Orlind (35 page)

He had a point.
She would have expected to see whurthag-mechs outside the door. In
fact, it now occurred to her that they hadn’t seen a single one
anywhere in the Library. ‘No idea, but there’s no time to ponder
it. Consider it a gift.’

Tren went back to
work with the keys. But the moment he touched one of them to the
panel, everything began to go wrong. An alarm sounded at top
volume, and almost instantly three Lokants appeared in the passage.
Each held a weapon: some kind of firearm, Eva guessed, though they
didn’t look like any gun she’d ever seen. All three weapons were
pointed at Krays’s door.

‘
Reveal yourself,’ said one of them.

For a moment, Eva
stood frozen in panic. This was about as bad as it could get. The
three Lokants blocked all possible exits; there was no way she and
Tren could sneak past without being caught. And as she formed that
thought, four more ran up, all carrying similar weapons.

They were caught,
well and truly.

Tren,
surprisingly, squeezed her hand, his thumb lightly stroking her
fingers. An odd gesture to make under these circumstances, she
thought, but before she had time to ponder it further Tren released
her and his invisibility dissolved. He held up his hands,
signalling that he was unarmed.

‘
Who
are you?’ demanded one of the Lokants, voice hard.

Tren said
nothing. He didn’t move as his would-be captors approached, weapons
ready.

Eva felt sudden
tears start to her eyes. The foolish boy was offering himself to
appease Krays’s people, hoping that they wouldn’t realise he had an
associate.
That
is what his little affectionate gesture had
meant. But would she let him do it? She watched, stricken, as one
of the Lokants secured Tren’s hands. The rest kept their weapons
trained on him, cutting off all possibility of escape.

‘
Check
there’s no one else,’ said the woman to her colleagues.

Decision time.
Eva suffered a brief, wild impulse to give herself up deliberately,
make sure she was taken along with him. They’d get out together,
later.

But that was
foolish. Tren’s heroics may be stupid, but he’d done it to protect
her, and she’d have a better chance of freeing him later if she
remained at liberty. She would have to be stronger than that, and
practical - no matter how hard it was to leave him
behind.

All of this
passed through her mind in a split second. Decision made, she
darted forward as the impenetrable line of Lokants broke, three of
them stepping forward to check Tren’s vicinity for accomplices. She
stepped sideways and around, blessing the soft shoes she’d worn
that masked her footsteps. One of the Lokants came so close she was
sure she was caught, and stopped; but someone else shouted
something and her near assailant brushed past, oblivious to
her.

What had got his
attention? Eva refused to be distracted until she was clear of the
muddle of bodies; then she cast a brief glance over her
shoulder.

‘
There’s something here,’ someone said, clutching at the air
over his head. Then a black winged shape appeared in the air,
swooping in circles over the heads of the assembled
white-hairs.

Rikbeek,
she called, touched by this display of loyalty but terrified lest
he should be caught. For once he obeyed her summons first time and
shot in her direction.

Eva paused only
to cast one last, anguished glance at Tren, handcuffed and guarded
by seven of the enemy. It broke her heart to run away, but she made
herself do it, because he was right: if they were both captured,
the chances of either of them escaping were about nil. She
remembered Dev’s tales of Krays’s prison cells.

Forcing herself
to turn her back on Tren, she ran down the passage as fast as she
could, not slowing until she was well out of sight or hearing of
the seven Lokants. Her invisibility was fading by this time, as she
put distance between herself and Tren.

Rikbeek,
she called again, packing it with the force of urgency. The
gwaystrel dived for her, grabbing her coat just as she accessed the
Map and travelled away.

She was going to
need Limbane’s help.

Chapter Twenty Four

Llan?
Llan!

Ori was shouting
in her head. Only distantly aware of it beneath her shock, Llandry
stirred herself with some difficulty to answer him.

I’m
here, Ori.

Thank
goodness. I need you to not panic, okay? We need to secure Pense’s
body. Just keep it together for a few minutes more and I’ll be
there.

Llandry hardly
heard these words, her mind too stupefied. It took a few long
moments for the sense of Ori’s words to penetrate into her
befuddled thoughts.

Pense’s
body.
Yes! If they could retain his body intact, he could be
resurrected. They could do it, between the two of them. Her heart
soared again for one glorious moment, and then sank once more. How
could they secure his body? He was in draykon shape! Even if both
she and Ori shifted, they couldn’t carry him away. He was too big,
too heavy. And Avane was out of action...

Hurry, Ori!

I’m
trying but I can’t leave Avane. Couple of Lokants on their way
though, I can see them. Just a few more minutes...

Llandry waited in
a fever of impatience. The invaders must have seen Pensould turn
draykoni on his way down; they’d recognise who he was. And they
knew that Llandry would try to resurrect him if she could. If Ori
didn’t get here soon, they wouldn’t even have a chance to try to
get him away.

‘
C’mon, Ori,’ she muttered under her breath, anxiously watching
the skies.

A dark shape flew
overhead, blotting out the sun. Then another, and a third, and
more... it was too late. Five draykoni were bearing down on her.
Would they realise who she was, while she wore human shape? Yes,
they must. Pensould had said often enough that he recognised an
awakened draykon soul no matter what shape it wore.

That meant they
might already have realised that there had been
four
draykon
souls among the coloured birds they’d been chasing earlier. But
with Avane and Pensould down, Iver’s plan was in ruins anyway. They
wouldn’t be launching any surprise attack now.

Ori,
they’re here!

His response was
a snarled curse.
Then you have to get out of there,
Llan.

And
leave Pensould?!

