that had split the flow of the Hornrace for thousands of years, were undermined in less than an hour. Peaks almost a thousand spans high tilted, toppled, rolled over and over and broke into pieces the size of hills before thundering to the bed of the Dry Sea, or into the salt lakes which were already overflowing. They could hear the roaring from on high, and even see the ground shake. Fissures zigzagged out across the salt for leagues.
The flow doubled and redoubled, until even from their height the noise was deafening. No one said a word. Even Gilhaelith was awed by the power of nature, so much greater than his greatest geomancy.
‘It’s not going to stop, is it?’ shouted Nish.
‘Not until it fills the Dry Sea –’ Irisis stopped with her mouth open. ‘They must have used the field controller to explode the node under the Foshorn.’
‘Neither Flydd nor Yggur would have done this, even if Orgestre put a sword to their necks,’ said Irisis.
‘No geomancer has the power to do what’s been done here,’ said Gilhaelith.
‘Then who has?’
‘Earth tremblers happen for their own reasons.’
He didn’t sound convinced and neither was Nish, who wasn’t a believer in coincidences.
‘It’s the end of the Dry Sea. It’s going to be the Sea of Perion again,’ said Tiaan.
‘And that too was foretold,’ said Malien.
‘How long will it take to fill?’ said Irisis.
‘Weeks, I should think,’ said Tiaan in a wisp of a voice. ‘But as soon as the water is two spans deep in this corner of the sea, all the lyrinx will drown, and Ryll will think I planned it all along. He’ll think it’s humanity’s perfect revenge – to offer them hope, then snatch it away at the last minute. There’s no death the lyrinx fear more than drowning.’
‘Liett will certainly think that,’ said Irisis.
‘What are we going to do?’ cried Tiaan, looking around wildly.
‘Don’t panic. There’s time yet,’ said Malien.
‘How much?’ she wailed.
‘It will depend on which point of the sea is lowest, and whether they have to cross it to get to Nithmak.’
‘We’d better warn them,’ said Tiaan, turning out towards the lyrinx. ‘Perhaps they can run a bit faster.’
The thapter raced from one end of the running horde, now stretched out over fifteen leagues of salt, to the other, though it seemed clear from their pace that the lyrinx knew what had happened. By the time they’d done that, the water was threading the bed of the Dry Sea and Tiaan was in a panic. Tiaan hurtled back to Nithmak, setting down right at the base of the tower in the middle of the afternoon, and running to the doors. They were still locked.
‘I wish I’d gone in before,’ she said. Tiaan threw herself back in and drove the thapter straight at the doors.
‘Stop! You don’t know how strongly it’s built,’ yelled Malien.
It was too late. The front of the thapter struck the doors with a crash that threw them all forward. The front crumpled and Malien cried out in dismay. The metal doors had buckled but still held. Tiaan pushed again and the doors tore from their hinges.
Everyone scrambled out, and Malien inspected the damage, shaking her head. ‘We may come to regret that.’
Tiaan wasn’t listening. She ran past and up the winding stairs into darkness. Everything had been built of basalt as black as the void itself, and there were no windows here. Irisis and Gilhaelith followed at a less precipitous pace.
Nish looked across the foyer after them. ‘I think Tiaan has taken leave of her senses.’
Malien came around the side. ‘She’s been troubled for a long time, and Minis’s sacrifice shook her.’
‘She’s always been a little … obsessive.’
He went out, inspecting the defences with a professional eye. Nithmak Tower occupied the centre of the flat-topped peak, leaving a rim of bare rock all around. The top of the peak was only a few hundred spans across, and thousands of fliers stood in a ring around the edges, watching silently. Nish shivered. At least they’d keep the thapters away.
He did a rough calculation. At a pinch the top might accommodate a hundred thousand lyrinx, crammed close together, but four or five times that number had to pass through the gate, if they survived the journey.
Nithmak could not be attacked from below but was vulnerable to attack from air-floaters and thapters. ‘I wonder why Vithis chose this place?’ he said to Irisis. ‘There are dozens of larger peaks in this part of the sea.’