The dragon continued to climb, so high now that daylight began to give way to the azureness of night as the air around it and the ship thinned, and that azure glow in turn began to give way to an inky blackness that was neither night or day. Kali and the others had been unable to do anything to prevent their continued ascent and they could do nothing now except experience, in stunned silence, that which no one of their world had ever experienced before.
It was an hour after dawn.
And the stars were coming out.
"Hooper?" Slowhand said, his voice tinged with wonder.
"Oh Gods." was all Kali could say in reply, as she stared out into the void.
That either of them could speak at all was a surprise. And not only because of what lay revealed before them. All four on board the ship had suffered near unconsciousness as they had been carried further and further from the now impossibly distant and patchwork ground, breathlessness giving way to burning lungs and then an inability to breathe at all. Thankfully, though, the effects of their rising altitude had not lasted, the ship forming a membrane around the deck that sealed them in while also generating fresh air for them to breathe. This was alongside another, far more peculiar and unexpected effect which was that, a few seconds later, she and the others seemed to be able to fly!
It was as if they weighed nothing at all, victims of some mischievous sorcery wielded by an invisible hand. The expressions on her companions faces reflected the same emotions Kali felt — that it was unbelievable and strange and incredible. And liberating. Too liberating in one case.
Slowhand's clothes were beginning to float off.
Fortunately they didn't get chance to float all the way.
The ship dropped suddenly, Kali and the others' weightless forms thrown into turmoil within, and as Kali scrambled to see through the membrane, paddling upside down across its surface, it was clear that the dragon had begun to struggle above them. The wound on its underside that Dolorosa had noticed earlier had become livid now, and the flesh around it was falling away, first in small flakes and then larger chunks, as if the creature were infected with a virulent leprosy. Whatever had possessed the dragon to bring them here, whatever had driven it on this suicidal climb, didn't matter for the moment, because it was clear that its journey was over — and with it their own. The ship dropped once more as the dragon's grip on it became weaker, but while it didn't let go, the creature itself began to turn, as if to dive back to the surface. The turn did not look deliberate to Kali, though — as if the creature were simply too weak now to remain aloft, listing rather than manoeuvring, merely suspended momentarily in this alien space. A second later, that proved to be the case.
Both the dragon and the ship began to plummet, and Kali and the others were propelled into the membrane. As it stretched Kali began to pray that it wouldn't break. She did not have to pray for long, though, as the dragon's rate of descent was so great that the weightlessness they had experienced soon dissipated. This resulted in all four of them being thrown about the craft like peas in a pod.
"Hooper, what in all the farking hells is going on!?" Slowhand shouted.
"Gravity, I think."
"That isn't what I mean and you know it!"
Kali stared up at the dragon and her brow furrowed. The wound on its underside had spread, encompassing now its sides and the beginnings of its wings. Cartilage and muscle and even bone were becoming visible beneath the flesh now and it was obvious to Kali what she was seeing. A reversal of the process that had formed the creature in the first place. This, then, was the fate of all those creations, bar the k'nid, who left the influence of the Crucible. The dragon was coming apart before her eyes.
And if it came apart at this height, then the ship would too.
Their dizzying fall continued and, as they dropped below a certain altitude, the membrane that had held them from the void disappeared, exposing all on the deck to the raw maelstrom of the wind. It was impossible to communicate with the others, words and even screams whipped away in the deafening roar, and it was almost as impossible to maintain their hold on the ship, winds ripping at them and making the flesh on their faces flap and ripple. Aldrededor, though, was fighting his way back to the controls, presumably in a desperate attempt to try and level them out. Even if he made it, the Sarcrean certainly had his work cut out for him, the decaying dragon having fallen now into a spiralling descent that span the world around them.
Kali willed the dragon to quite literally keep itself together for just a little longer, until they were at an altitude where Aldrededor might be able to safely regain some control. She had no doubt now that the same benign intelligence — perhaps all that was left of the dwelf — that had guided them through the Dragonfire was still at play here, because the dragon was clearly trying to raise and flex its wings and pull them out of their terminal dive. Even as great scaled and fleshy chunks of it were torn away by the tumultuous descent, the dragon, for whatever reason it had brought them here, was now trying to bring them safely home.
