn’t much used to walking. His recent travels had been in thapters, air-floaters, constructs or clankers. The group set off at a pace he could barely maintain and, after an hour, when his legs had turned to rubber, he was taken on the shoulders of one or other of the lyrinx. It was not a position he found comfortable or dignified. They walked all night and until mid-morning the following day, and did the same every day.
The only rest they took was for the six hours in the middle of the day and, while he was carried for all but a few hours of the march, Nish was never anything but exhausted. However, the trip proved uneventful, and although he remained alert for opportunities to escape, they gave him none.
One day they were moving across a broad valley where the river was just a series of long pools up to a league in length, separated by gravel banks covered in tall reeds. Ryll and most of the lyrinx had crossed the gravel and Nish was stumbling along at the rear, with only a single lyrinx to guard him.
Without warning, a battered construct shot out of the reeds in front of them. Another construct pushed out behind and Nish heard a third moving in their direction, though he couldn’t tell where it was. The guard, taken by surprise, darted into the reeds to his right. Nish went left and hid.
He heard the sound of a construct as it pursued the rest of the lyrinx across the river. Nish crouched down and did not move, hoping that the Aachim had not noticed him dart into the reeds, but unfortunately the other two constructs remained where they were. He could hear the gentle whine of their mechanisms now, and Aachim calling to one another in their own tongue. They began to tramp through the reeds and he debated whether it was better to remain where he was or to run. He