Ian Irvine - Alchymist

They did that, accompanied by much grunting and heaving, not to mention the near loss of Nish's toes when the mechanism slipped at the last moment; but finally it lay on the stony soil, undamaged.

'Wait here,' said Yggur, heading for the invisible barrier a few hundred paces distant. He passed through, looking up for signs of the air-floater, and disappeared among the sparse shrubbery.

Several minutes went by. 'I hope it hasn't gone too far,' said Nish.

'Or worse,' Irisis replied darkly.

Thump-thump.

'The scavengers are coming back,' she added.

'Afraid so.'

'What are we going to do?'

'Haven't a clue.'

Neither spoke for several minutes. The clanker contraption reappeared, tracking along the outside of the barrier. The same three men got out.

'I've just had an uncomfortable thought,' said Nish.

'What's that?'

'This protection keeps out living things, but the wind blows straight through it.'

'I'm not sure what you're saying,' said Irisis.

'What if they can fire their weapons through?'

A big, hairy man climbed on top, peering in their direction with a rusty spyglass. The pair on the ground squatted down.

'We're in trouble,' said Nish. 'Don't move. 'You're the one who's breathing so loudly,' Irisis retorted with her famous calm.

'I hope Yggur sealed the protection when he went out.'

The spyglass tracked across to where they huddled in the shadow under the construct, passed on, then came back. The hairy man shouted instructions, though Nish could not distinguish them.

Shortly a woman emerged from the rear hatch of the clanker, pulling a child by the arm. The child, a girl of ten or twelve with tangled black hair, resisted. The man roared at the woman, pointing at the tilted construct. The woman screeched back, clipped the struggling girl over the ear and dragged her to the barrier by her hair.

The girl shook the woman off, turned towards the hairy man, who was still roaring, and gave him a two-fingered sign. She poked her tongue out at the woman and received another clip over the ear.

Pressing her grubby hands to the barrier, she stared through it. As her gaze passed across him, again the soles of Nish's feet tingled.

'That's done it,' said Irisis. 'She must have a native seeker's talent.'

'Doesn't explain how she found me,' said Nish. 'Since, as you frequently point out, I've got no talent at all.'

'You make up for it in other ways, Nish.'

The girl pointed at them, shouting excitedly.

'Look out!' cried Irisis as the hairy man swung his javelard in their direction.

No time to run. All Nish could do was flatten himself against the ground and pray that he made an indistinct target. The spear slammed into the base of the construct next to him. Irisis cried out.

'Are you all right?' said Nish.

'Just dirt in my eye. Run! Next time he'll put it right through one of us.'

They scrambled out, clawing their way around the other side, where he would not be able to see them. Another missile whizzed by Nish's backside as he went.

'He's bloody fast to reload,' Nish said, panting.

'Now what do we do?'

'Wait for them to go away?'

'Have you got any water?'

'No. Have you?'

'No. It could be a thirsty wait.'

'At least the company's good' said Nish.

'I've been wondering when you'd notice,' she said, pretending to be piqued.

'You know what I'm like—'

'Slow!'

'I have to work things out in my own way and my own time.'

'But I don't. Come here.' She put her arms around him. 'I've missed you so badly, Nish.'

And I you — you're my dearest friend.' After a long moment he pulled away. 'Sorry — it's too hot.'

She sighed.

'Yggur will do something,' Irisis said a good while later.

'If they haven't got the air-floater already. There were three clankers, remember?'

'That's comforting.'

'Glad to be of assistance,' he grunted.

'It seems to be getting hotter every second,' she said after another long wait. 'Do you think they're still there?'

'We'd hear them move. Scavengers must be used to waiting.'

It was mid-afternoon now and Nish was parched. Unable to stand the suspense, he crept to the front end of the construct, peering warily around. A spear slammed into the dirt a finger's length from his nose. Shortly, the other two clankers thumped up.

'How long does it take to die of thirst?' Irisis asked casually. A few days, I'd imagine.'

'I don't-'

'What's that?' hissed Nish.

'It must be Yggur coming back in the air-floater.'

A shadow passed across the sun and soon the machine was hovering above the barrier, just out of javelard range.

'Now what?' said Nish. 'It can't come any lower, and we can't move without being shot.'

'We wait for dark.'

They did, interminably, but dark brought no relief. The scavengers raised a ramshackle tower from the top of the first clanker, from which, by some uncanny means, a beam of blinding light lit up the area around their refuge. The other two clankers did the same from the sides, leaving only a tiny pool of darkness behind the construct for Nish and Irisis to hide in. Camp fires were built, and shortly the smell of roasting meat drifted across.

'I could use a haunch of that, whatever it is,' Nish said in a cracked voice.

Irisis took his hand, giving it a hard squeeze. 'We've got to do something, Nish.'

Once Nish would have thought the same, but he was wiser now. 'There's nothing we can do. Leave it to Yggur. He'll have a plan and we might spoil it.'

'What if he doesn't? What if he's past it?'

He didn't reply.

'Can you hear something?' Irisis was on her feet. There was shouting off to the right, and one of the beams had gone out.

'Something's burning,' said Nish.

Another of the beams swung away. Nish peered from the dark side. 'One of their wagons is on fire.'

'Yggur's made a diversion,' said Irisis. 'Does he mean us to run for safety?'

'He hasn't come all this way to leave without the driver mechanism,' said Nish. 'Let's see if we can get it out.'

After further shouting, the third beam went out. They scampered round the exposed side and underneath, heaving and tugging, but hadn't moved the mechanism far before the beam swung back in their faces. They froze under the construct, trying to look like red dirt and black metal.

'If he realises we're here,' Irisis said out of the corner of her mouth, 'he can hardly miss.'

'Whoever he shoots won't know anything about it.' Nish shielded his eyes, but the beam was so dazzling he couldn't tell what was happening at the clankers.

As he was squinting off to his right, Nish saw a tiny spark drift down, as if attached to a piece of thistledown. It floated towards where the second of the clankers had been.

The explosion painted his retina red. The black cut-out of the clanker was lifted into the air and turned onto its side. His eardrums throbbed from the colossal boom and crash. There were cries of pain and terror, and the last beam swung away, crisscrossing the sky for the air-floater.

Feet pounded towards them. They shrank down into the dirt, then someone skidded under the construct. Flangers!

'Is this it?' he panted, indicating the mechanism.

'Yes, but we'll never lift it.'

'We don't have to.' They lugged it out from underneath. 'Round the back!' said Flangers, 'where they can't get such an easy shot at us.'

'What was that bang?' said Irisis.

'A big balloon full of floater gas, pulled down by sandbags. Went off nicely, didn't it?'

'We're not complaining,' Irisis said dryly.

'And before that, I dropped a burning jug of oil onto one of the wagons.'

'You're a dangerous man in an emergency,' said Nish. 'What's the plan?'

'Yggur's getting another balloon ready. As soon as it goes off, he'll lower a rope onto us and winch the mechanism up through a hole he's made in the barrier.'