Kali pulled herself down the deck to Aldrededor's side, where the ex-pirate was linked to the ship once more but clearly straining to impose his will upon it. As he did, she stared at the dragon again, heart sinking as she saw its flesh had now all but been stripped away.
It was surely only a matter of minutes before there was nothing left of the creature at all. Still, as it fought, its wings, slowly, began to lift.
And as they did, the ship began to level out.
Kali looked down. Their angle of descent was still way too steep, way too fast. But it was a start. The dragon was trying, and they had to try too.
"Aldrededor, you have to pull us up!" Kali shouted. "You have to pull us up when I tell you!"
The ex-pirate's flowing moustache was plastered against his cheeks by the wind now. "I… will try… Kali Hooper."
Kali slapped him on the back. "I know you will!"
"Hooper, our friend is a goner," Slowhand shouted.
"Just a few moments more." Kali willed.
Again, she looked at the dragon and was staggered and awed as, quite deliberately, its head — actually more a cadaverous skull now — turned on its long neck and looked at her, as if acknowledging its complicitness in her plan. The creature knew what it was doing, all right, and it could only know if it did indeed carry the consciousness of the dwelf. Kali looked up as a beating that could be heard even above the roaring wind began and saw that at last the dragon had managed to fully flex what remained of its wings. As they slowly, majestically, swept at the air it began to pull the ship onto a more level keel.
But it would not be enough unless they did their bit.
Kali stared one last time at the dragon, swallowing as its saddened eyes began to dull, then turn grey, and then, like the rest of its form, began to discorporealise. The air around her filled with a dry, golden rain that coated her face and tasted bitter on her lips.
"Aldrededor, now," she said, a tear in her eye.
"Everybody hold on."
The Sarcrean's eyes shut, his jaw clenched and his temples throbbed with concentration. Above him, the dragon was now nothing but a skeletal afterthought and, even as he pulled back on the ship's controls, that too began to stream away into the wind.
Thank you and goodbye, Kali thought sadly, wishing she had more time to mourn the passing of the ancient creature.
As the dragon vanished on the wind, the Kerberos ship soared from its ashes, punching through its discorporealising remains into clear sky, pulling up from what had become a forty-five degree dive into a much gentler descent. Only the angle of the descent was gentle, however, the ship still hurtling through the air at previously unimaginable speed.
As Twilight rolled beneath it, Kali could not work out how high they still were because she could see no landmarks below. But then as the ship drew lower, penetrating a thin layer of cloud, she understood why — they were coming down over the sea.
Storm tossed waves roiled beneath them and lightning flashed. How far out they were, Kali didn't know, but she understood instantly why the Twilight Seas were considered so dangerous by those who sailed them. Here, beyond the Storm Wall, she could see that vast areas of the deeps were whorled by giant whirlpools. Waves clashed like opposing armies, the fallout of battle spreading for leagues and, in one place in particular, Kali saw a wall of water so high it was moving dizzying slowly, but seemingly with purpose, across the turbulent expanse. What the hells was that? Kali thought. It even seemed to have things riding the side of it, something on top of it.
Whatever it was, their passage was such that it was soon gone and at last, ahead of them, Kali began to make out the jagged edges of what looked like a large island. From its shape she recognised Allantia, and beyond that a much larger landmass that, by extension, had to be the northern coast of the peninsula. As the ship passed over Allantia, a dark mass flecked with both red and white rose ominously on the eastern horizon, bending southward for leagues after leagues — a mass that was without doubt the World's Ridge Mountains.
Kali felt a momentary stab of disappointment, that of missed opportunity, because if only they had come in the other way she might have been able to see what lay beyond. She shrugged the feeling aside in favour of a much more positive one, however, because Aldrededor had brought them almost exactly where they needed to be.
The ex-pirate brought the ship onto an almost level keel and Kali turned to congratulate him but, as she did, the ship shuddered violently beneath her. It sounded and felt as if it had taken far more of a battering than it could stand.
