‘What the hell have you done?’ shouted Densyr. Once again, the balcony doors were open and this time they showed the crumbling of Xetesk. ‘The outer wards are collapsing. The stream is heading this way.’
‘Polarity. Reversed,’ managed Septern. ‘No control. Please.’
Densyr tore his eyes from the ruination of the city.
‘Inside out, I said.’ He sat down next to Septern and put a hand over the great mage’s clawed fingers where they grasped at the arm of his chair. ‘Must I do everything myself? I… Oh dear Gods drowning.’
Densyr had tuned into the mana spectrum, and saw the disaster rolling towards them with the speed of a tidal wave being forced up a narrowing channel. Flares in the grid described wards triggering with ridiculous power. Every line on the complex lattice was throbbing with barely controlled mana energy. The loose ends of the unpicked grid flailed in the chaotic maelstrom of unsuppressed mana, sending bursts of fire into the sky.
Densyr could see the shape of the Garonin machine and its cloud, depicted by the dense, dark roiling blue that seemed to hang over the entire spectrum. The blue deepened with every detonation, and the spinning of the cloud intensified. They were causing this, he knew, but couldn’t see how. All he could see was a chain reaction with an inevitable conclusion.
‘We have to break the cycle,’ said Densyr.
‘I have not the strength,’ said Septern. ‘The flow of mana is too great.’
‘Then let me help you. Tell me what to do.’
Densyr had lent his strength to Septern and the mage’s voice steadied but remained full of panic.
‘Have to block the feedback. Break the linkage and place your mind in front of the Heart. Deflect the pulses away.’
‘You’re asking me to render myself helpless in front of this assault.’
‘Not helpless,’ gasped Septern. ‘Hero.’
Into Densyr’s eyes sprang unforeseen tears. He closed them and entered Septern’s failing construct.
Sol, with Hirad slipping ever nearer towards death in his arms, ran headlong at the next intersection. His hip protested, his back was bleeding again and his arms screamed for relief. But behind them the rattle of explosion and demolition grew louder, the space between each set of wards firing grew shorter and the surge and shake beneath their feet grew more violent.
Already, the dust clogged their lungs and threatened their vision ahead. Loose roof tiles slipped and crashed underfoot. Balustrades wobbled. Every landing point was a shuddering accident waiting to happen.
‘Hang on, Hirad,’ said Sol. ‘That soul of yours has never given up on anything. Don’t you dare start now.’
Sirendor hit the edge of the building and leapt into space, circling his arms and coming down for a slithered landing on the sloping tiles across the alleyway. He turned as soon as he’d stopped and stood a little to the left of Thraun.
‘Six feet maximum,’ he called. ‘We’re ready.’
‘Sorry for the jolt, Hirad. Over soon.’
Sol ran harder and faster, the dead weight of Hirad a terrible drain on balance and strength. He leaned his body forward, caught the very edge of the building and pushed off with everything he had. He tried to work his body a little more upright as he flew but time was so short. He was falling fast. Too fast.
Sol sought forward with his left leg and prayed. His foot snagged the edge of the building’s balustrade. Sirendor snaked out an arm and gripped his collar. Thraun’s arms took the weight of Hirad. Sol blew out his cheeks, steadied and stepped off the balustrade.
‘Next up, not so easy,’ said Thraun.
Sol looked behind them. The Garonin were in temporary disarray. Up in the sky, the machine was being forced higher and higher as the mana energy blasted upwards. Of the soldiers on the ground, there was nothing. Not a sign. A small mercy. A quicker, surer death was stampeding towards them.
‘We have to try. Go, go.’
Thraun carried Hirad. His younger body was stout in the arm and chest and Sol was blowing badly. They ran up the slope of the roof, over the apex and slid down the other side. The air was full of the sound of explosions and the cloying drab of dust and smoke. Heat billowed around them as intense as dragon fire.
The next roof was flat and held an ornamental garden and fish pond. The carp in the pond all floated belly up. The water was steaming. The Raven tore across it, shadowed by wolves running along the roofs of adjacent buildings. Another flat roof ended in a gap of twelve feet.
‘No way,’ said Ilkar. ‘Don’t even attempt it.’
‘What do you expect me to do, leave him here to burn?’ Sol beckoned Thraun over and held out his arms to receive his old friend.
‘No,’ snapped Ilkar. ‘I don’t know. But this is suicide. I mean, we need you to commit suicide but not here and not now.’
‘So bloody comforting,’ muttered Sol.
Explosions blew apart the roof of the building they had just left. All three ducked reflexively as splinters of stone rattled the tiles at their backs.
‘We can’t stay here,’ said Thraun. ‘I will jump.’
‘You won’t make it. None of us can make it.’ Ilkar looked around desperately. ‘We have to risk the ground.’
‘We won’t get ten yards. The wards go from here to the apron.’ Sol’s fists clenched in frustration. ‘Which way did the ClawBound go? And my wife and son?’
Thraun gestured away across the street. ‘Easy. ClawBound jumps. Ropes are fixed. People cross. ClawBound retrieves ropes.’
‘And never mind the stragglers,’ said Ilkar.
‘Well they got that bit right,’ said Sol. His sigh was lost in another detonation. Smoke billowed up from the alley they’d crossed. ‘Hirad’s last chance. Any ideas.’
There was nothing. The street was too wide to jump, the ground was covered in traps none of them could see and they had no rope, no focused mage and now no hope at all.
‘Drop him and go,’ barked a voice from directly above their heads.
‘Brynar. What are you doing here?’ asked Sol.
‘My bit,’ he said. ‘Hurry. Get down to the street and run. I’ll take Hirad.’
‘The street?’
‘Trust me, Sol. The wards are triggering out to in. I’ve been into the spectrum to see what Densyr is doing. Nothing is active ahead-’ Detonations, very close. A whoosh of flame and a grinding of stone. ‘It’s all behind you. Run. Please.’
‘Bless you, Brynar. Thraun, put Hirad down.’
‘How do we get down?’ Panic edged Ilkar’s voice.
There was a skylight in the roof. Sol jumped straight through it, covering his face. He landed on timbers about eight feet below.
‘Come on!’
The building shook to its foundations. Sol saw Ilkar at the shattered skylight, Thraun shadowing him. He turned and ran to a wide stair that led down to a second level. He leaned against the wall with the building shaking enough to cast ornaments from their stands, shudder a table across the floor below him and bring down plaster- work in lumps.
‘Up the bloody stairs, down the bloody stairs. Make up your mind, Unknown,’ grumbled Ilkar, stamping down the stairs behind him and overtaking him on the way to the final flight.
‘Where are you going?’
‘Ahead of you. If Brynar is wrong, best it’s a dead elf that catches it rather than a live king we want to make into a dead king later on.’
Sol found a smile on his face as he hurdled a low table. He felt a spear of pain through his old hip wound and took the last stairs one at a time. Thraun was right behind him, his wolves anxious to be outside.
‘And for a moment I thought your action truly selfless.’
Ilkar pulled open the front door on a scene of dust and crumbling stonework not thirty yards to their left.
‘Wrong word. I put the “elf” in selfish, old friend.’
‘That is a joke worth dying to avoid,’ said Sol.
