been told to line up on the enemy's ship and stand ready to take it out.
Our three vessels, my pinnace and two shuttles from Ravenor's stable, had sunk low into the thin atmosphere and skimmed across the perfect, geometric surface, their shadows flitting across the flat black sections and the deep chasms.
We'd put down in adjacent gorges near the target zone.
The first surprise had been that the air was breathable. We'd all brought vacuum suits and rebreathers.
'How is that possible?' Eleena had asked.
'I don't know.'
'But it's so unlikely… I mean it's unfeasible,' she had stammered.
'Yes, it is.'
The second surprise had been the discovery that Medea was right.
Kenzer had knelt down with his auspex at the side of the gorge, studying microscopically the relationship between chasm floor and chasm wall.
I didn't need him to tell me they were perfect. Smooth. Exact. Machined. Engraved.
'The angle between floor and wall is ninety degrees to a margin of accuracy that… well, it is so precise, it goes off my auspex's scale. Who… who could do a thing like this?' Kenzer had gasped.
The hermits of Glavia?' Medea had cracked.
'If they had fusion beams, starships, a spare planet and unlimited power supplies,' I had said. 'Besides, tell me this: who polished the planet smooth before they started?'
We moved down the gorge. It curved gently to the west, like an old river, deep cut in its banks. Long before on KCX-1288, facing the sarathi, I had been disconcerted by the lack of angular geometry. Now I was disturbed by the reverse. Everything was so damned precise, squared off, unmarked and unblemished. Only a faint sooty deposit in the wide floor of the trench suggested any antiquity at all.
We caught up with Nayl.
'They know we're here/ he said, referring to the sounds of battle in the nearby gorge.
'Any idea of numbers?' I asked.
'Not a thing, but Skynner's mob has found trouble too. Vessorines, so he reckon, wrapped up in carapace suits and loaded for bear.'
'We'd best be careful then/
I tried Ravenor, using my mind instead of my intervox.
I could feel the sub-surface twinges of power as he channelled his mind into his force chair's psi-cannons.
He broke off. There was a grinding wash of distortion for a moment.
He broadcast a sequence of map co-ordinates and I took the map-slate out of Nayl's hands and punched them in.
More distortion. Then he floated back to me.
'My apologies,' I said, vocal again. 'We're moving forward. This chasm turns south-west and intersects with two others. Target site's at the junction, so Gideon reckons/
We hurried forward, moving through the steep shadow of the gorge.
'Glory be!' exclaimed Kenzer suddenly. He was looking up.
Bright flashes lit up the starry sky framed by the sides of the chasm. They washed back and forth like spills of milk in ink. Alerted to our presence, Glaw's starship had presented for combat and the
'I wouldn't wanna be up there/ said Korl Kraine. Kraine was a hiver who'd never served in any formal militia. His allegiance was to Ravenor first and to the underclan of Tanhive Nine, Tansetch, second and last. He was a short, pale man wearing patched and cut-off flak-canvas. His skin was dyed with clan colours and his eyes were cheap augments. He wore a string of human teeth around his neck, which was ironic as his own teeth were all made of ceramite.
Kraine raised his night-sighted Tronsvasse autorifle to his shoulder and scurried forward. He'd lived in a lightless warren of city all his life until Ravenor recruited him. This gloom suited him.
The sound of catapults grew louder. There were several of them at work now, buzzing out a duet with heavyweight lasguns. I heard the gritty thump of a grenade.
Kenzer, the archaeologist, was lagging. He wasn't part of Ravenor's official troop, merely an expert paid to help out on Promody. I didn't like him much. He had no fibre and no real commitment.
I didn't need to read his mind to see that he was only here for the potential fortune a few exclusive academic papers about the Ghiil discovery could make him.
'Hurry up!' I yelled at him. My back was getting tired and the blood in my mouth was back again.
Kenzer was hunched down at the base of the chasm side, fidgeting with his hand-scanner.
I called a halt and stomped back to him, my heavy boots, reinforced with the brace's metal frame, kicking up soot. Ironhoof, indeed!
I believed my greatest annoyance wasn't the brace-frame or its weight or the lumpen gait I was forced to adopt, not even the non-specific haemorrhage that was seeping into my mouth.
No, the worst thing was my cold scalp.
I really couldn't get used to it. Crezia had been obliged to shave my head in order to implant the cluster of neural and synaptic cables that would drive the augmetic frame around my legs. She had been upset all through the implant procedure. It really was terribly crude, even by basic Imperial standards. But out in the middle of nowhere at all, it had been the best she and Antribus could cobble