Kali looked to the east where the thick bow of the Sardenne Forest could now just be made out, wrapping the base of the World's Ridge Mountains. The problem was, she could feel the ship moving ever so slightly away from it, on a south-easterly course.
"Aldrededor, can you turn us towards the Spiral?"
The Sarcrean shook his head. "I fear not, Kali Hooper. Our manoeuvrability remains all but non-existant and many thread funnels are damaged. We are locked on this course unable to climb and, what is worse, unable to attempt a controlled descent."
"You mean we arra going to crash?" Dolorosa asked.
"Not so much crash as fly into the ground… eventually," Kali corrected. "Aldrededor, where will we come down?"
The ex-pirate closed his eyes, calculated. "With our rate of descent and crew complement we will impact several leagues outside Andon, to the east of the Anclas Territorial border."
The Anclas Territories, Kali thought. Dammit!
Because in other words, that meant right under the hawklike noses of the Vos military. She had never been partisan in her life, and she wasn't about to start being so now, but if that happened, even if the ship took damage, the dwelfen technology on board could unfairly tip the balance of power in Vos's favour for years to come. They had to get past them, bring the ship down elsewhere somehow.
But where? As Kali studied the ground flashing below, she asked herself not for the first time just where on the peninsula it would be safe from its burgeoning civilisation.
And the answer was nowhere.
Kali paused, a plan forming. A plan she was amazed she hadn't thought of before now.
"Aldrededor," she said suddenly. "You said with our 'current crew complement.' So if our crew complement were fewer, namely one, would the ship avoid coming down near the territories, even overfly Andon?"
"By a narrow margin, Kali Hooper. But I do not understand — you are thinking of hiding the ship beyond Andon?"
Kali smiled. "Something like that, Mister Pirate."
Aldrededor frowned, not understanding but willing to comply nonetheless.
"Very well, Kali Hooper. But how do my wife, Mister Slowhand and yourself plan to leave the ship exactly?"
"I don't. It's you lot I need to walk the plank."
The ex-pirate 's eyebrows rose. "This ship needs a pilot, Kali Hooper."
"No, Aldrededor, not any more. The ship's locked on course, right? So even if you detach yourself from the threads, it'll get me where I need to go yes?"
"Yes, but — "
"Then it's settled," Kali looked at the ground. "Get yourself ready, there isn't much time."
"Whoa, whoa, whoa," Slowhand protested. "There isn't much time for what? How exactly are we going to abandon ship, Hooper?"
"Once, whenna our sheep was swept into the sky by the Great Gusts of Groom," Dolorosa interjected, "Aldrededor and I escape using the sheep's flag anda feathers from its mascot. We called itta the parrot-chute!"
"You have to be kidding, right?" Slowhand sighed. "Well, unfortunately, we're all out of parrots, too."
"You havva the better idea, preety boy?"
"Pretty boy?"
"Yessa, preety boy!"
"Hey!"
"I have the better idea," Kali interrupted. "We use the Roaring."
"The Roaring?"
Kali nodded, picturing the giant, coolwater geyser that erupted north of Miramas and Gargas, the strange wall of water she had seen at sea having given her the idea. No one really knew what the source of the Roaring was, though some said it was an outlet for water surging underground from the other side of the World's Ridge Mountains. What she did know was that it thundered into the air for an hour each day at about this time, and the phenomenon was right in their flightpath. What was more, when the geyser crashed back to ground, its overflow became the Rainbow River which, flowing south-easterly, eventually fed Badlands Brook near which sat the Flagons. If Slowhand and the others gave themselves to the geyser and the current of the river they should not only be home in no time but — assuming they stayed in the moving water — relatively safe from any k'nid infestation between here and their destination.
"Let me get this straight," Slowhand said. "You want us to jump into the Roaring?"
"Only if it's spouting."
"What ees the matter, preety boy — afraid of a leetle water?" Dolorosa taunted. She joined Aldrededor at the ship's rails, her husband having already detached himself from the controls, trusting Kali implicitly.
