'These are the last,' said Fusshte. 'Let's get the trials underway. The executioners are impatient.'

Their hands were bound behind them and they were marched out of the broken doors of Fiz Gorgo into the bleak yard. The thirty or so prisoners already there, each with their group of guards, were well separated. Yggur's servants and his few surviving guards were treated no differently. All were surrounded by four or five soldiers.

Irisis struggled all the way, suffering many a kick and a cuff across the face from the soldiers. It did not deter her. She fought them until the ropes had worn a collar of skin off each wrist and her raw flesh rasped against the wiry fibres.

'Cut it out,' said Flydd, who was still beside her. He looked up at the vast air-dreadnoughts, hanging in the sky around the walls in perfect formation. Already the attendants were tethering them in place with cables as thick as a man's arm. 'See what we're facing. They've spent half a year planning this. If I know Ghorr, he's left nothing to chance.'

'I'm not giving in,' she gritted. 'I'll never submit to them, Xervish.'

He shrugged. 'Do as you will. It won't make any difference, either way.'

'What do you mean?'

'They made up their minds about us a long time ago. We've got as much time left as the trial takes, and that's the limit.'

For all her premonitions of doom, Irisis wasn't prepared for that. 'But surely they'll take us back to Nennifer. Or Lybing, or other great city, to make a spectacle of our trial and punishment.'

¦Ghorr won't risk it, in case any of us has a trick up our sleeves. Their air-dreadnoughts must contain a thousand people, and that's plenty to witness the spectacle. Among them will be tale-tellers and chroniclers enough to spread the word throughout all the lands of Santhenar. There have been too many humiliations, Irisis. The people are already questioning the scrutators' authority, so this operation has to be quick, brutal and complete. We must all die in the most drawn-out and horrible of ways, as a lesson to everyone else. I wonder what Ghorr's got planned for us?'

'How can you be so calm?' she said.

'To be a scrutator is to be impassive to the worst the world, and your fellows, can throw at you.'

'Impassive!' she murmured cheekily. 'I've seen the proud, imperious Flydd, the irascible, the querulous, and occasionally the mean and spiteful side of you, but I'd never call you impassive.'

'I'm just a man, with as many faults as any other, and I never claimed differently. It seems the worst brings out the best in me. Let me assure you, Irisis,' Flydd gave her the best smile he could manage, 'on the inside I'm quaking. I know what it's going to be like. I've been in their hands before, remember?'

The smile did not help. She'd been expecting to die for a year now, and had long ago inured herself to it. But this was going to be torment, inflicted by people who had made a science of agony.

'I'm really scared, Xervish.'

He rubbed his shoulder against hers, since his hands were tied behind his back and he could not reach her. 'You shouldbe scared. Take comfort from one thing, though.'

'What's that?'

'We're all in it together, and we'll all be thinking of you, as you will be of us.'

'I don't see how that's going to make a difference,' she said bitterly. 'Oh, I suppose it does, in a way. I've suffered alone, and I've suffered with dear friends, and the latter is preferable.'

'Well, if that's little comfort,' said Flydd, 'here's something that should be: We'll all be dead by nightfall.'

'They'll draw our torment out for days. They like to make their prisoners suffer.'

'They won't dare, this deep in enemy territory. The air-dreadnoughts are a powerful force, none more so. And from what we heard earlier, they've got weapons no one has ever heard of before. But even so, air-dreadnoughts are as vulnerable as any other kind of air-floater. It only takes one lyrinx to tear the airbags, after all. In the daytime this fleet might fight off hundreds of flying lyrinx, but if they attacked in their thousands, enough would get through to bring down every machine and all the people in them. That would be the end of the Council, and Ghorr doesn't take chances like that. See how most of the guards up there have their weapons pointed out and up, rather than down at us.'

She did not look up. There was no point — to anything.

And in the night,' Flydd went on, 'he won't dare land, for a handful of flying lyrinx could destroy all these air-dreadnoughts without being seen. Ghorr must finish his business with us and be high in the sky before nightfall. The only way to ensure the safety of such fragile craft is to fly higher than the lyrinx can reach. This Council will put their safety before anything else. No, it will all be over by dark, and that's a pity and a tragedy.'

'It's certainly a tragedy for us,' she said waspishly, 'and a pity we won't be around to mourn ourselves, since no one else will.'

'I meant for humanity. This victory spells the death-knell for humankind, and that's something I've fought my entire life to avoid.'

'Surely you've got a plan or two up your sleeve, Xervish? You always do. What about another of those embedded crystals, that you used to escape once before?'

'Sadly, no. I never thought Ghorr would dare come this deep into Meldorin. And even if I had a crystal or two, it wouldn't make a jot of difference. See up there?' He pointed with his elbow.

Each air-dreadnought held at least one robed mancer, watching the prisoners with a spyglass. Beside him were cross-bowmen and javelard operators, whose weapons were trained on them.

'Ghorr has thought of everything,' said Flydd. 'Even if I could free myself with such a crystal, they'd shoot me down before I could move a dozen strides. That's why they've kept us in the middle of the yard, where we can be seen.'

'How did they find us?' said Irisis. 'I thought Yggur had a protection to hide Fiz Gorge.’

'I don't know, but if they can track down mancers from so far away, what else can they do?'

Irisis didn't care to speculate. She was still thinking that there had to be a way to escape.

Flydd seemed to read her mind. 'Even were I Rulke himself, the greatest mancer that ever lived, there's no way out of here alive.'

'I refuse to give up. While there's a breath left in my lungs, I'll fight them.'

'By all means,' said Flydd. 'If that helps.'

Irisis looked around the yard. The other prisoners were surrounded by tall, burly guards so, in most cases, she could not identify who was in the middle. Over in the corner she made out the tall form of Yggur, tightly bound and his mouth stopped. He was swaying on his feet; a bloody bandage was wrapped around his skull. To his left, taller by his frizzled mass of sandy hair, Gilhaelith stood half a head above the biggest of the guards. Rags were bound across his mouth, in case he tried to speak mathemancy or any other kind of spell.

'Where's Malien?' said Irisis, still hoping that one of the company had escaped and would free them. If anyone had power to break the hold of the scrutators, it was Malien.

'Don't get your hopes up,' said Flydd. 'I saw her being carried out, all trussed up like a chicken. She's over by the southern wall.'

Irisis made out someone slumped in the shadows, surrounded by at least twenty guards, and with a crystal-equipped mancer at either end. 'Surely they're not going to execute Malien?'

'They wouldn't dare. That would be as good as declaring war on the Aachim. But they've made sure she can't help us.' Irisis scanned the yard. 'I don't see Tiaan anywhere.' 'You're clinging to the hope that she's got free and will single-handedly rescue us in the thapter.' Flydd chuckled mockingly.

'Why not?' she said, not liking his tone. 'The miracles Tiaan's performed in the past year, why can't I hope for one more?'