They climbed in but it refused to go, for the oil had set hard and in the blizzard that followed they could not even see who they were standing next to. Fortunately there was dry scrub in the ravines cutting into the plateau. They made a fire there, a roaring blaze under an overhang, or they would not have survived.

Irisis had not mentioned the lost crystal again. She was recovering well, hobbling about on her crutches, though she would not walk unaided for at least six weeks. However, she suffered her disability without complaint and was the most cheerful of the crew except for Ky-Ara, who was in ecstasies of bliss at having a clanker again. He had quite recovered, apart from occasional headaches and memory loss. There were times when he had to ask the names of the people around him. He often asked what had happened to Simmo.

Ullii had retreated into herself since the attack. The horrors of the battle at the ice house, or perhaps the flesh-forming, had rewoken some primal fear in her. She spent the days with mask on and earplugs in, and often a black silk bag over her head. Nish did not try to bring her out. He no longer had the strength. He asked her several times a day if she could see Tiaan. The answer was always no.

The greatest worry was Jal-Nish. The perquisitor's shoulder and chest were already healing but his face had not. The rents were hideous, weeping wounds, so ghastly that no one could bear to look at him, least of all his son. Worse, Jal-Nish had caught a brain fever that made him rant, curse and attack whoever came near. Twice, after taking food to his father, Nish had to have the iron fingers prised from his throat. The perquisitor was surprisingly strong, considering the butchery that had been done on his shoulder.

Irisis was his main target. Sometimes Jal-Nish cursed her for hours without stopping, in a gurgling, pus-sodden voice. He blamed her for seducing his idiot son, for what she had done to Tiaan, but most of all for saving his life instead of letting him die.

Irisis seemed unaffected by the abuse. She took her turn changing his dressings until the day the weather turned and they were about to head for home. She limped up, carrying a mug of hot broth for Jal-Nish. He threw it in her face, knocked her off her crutches, and was about to grind his boot into her throat when Nish and Ky-Ara dragged him off.

'Slutting bitch!' Jal-Nish screamed. 'You're a liar and a fraud, Irisis. I'll see you in the breeding factory when I get back. You'll never be an artisan again.

He ranted and cursed, and kept it up for an hour until Ky-Ara, the only one able to get on with him, took him tea doped with nigah syrup. After that they kept him sedated twenty-four hours a day and his good arm was bound to his side.

Three weeks had passed since the battle at the ice houses, before they came in sight of the manufactory, and such labouring days they were in the bitterness of the mountain winter that many times Nish thought they would not get back at all. No one travelled up here at this time of year. Had the clanker not been so well built they would all have perished.

Finally they found their way back over the mountain through which the mine tunnels were delved and looked down to see the grey bulk of the manufactory on the other side of the valley. They had been gone for more than a month.

Irisis levered herself out of the back of the clanker. As Nish handed her the crutches there were tears in his eyes. Everyone stared down at the manufactory. The only one not glad to see it was Ky-Ara. He looked agitated, and though it was as cold as ever he was sweating and casting anxious glances at the querist.

'Should not the furnace chimneys be smoking?' Fyn-Mah said, coming up between them.

'They must have gotten slack while the overseer's been away,' Nish replied lightly.

Fyn-Mah held a spyglass to her left eye. It moved slowly across the landscape, then the hand holding it fell to her side. 'There's not a chimney smoking anywhere. Not at the manufactory, the galleys, the laundries or dormitories, or even down at the mining village.' Her voice cracked. Nish caught her eye and her self-control failed. 'The lyrinx have come!' Fyn-Mah looked as if she was going to cry. 'All those children.'

'Damned hypocrite!' Irisis muttered.

'Dangerous ground, artisan,' said Fyn-Mah glacially.

Irisis yawned in her face. She did not seem to worry. 'What do you care for the children? I don't see any evidence of you doing your duty.'

Fyn-Mah crushed one fist into another, then pulled the tall woman to one side.

'How dare you lecture me on duty, after the crimes you've committed?'

'There is no bigger crime than preventing conception.' Irisis quoted one of the many regulations that governed their lives.

Fyn-Mah went so cold that Nish, watching from some distance away, could scarcely bear to look.

'I'm barren!' she hissed. 'I've been to eleven healers and none can do anything.' She pressed her palms against her eyes. 'All I ever wanted was children, and to be mocked by you ... you ...' To Nish's horror, she burst into tears.

Irisis was struck dumb. It was all perfectly clear now: the iron self-control, the impression that she was keeping the whole world at bay. And yet, she recalled, when the manufactory was attacked that first time, the querist's first thought had been for the children.

'I'm sorry,' said Irisis.

Fyn-Mah did not react.

'I am truly sorry,' Irisis repeated. 'How you must despise a cheat and liar like me.'

'I don't despise you,' said Fyn-Mah. 'I pity you, for you have everything and yet it's worth nothing.'

Irisis might have done a lot of things, but in one of those rare impulses that turned everything upside down, she threw her arms around the querist and would not let go. After a while the smaller woman stopped struggling and buried her face in the artisan's coat.