You
have to, or they’ll take both of you!

I
can’t just abandon him.

You
won’t. We’ll find a way to get him back.

She hesitated,
torn, as the first draykoni found a path through the trees and
angled down, coming straight for her. Ori was right, and Pense
would have told her exactly the same thing. She must get herself to
the Commander. Iver would help her.

In a flash she
shifted, her panicking mind grasping at the first thing that
occurred to her. Clad once more in her scarlet kreeay feathers, she
tried to fly.

No good. She’d
flown too much in the past hour; her wing-muscles were worn to the
point of exhaustion. Her flight lasted a mere two seconds and then
petered out, sending her diving for the ground.

Something
small, Llan!
Ori yelled.
Hide!

Yes! Something
that could meld into the shredded undergrowth, too small to be
discovered. She became a wole, colouring her fur to camouflage with
the blue-green moss and foliage that surrounded her.

Then a disturbing
thought occurred to her.

Ori,
if we can shape-shift, so can they!

Silence for a
moment. Then,
How many are there?

Five.

I
reckon they’ll need all five to take Pense away. But hold on, I’m
coming.

Llandry didn’t
wait to see if he was right. She began running, her small legs
pumping as fast as possible as she pelted through the fallen leaves
at a rustling gallop. She was heading away from Waeverleyne,
running blindly, but she didn’t care: her only thought was to
escape.

She met Ori a few
minutes later. He’d adopted orting shape; at her current size he
seemed impossibly big.

Come on,
he told her.
I know the way back from here.

Avane?
she
asked.

Lokants took her back to the Library. They said she’ll
probably be fine.

Probably? That
was an ominous word. Llandry ran on, trying to ignore her growing
despair. Two friends down, one of them dead and taken, the other
close to it...

When they reached
Iver and shifted human again, it was Ori who gave the report. The
Commander heard him out in silence, his face grim.

‘
I’m
sorry about Pensould, truly,’ he said when Ori had finished
speaking, ‘But we can’t launch a rescue operation just
now.’

‘
What?’ Llan said in disbelief. ‘But... he was killed carrying
out
your
plan!’

‘
Same
as a great many other people,’ Iver said brutally. ‘Thanks to the
four of you, the constructs are down, but we still have a lot of
draykoni and a number of whurthag-mechs to deal with. I can’t spare
anyone!’

‘
Think
about it tactically,’ she said in desperation. ‘You’ve just lost
half the drayks on our side. If we get him back, Ori and I can
regenerate him and the three of us can-’

‘
No!’
he barked. ‘Do you want to tell me how we’re going to do that?
Storming a camp full of enraged draykoni to rescue
one
comrade is not an option!’ With that, he turned his back on her and
stalked away.

Llan covered her
face with her hands, trying to hide the tears that drenched her
cheeks. She felt weak, weeping like that; worse losses had been
sustained in this war. But not for her. The thought of Pensould
condemned to the care of those who hated him as a traitor tore
painfully at her heart and escalated her fear until she could
hardly breathe. They might destroy his body if they chose, so
ensuring that he could never be resurrected. With the body taken,
all hope of getting him back faded.

She was distantly
aware of Ori hovering nearby, awkward and unsure what to do. He
gripped her shoulder, the way he might do with a male
friend.

‘
We’ll
think of something, Llan,’ he promised.

‘
W-what if they destroy him?’

That silenced
him. ‘Surely they wouldn’t destroy one of their own,’ he said,
sounding anything but confident.

‘
He
sided with the enemy. They don’t see him as one of their own.’ She
was getting herself back under control now, though an occasional
deep sob still shook her.

An idea occurred
to her. ‘What about the draykons we captured? We have five or six
bodies, don’t we?’

‘
They
destroyed them.’

‘
W-what?’

‘
Iver
ordered them burned.’ At her stricken look he lost his temper a
little. ‘Of course he did, Llan! While the bodies remained whole
they were a liability. It’d only be a matter of time before they
were reclaimed and brought back. The war could go on forever at
that rate.’

‘
But
that’s awful.’

‘
It’s
war.
All of it is awful.’

Llandry put her
hands to her head, suddenly aware of a terrific headache. ‘I was
thinking... maybe we could have done an exchange, or
something...’

‘
Well,
that’s not an option. We’ll have to think of something
else.’

Llandry shook her
pounding head. ‘I can’t think. What else can we-’

A tremor shook
the ground, interrupting her train of thought. It lasted only a
second or two, but it felt profound.

‘
Oh
no,’ Ori whispered. ‘What now...’

The ground shook
violently again, the muffled roar of distressed earth drowning out
all other sounds. When it subsided, it left behind the heavy
silence of trepidation. Everyone waited to see what this new
misfortune comprehended.

Ori had turned
and now stood with his back to her, staring into the sky. ‘Llan...
look at this.’

Joining him,
Llandry looked up.

All the remaining
draykoni were up in the air. They weren’t flying; rather, by some
extraordinary means they were holding themselves aloft and
motionless, arranged into lines with their faces towards the centre
of the city.

‘
What
are they doing?’ Her voice emerged as a scared whisper.

‘
I
don’t know. But it’s not... oh no.’ Ori broke off as the skies
darkened, heavy clouds materialising to cut off the light of the
sun. Another tremor shook the earth, this one strong enough to
knock Llandry off her feet. Ori grabbed her, keeping her upright.
She clung to him.

The air rippled,
heat washing over her, and Llandry froze. That was
familiar.

‘
Ori,’
she hissed, grabbing his arm. ‘They’re Changing
it!’