FORTY-FOUR

The scrutator had set up camp in a cave below the steep top of the twin pinnacles at Minnien. Irisis and her team had been working for days, mapping the wisps of field as it strengthened and trying to work out what had happened to it. At the same time, they built a device to read the aura of the node, and hopefully its history. It was a contraption of gold and silver leaf, platinum wire and crystals of various kinds. Jewel-like in its delicacy, it vaguely resembled a dragonfly. It could have had a variety of forms but Irisis had taken her frustrations out by making it as extravagant, and as beautiful, as she could with the materials she had. The work was painstaking, and blindness made it more so, but she would make no concessions to her disability.

They had not seen the lyrinx again, though Irisis felt sure that its visit had something to do with the reappearance of the field, which was clearer and stronger each day.

‘It’s nearly strong enough to drive a clanker,’ she said to Flydd on the fourth morning.

He sat up nakedly in his sleeping pouch. ‘Our first piece of luck.’ He scratched his scarred, hairless chest. ‘How is your aura reader going?’

‘Almost finished. The thing that puzzles me, Xervish, is why the Council did not do this a long time ago.’

‘Too blinkered,’ he said. ‘We scrutators think of mancing as the very pinnacle of the Secret Art, and no doubt it is, in terms of sheer power. But it is not a subtle Art, the way we use it, and we do not have the artisan’s ability to see the field. We draw on it intuitively; almost blindly. So, when our Art failed to penetrate the node, we did not consider that lesser abilities might succeed.’

‘It remains to be seen whether our minor talents can.’

‘Your humility is admirable,’ he said with a twitch of the lips.

‘I was taught by a master.’

She began to work another crystal into the dragonfly. Irisis did not need to see for this. As a prentice she had often made jewellery in the dormitory after the lamps had been snuffed out. That craft was her greatest pleasure, though she had little enough time to practise it.

‘What are we looking for, precisely?’ she asked. ‘Or is that another of your scrutator’s secrets that can be revealed to none?’

‘Several things.’ He laid a twisted finger on her bare upper arm. ‘Firstly, using my raw power and your subtle device, we will attempt to induce an aura from the node itself. That could reveal its recent history, though auras can be hard to read and even harder to interpret. Tiaan did this with a failed controller crystal, once. But of course, Tiaan …’ He sighed heavily.

Irisis was heartily sick of Tiaan’s marvels. ‘Might that not be dangerous?’ she said irritably.

‘Very. It will take much power and the only place I can get it is from the node, which runs the risk of power feeding back on itself. Such things can get out of control very quickly. Just to induce an aura in something so powerful as a node will be hard. There will be barriers to overcome.’

‘And other forces?’

‘I was coming to that. The field surrounding a node comes from the weak force that Nunar first described a century ago. But we believe, and it is written in Nunar’s The Mancer’s Art, that stronger forces may also exist. We do not know how to see or draw upon them, though some mancers have accidentally done so. Sadly, none lived to write down what they had discovered.’

‘And if you accidentally hit upon one of these forces …’

‘I will cease to exist even more gorily than that unfortunate mancer up on the aqueduct. And you too, if you’re standing too close.’ He chuckled.

‘Don’t get your hopes up,’ Irisis snapped. ‘I’ve gone off you, scrutator, since you took my sight away.’

‘I warned you, but you were too much of a stickybeak. You had to look back.’

‘I was trying to help you!’

‘More fool you,’ Flydd said cheerfully.

‘Oh, go away. I never want to see you again.’ Then, realising what she had said, she began to laugh. It was that or burst into tears. He laughed with her.

Irisis worked the last of the crystals into place and checked the device with her fingers. It felt just like a dragonfly now, but with only a single pair of wings.

‘I love watching you work.’ His voice was rich with good humour. ‘You have such beautiful hands. And they move so cleverly.’

She held them up before her blind eyes. ‘You just want more of what I did with them the other night.’

‘I confess it. After my torment thirty years ago, I never thought I would feel that kind of pleasure again.’

She looked surprised. ‘You fasted for thirty years? Surely even an ugly old coot like you must have his pick of lovers. You are scrutator after all, and a lot of women find power rather … lubricious.’

‘And you’re one of them.’

‘So it would seem.’

‘Until you, I lacked the courage to bare myself.’

‘Really? Does the great scrutator confess to a weakness.’

‘Ex-scrutator, remember, and you are risking your life by being associated with me.’

‘I imagine the price on my head is almost the equal of your own.’

‘It isn’t, but you will die a most miserable death when they catch you.’

‘When?’ A chill settled over her. She had never heard him talk like that before.

‘The scrutators can’t afford to be humiliated. They will hunt us down and bring us to justice if it takes the rest of our lives. They never give up.’

‘Oh well,’ she said casually, ‘nothing we can do. Better get on with it. This is ready.’

‘I’ll call the others.’

She heard him moving away. Irisis began to take deep breaths, calming herself and getting into the right state for sensing. This would be harder than anything she had done before, and she could not afford a mistake. Flydd’s life depended on it. She clung to the hope that he could somehow save them, in spite of what he had said. But if he died, they were all doomed.

The party came crunching up the hill, chattering. Flydd gave them their orders. ‘Zoyl, I want you to stand here. Oon-Mie, over there. Irisis, stay where you are but get into a comfortable position. This could take a while.’

They moved to their places. ‘Shall we begin?’ said the scrutator. Despite his demotion, Irisis could not think of Flydd as anything else.

‘I’m ready.’ Irisis held the reader out.

‘I’ll take that.’ He plucked it from her hands.

‘What do you think you’re doing?’ She felt around in the air for it.

‘You know what I’m doing,’ he said, ‘and why.’ He crunched up to the back wall of the cavern. ‘Your turn will come.’

‘What am I supposed to do?’

‘Just keep a close eye on things. In case.’

He tossed the dragonfly into the air. It rotated and when it came down again, Zoyl cried out, ‘The eyes are glowing.’

‘Pipe down, boy,’ snapped Flydd. ‘You’re not at the circus now. Irisis, find the field.’

Taking her pliance between her palms, she visualised. Sight was not required for that. ‘I can see it.’

‘Tell me what it looks like.’

‘The individual wisps are moving faster than before, and there are more of them. They form an almost complete figure-eight now, like two crowns joined at the side.’

‘Better, but a long way to go. Keep hold of that image. Oon-Mie?’

‘Ready, willing and able, surr,’ she said and Irisis could almost see the grin.

There was no humour in Flydd’s voice now. ‘You will control the flow of power, very carefully. If it starts to feed back on itself, it will quickly get out of control and there won’t be anything I can do about it. Just trickle it to me. If it starts to flood, clamp down hard.’

‘I understand, surr.’

‘Aarp, you have the most difficult task of all. I hope you’re up to it.’