'We'd better go carefully,' said Rustina, 'and be prepared for anything.'

They gathered stones for the catapult, storing them in the metal basket on top. Tuniz sat in the shooter's seat. Nish climbed up beside her, armed with a spear and his short sword. They went down at normal pace, since the clatter of the clanker could not be disguised, rattled across the frozen stream and up the hillside towards the manufactory, skirting around the forest to meet the road higher up. They would not have much chance in the open, but none at all in a forest ambush.

The clanker thudded up the hill, turning onto the Tiksi road. The gates of the manufactory dangled from their hinges. There was more damage inside, as well as head-high drifts of snow, but no tracks.

'Looks like it happened some time ago,' said Tuniz. 'That drift didn't get here in a day.'

They went down the central walkway, weapons at the ready. Irisis, hobbling past the cold furnaces, peered in and shook her head. 'They must have been out for at least a week.'

'And they'll be the very devil to get back into operation,' said Tuniz. 'This one has a load of iron set hard in the bottom. How are we going to get that out?'

They found no one, nor any great signs of violence inside. There were no bodies and the place had not been sacked or looted, though all the crystal was gone from the artisans' workshops. Sitting in a courtyard out the back, where a meagre sun just managed to top the wall, they ate a dismal lunch.

'It looks as if the place was attacked and everyone fled,' said Nish. 'Though all the lyrinx came for was the crystal.'

'Or to put the place out of action,' said Fyn-Mah, composed again.

'I suppose you're in charge here now,' said Irisis to the querist.

'I suppose I am. And I'm loath to abandon this place, since it's the best mine and the best manufactory in this area, but we can't stay here without a guard. We'll head down to Tiksi, where I dare say we'll find our workers and miners. I'll see what's happened and seek advice from the scrutator, if I can commandeer a skeet. And there,' she lowered her voice, 'we'll have to do something about our operator.'

'I don't know that there's any proof ...' Nish began. He looked up to see Ky-Ara hurrying out.

'No proof is needed to put him where he can do no more harm!' Fyn-Mah said savagely.

They were getting up when they heard the clanker rattling down the track.

'What's he doing?' Fyn-Mah shouted.

Nish ran to the front gate. The machine was already out of sight. 'He's gone renegade,' Irisis said, clacking towards him on her crutches. She began to laugh.

'What's so funny?' said Nish. 'Now we've got to walk down to Tiksi.'

'How else could this bloody fiasco of an expedition end?' she snorted and, tucking the crutches under her arms, set off down the hill.

They went by the mine and the village. Both had been evacuated. The weather being good, they continued down the mountain and reached the gates of Tiksi at dusk. There they found scenes of confusion and chaos. Spikes were being installed on top of the city walls and a massive new gate constructed outside the old one.

'That won't keep lyrinx out for long,' said Tuniz after they had gone through. She turned to stare at the stonework with a professional's eye.

'I don't suppose it will.' Nish plodded apathetically beside her. After so long on the road, all he wanted was a hot bath. He planned to lie in it until his skin peeled off, then go to bed and not get up for a week.

Irisis was not laughing now. The crutches had taken the skin off under her arms and every step brought a gasp.

Nish saw his father settled into bed at an inn and called a healer to attend him. Jal-Nish was docile after the weeks of sedation, but Nish gave the appropriate warnings. He found a quiet room for Ullii, who remained closed off, advised the maid how to treat her, and attended to a dozen other urgent matters. Fyn-Mah had gone to see the master of the city.

Finally, around midnight, he had just taken his clothes off and was putting one grimy foot in the bathwater, which was barely lukewarm, when someone pounded on the door with a spear butt.

'Cryl-Nish Hlar! Cryl-Nish Hlar!'

'Yes!' he snapped.

'You are called to attend the master.'

'I'm in the bath. I'll be out directly.'

'He said you were to come immediately immediately!'

Nish cursed the man under his breath. 'It will take a few minutes to get dressed.'

'Make it quick!'

Nish gave himself a quick scrub with a cloth, removing the surface grime. Whatever the urgency, appearances were important. He found clothes in his pack which, though not clean, were better than the ones he had on. Before he was ready the soldier began pounding on the door again. Nish was hurried through the streets and up the steps of the master's mansion. There he was ushered into a small room crowded with people. He recognised many faces from the manufactory, including Foreman Gryste and, surprisingly, Muss the halfwit. Irisis and Fyn-Mah were there too, as well as the master of the city and a small, thin man Nish had never seen before. He sat at the end of the table and even the master seemed in awe of him.

'Cryl-Nish Hlar!' announced the aide, and the small man turned a pair of mild black eyes on him. They were shaded in deep sockets by eyebrows that formed an unbroken black band across the bridge of the man's nose.

'About time!' he snapped. 'Where have you been, Artificer Cryl-Nish?'

'I had to settle my father, surr. He is Perquisitor Jal-Nish ...'