"I'm not going anywhere," Slowhand said to Kali. "I'm staying with you."
"Slowhand, you can't. One person on board, this ship get where I need it to go. Two, it crashes and burns."
"Then you jump, too!" the archer retorted. And then, more softly: "Dammit, Hooper, I've already lost one person I love today."
Kali stared at him, momentarily speechless. The fact was, she didn't exactly relish what she planned to do as it was as potentially dangerous as Slowhand feared, but if her plan was to work she had to stay with the ship. "There's no choice."
"What are you going to do, Hooper, hit me again? Well, try it. You just try — "
Kali's fist landed hard. The archer staggered back and then collapsed to the deck.
Kali took a deep breath, then leaned over the rail and looked down and ahead. The Roaring was already looming, spray from it spattering her face.
"Time to go."
Both Aldrededor and Dolorosa climbed onto the rail, ready to jump, the latter hesitating slightly.
"Bossa lady? Arra you sure you know whatta you are doing?"
Kali smiled. "I thought I told you, I make this up as I go along." She looked at the prone archer. "Look after him, okay?"
"Pretty boy, he willa notta be pleased."
"I hope you survive to find out, Kali Hooper." Aldrededor said.
"Both of you," Kali said, "thank you. For everything."
The ex-pirates nodded, he with a twirl of his moustache and a twinkle of his eye, she with a smile that cracked parts of her face Kali hadn't ever seen move. And then the two of them waited until the wide geyser was beneath them and leapt.
Kali watched the two Sarcreans plunge into the seething plateau and then quickly heaved Slowhand's unconscious form onto the rail. The archer was groaning, beginning to stir, when she grabbed his legs and tipped him forward. Slowhand's semi conscious form tumbled from the ship, his clothes snagging awkwardly on some protrusion from the hull and, before Kali's disbelieving eyes, they were ripped from him, leaving him completely naked, bar his bow and quiver, to fall after the pirates.
Pits of bloody Kerberos! Just how in the hells did he do it?
Shaking her head, Kali moved to the rear of the deck and watched as Aldrededor and Dolorosa caught the spluttering archer, and then the three of them began to recede from her view as the giant geyser reached its zenith and began to drop from whence it had come.
Kali moved to the bow of the ship and stared down to study the landscape as it continued to roll beneath her. The ship was following the course of the Rainbow River. There was the Rainbow Delta and one of its various offshoots, Badlands Brook, there Ponderfoot's Copse, there Bottomless Pit, and there — suddenly — the Flagons itself. The sight of home — surrounded, though thankfully still untouched, by the k'nid — tugged at her, and the desire to be down there, downing her eighth glass of thwack was almost so overwhelming that she was tempted, for a second, to leap overboard herself. The desire became all the more tempting when unexpectedly — no doubt drawn by the sound of the ship, the kind of off key sound that only he would recognise — Merrit Moon emerged from the doors of the tavern and stared upwards. It was odd but Kali had become somehow so used to the concept of the Kerberos ship over these last hours that she had forgotten how staggering it might be to another's eyes. She watched the old man's face gurn through a number of indefinable expressions before he mouthed the words: "My Gods."
He actually did stagger back when she waved to him from the deck, and for a moment she thought he might spontaneously turn into Thrutt.
Interested in Old Race artefacts, old man? Well, I got you a doozy.
She wished she could explain what was happening, have the reassuring presence of the old man with her somehow, but that task would have to be left to Aldrededor, Dolorosa and Slowhand.
The ship moved on and, after a while, Kali wondered whether she were close enough yet to put the next stage of her plan into action, studying the ground once more to sight landmarks to indicate her proximity to Andon. The effective range at which her plan might work was a complete unknown, however, and she would really lose nothing by trying to instigate it now. Decided, she steadied herself on the bow of the ship and focused all her mental energy and concentration into the formation of a single word. A name.
Sonpear.
It was a gamble, of course — a gamble that the telepathic link that the League sorcerer had established with her while she was in Domdruggle's Expanse remained effective.