'I know your damned father! Sit down! Querist Fyn-Mah has given me an outline of this disaster. Four clankers lost, and forty soldiers, for absolutely no gain. Such incompetence I cannot comprehend. I've a good mind to send the whole blasted lot of you to the front-line.'

An audible shiver passed through the room. He let the sentence hang in the air while he glared at each of them in turn. Nish tried to meet his gaze but had to look away. This was a man very much used to dominating others. He had an exceptionally thin and angular face that looked to have had all the meat pared from it, leaving mere bone, skin and sinew. His cheeks were sucked in so far that Nish could see the outline of his teeth. A straggle of beard on the chin emphasised its spade-like quality.

'Humpf! Useless lot.' His eye fell on Nish again, who was seated next to Irisis. 'Especially you pair! What was that fuss all about?'

Neither said anything, since they had no idea what the question meant.

'Fornication! That's what! I blame you two for the whole sorry mess.' The man sighed. 'In the meantime, there's work to be done. It's a tragedy Tiaan is lost to us. A double tragedy that the curious crystal is gone as well. And to cap it all, your clanker operator's run off with his machine. Who the hell was running the show?'

No one spoke. Fyn-Mah looked stricken. 'I was, surr, after the perquisitor was injured. I take full resp ...'

'Humpfh! I sent Jal-Nish. The responsibility is mine. Don't suppose the fellow will get far, anyway. Now, how do we get out of this mess?'

Again no one spoke.

'You lot don't have a quile of initiative between you!' He twirled his whiskers around a finger and pressed the coil in through his lips, sucking on the strands. 'We can't give up the manufactory. We won't won't be intimidated. It goes back into operation as soon as possible. And the mine. But I need an overseer.' He considered, sucking furiously. be intimidated. It goes back into operation as soon as possible. And the mine. But I need an overseer.' He considered, sucking furiously.

A chair scraped halfway down Nish's row. A big, barrel-chested man stood up. 'I would like to put ...'

'Sit down, Foreman Foreman Gryste,' said the thin man. 'Artificer Tuniz, you have come out of the excursion with some credit. You will be overseer. I shall give you two weeks to get the manufactory operating again, and then I want a clanker from it every fortnight.' Gryste,' said the thin man. 'Artificer Tuniz, you have come out of the excursion with some credit. You will be overseer. I shall give you two weeks to get the manufactory operating again, and then I want a clanker from it every fortnight.'

Gryste rocked back on his chair, dismayed, then angry.

'It can't be done!' said Tuniz flatly.

'I can do it, surr,' said Gryste.

'Good! See you are the best foreman the manufactory has ever had or I'll have your head. Overseer Tuniz, find a way! You will have the support you need.'

'I have children in Crandor, surr,' she said softly.

'You should never have left them.' He bit his knuckles. 'After one year, if the manufactory meets its goals all of them I will send you home.'

'Thank you, surr.' Tuniz was beaming from one side of her face to the other.

He rotated in his chair. 'Artisan Irisis. I know everything about you!' He glared at her so fiercely that Nish thought she was going to be sent to the execution block. 'Including that you manage your artisans better than anyone. You will be acting crafter, your job to produce controllers as fast as you possibly can.'

'I'll need more artisans and prentices,' she said calmly. Nish admired her self-possession, for she must have been expecting the breeding factory, or worse.

'You'll have them as soon as I can march them here.'

'And better defences for the manufactory and the mine.'

'Masons are being collected right now, and a detail of two hundred soldiers is on its way. I've had a warrant made up for you. Collect it before you leave. Buy whatever you require and be prepared to go back by the end of the week.'

'What I need is crystal,' said Irisis. 'The lyrinx cleaned out our stores. I must have miners who can find the kind we need.'

'Wasn't there an old fellow ... Joeyn?' said the thin man.

'He's dead, and the others are mere metal miners. They can't tell crystal from muck.'

'I'll have miners sent here, though it may be a month before you get them. Too long ...'

'I have an idea, surr,' said Irisis. 'If you're prepared to listen.'

He raised half of his continuous eyebrow.

'When we were in the mine,' Irisis said, 'the seeker said she could see crystal in the mountain like raisins in a pudding. What if ...?'

'Already you prove your worth, Crafter Irisis. Get to it! She will guide the miners.'

He swung around again. 'And now for you, Cryl-Nish Hlar. What am I to do with you?'

Nish caught his breath, but this time he held the man's gaze. It was like looking into an empty shaft his eyes gave nothing away.

'Humpf!' said the man. 'The reports I've had of you are not entirely entirely unfavourable. You have a little project for Fyn-Mah, I understand. Concerning what was found up in the ice houses? And there's your work with the seeker. Where is she?' unfavourable. You have a little project for Fyn-Mah, I understand. Concerning what was found up in the ice houses? And there's your work with the seeker. Where is she?'

'In her room at the inn,' said Nish.

'Not much damn good there! Send her down for examination. Go back to your bath, boy, while I consider how I can use you. If at all If at all!'

Nish felt piqued that Irisis had been rewarded handsomely while his life still hung by a thread. 'Ullii requires special handling if you are to get anything out of her, surr. It might be better ...'