Sonpear, she attempted again, trying to amplify her thoughts. Can you hear me?
No reply.
Sonpear.
SONPEAR!
Kali's eyes squeezed shut and her brow furrowed in concentration. She was oblivious to the wind that buffeted her as the ship continued its long descent, oblivious to everything but the image of a man on whom she would never have dreamt the lives of so many would depend.
SONPEAR, YOU BASTARD, HEAR ME!
Miss Hooper? There is really no need to shout. Or, I might add, to get personal.
Kali's eyes snapped back open and, for a second, she felt the link that had just been established slip away. But she fought against it until she could once again feel the sorcerer in her grasp.
Miss Hooper, it is pleasing to hear from you. Tell me — was your mission successful?
There'll be no more k'nid from the Crucible. But the danger isn't over yet.
Indeed? And I gather that this communication is occurring because you once more need my help?
Not only yours, Sonpear. The League.
The League? Miss Hooper, I thought you already understood that the League has sealed its doors. That they are offering their help to no one.
And doing so because they know nothing works. Tell me, Sonpear — how are things in Andon?
The k'nid are ubiquitous. There is little more that can be done to prevent the city falling to them completely. Thankfully, we have managed to evacuate many of our people to the sewer network. Not the most salubrious place of refuge, as I can testify, but one that has become a necessity.
Keep them there, Sonpear. But I need you to bring a message to the League, however you can.
And that message is?
That I have the means to eradicate the k'nid. But I need you, and them, to do something for me in return.
Which is?
Open another portal to Domdruggle's Expanse.
The Expanse? But surely I alone could attempt -
I doubt it, Sonpear. This one needs to be a little bigger.
Bigger?
And in the sky
Sky?
It's a long story. Trust me.
Sonpear went silent, and whether it was the telepathic link or not, Kali could almost feel him cogitating.
Very well, Miss Hooper, I shall do as you ask. How long do we have to prepare the portal?
Ohhh… about ten minutes.
Hmph. I see.
Not yet, you don't. But you will. Later, Sonpear.
The sorcerer's voice sounded vaguely puzzled. Very well, Miss Hooper. Later, as you say.
Kali broke the link and returned her attention to the physical rather than the mental, staring ahead of the ship to determine its current location. Its trajectory had not wavered while she had been otherwise occupied and, while it was inevitably now slightly lower in the sky, it was also closer to Andon, whose tallest structure — the Three Towers — had now become visible. She guessed that she would know if Sonpear had been successful in his task if she saw the structure unfurl from its defensive position. For now there was nothing that she could do.
She gazed down at the passing landscape once more. Soon she would pass over the desolation surrounding Andon that was known as the Killing Ground. But, before she reached that, she was already encountering a number of smaller settlements that had established themselves between the Anclas Territories and the city. They were mining towns, mainly, what their inhabitants liked to think of as frontier towns and they provided Kali with her first chance to see the effects of the k'nid on populated areas. Having slaughtered, absorbed or driven into hiding everyone in the area, the k'nid were now the only living presence — and they were everywhere. It was as if someone had lain a grey blanket over the countryside. She realised that if the k'nid were not stopped, then the peninsula would be lost forever.
Kali looked to the horizon, filling now with the diverse shapes that made up the skyline of Andon, from besieged battlements to ramshackle merchants' houses, from the warehouses at the Skeleton Quay to Archimandrate Thomas Marek's solitary, Final Faith church; each and every structure quiet and abandoned and obscured beneath a layer of feasting k'nid. The only structure that seemed — perhaps through some magical means — to have escaped absorption was the Three Towers, but even so the headquarters of the League looked battered after enduring days of what must have been continuous assault. It did not, though, matter a jot what the Three Towers looked like, so long as its offences were still functional.
Dammit, Sonpear. This is cutting things fine.
But at that very moment the towers began to unfurl.
Standing at the prow of the ship, Kali watched as the three separate spires of the headquarters of the League of Prestidigitation and Prestige began to return to their normal state, shedding those k'nid that determinedly clung to the sides. It was an awesome sight but, as she watched, Kali was uncomfortably aware that she was the only spectator. The city below was deserted. But the restoration of the Three Towers to their normal state was a sight that instilled confidence, and not a little pride, in her. And her confidence was further bolstered when she began to make out a considerable number of figures exiting the spires and lining the bridges that were beginning to snap back into place.
Sonpear had done it. He had managed to persuade the mages to come out of their hidey-hole and join the final battle.
Still, what she was asking them to do was, as Sonpear himself had admitted, going to be far from easy. She wasn't exactly convinced that it was even possible — there was certainly no sign of any portal that she could see. Kali reckoned that she had approximately two or three minutes before the ship intercepted the Three Towers and she was knocked out of the sky. They all had only one chance at this, and if they failed the rune-covered crystal she carried with her would be lost, possibly for ever.
Suddenly, however, something began to happen. The mages lining the bridges turned as one to face the approaching ship and though she could not hear them, the gesticulations they made with their arms made Kali realise, that they had begun to chant. Led by Poul Sonpear — and Kali was convinced she spotted Lucius Kane in there too — every man and woman present was mouthing the same invocation over and over again, the volume growing as she neared them. And as the volume grew, so did something else.
Kali's previous experience of a magical portal had been pressured and fleeting to say the least, but there was no mistaking what was forming before her and the ship now. Smack in the middle of the triangle formed by the three towers, above the bridges, the sky was opening. The portal began to spread across the sky like a bleeding wound, as if the heavens themselves had been knifed, and through it Kali could see the shadowy netherworld that was Domdruggle's Expanse. The perfect hiding place, she thought, where the ship could remain in limbo until, if ever, it was needed. And the ship was heading straight for it. Which, of course, meant that it was time to go.
Kali had had her escape route mapped out from the moment Andon had appeared on the horizon, a sequence of buildings she intended to use as stepping stones to get her safely down to ground level, starting with the steeple of the Final Faith church. She was sure the Archimandrite in charge of the place wouldn't mind the sacrilege, after all it was his lot that had started this mess in the first place. Of course, she would have to contend with the k'nid on her way down, but she still had her crackstaff and that should keep her safe enough until she could reach the Three Towers and hand over the crystal whereupon — hopefully — that particular problem would become academic. All she had to do was time her drop right so that she didn't break her legs.
She was beginning to unfurl a rope from her equipment belt, intending to tie it off and lower herself part of the way, when the ship shook violently and unexpectedly beneath her. She glanced worriedly ahead, saw that the ship was veering off course slightly. And if it continued the way it was going, it would veer away from the portal and into one of the towers themselves.
Dammit! Kali thought, dropping the rope and returning to the controls.
She had little, if any, idea of their internal workings and so did the only thing she could — thump them. Hard. She thumped them again but there was no response. And then, for the sake of variety, she kicked them. There was a slight response then and the course of the ship corrected slightly. But only for a second. Clearly the ship had leaked too much charge to continue without some persuasion and the implication of that couldn't have been worse.
She couldn't abandon the ship. She had to ride with it into the portal. And this time she doubted she would be coming back.
Kali looked up. The portal was directly in front of her now, fully formed, filling her world. The junction between realities seemed to slow the world around it, so that the ship edged rather than raced forward, but Kali wasn't sure whether that was a good thing or not, because it gave her more time to see what was waiting for her inside. Looming large, directly on the other side of the portal — filling it — was Domdruggle's face. That angry, wizened, no longer human face. And it was roaring at her.
"Hooper!" it shouted.
Or did it? The voice seemed to come from behind and below her, faint on the wind, and somehow not possessing the rumbling, vocal gravitas one might expect from an ages old, spectral wizard.
"Hooper!"
No, she thought. It couldn't be.
Kali raced to the rear of the deck and looked down. Oh Gods, no, it really, really couldn't be…
But it was.
There was a naked man on a horse following the ship.
Correction. There was a naked man on Horse following the ship.
Riding him across the rooftops.
Kali stared, and despite her predicament couldn't help but smile. The fact was, Slowhand wasn't so much riding Horse as Horse was allowing him to stay mounted as he galloped in pursuit, the great beast taking the gaps between buildings with powerful leaps, flinging the archer about in the saddle. Quite how he had gotten here so quickly she could only guess at, but presumably filled with indignant anger at being unceremoniously — and literally — dumped, Slowhand had survived the Rainbow River and hot-footed it to the Flagons and coaxed Horse from his sickbed with warnings about how she was in mortal danger. The bamfcat's unusual abilities took care of the rest. Kali's heart lifted to see how well the beast had recovered under Merrit Moon's tender ministrations, and having him nearby made her feel less alone against what she faced. The archer, too, she supposed begrudgingly.
"Hooper, jump!" Slowhand shouted, his voice faint across the distance between them.
"I can't!" she shouted back, hoping that he not only heard but realised there was a reason for her refusal beyond the dizzying height. Fortunately, the ship juddered once more to illustrate her point.
A second passed, Slowhand sizing the situation up. As Kali corrected the ship's course once more, she heard: "Hooper, just time it!"
Time what? Kali thought.
Because despite their mutual effort, Slowhand and Horse remained too far away. But at that second the nose of the ship impacted with the portal, squelching as it entered, and the effect the portal had on seeming to slow time was magnified tenfold as it slowly began to suck the ship through the bridge between worlds. Two things became immediately apparent to Kali — one, that this would give Slowhand and Horse time to draw closer and, two, that the ship no longer needed to be steered. It was entering the portal now no matter what and that made the difference between heroism and suicide. The jump itself might be suicide but at least she could try.
Again, she raced to the back of the ship, saw Slowhand and Horse had drawn closer, galloping now across some of the higher rooftops surrounding the Andon Heart. But they were still some way away and one hells of a long way down. She'd never make it.
Still, Slowhand had to have some kind of plan. She knew he thought she thought he was an idiot but he was an idiot she had learned to trust. Even Slowhand wouldn't suggest she leap to her death. She had to trust him, whatever his plan.
As he had said, she had to time it, wait until the last possible moment before she leapt. Decided, Kali returned to the bow of the ship and stood directly before the portal, drawing a deep breath to steady herself against Domdruggle's immense, looming visage. And as the ship penetrated ever further into the portal she began to back up, keeping the threshold at a safe distance all the time. As she did, she mentally envisaged the deck shortening behind her, waiting for the exact moment when it had become just short and long enough to make her leap a viable one. And then, with a roar of determination, she turned and ran.
Kali pounded along the remaining deck, legs thumping, arms pumping, her panting drowning out every other sound as she watched the Andon skyline bob before her. And then she was in the air.
She soared from the end of the ship, legs still pumping, arms windmilling as, behind her, the ship continued to be absorbed by the portal, but she was no longer interested in what was behind her, only what was in front and below. As the air whistled about her she tried to orientate herself enough to spot Slowhand and there he was, spurring Horse up the sixty degree slope of the roof of an Inn. And then, at full gallop, he spurred Horse off it so that the great beast seemed, momentarily, to be making a jump towards the heavens.
Then the pair of them disappeared.
Suddenly they were gone. Completely.
Oh crap.
She had recognised the disturbance in the air about Horse enough to know that he had just made one of his 'leaps' but she had no idea if the leap had been made by accident or design. Maybe Horse had simply panicked at what the archer had made him do, or maybe it had been a deliberate, if mistimed, attempt to somehow reach her.
Alone now, Kali watched the rooftops grow beneath her and tried not to anticipate the impact she would soon feel. It wasn't the first time she had been in a situation such as this but it was different. Falling from a suicide slide above the rooftops of Scholten was one thing but here she was, having leapt from somewhere almost forty stories high, and that was something else entirely.
Suddenly Horse appeared directly in front and a little below her, a roaring Slowhand on his back. The shock was so great that Kali almost dropped right past them thinking: Hey, that was neat. Then her survival instincts kicked in and she grabbed for the beast — and missed. Luckily, in the second she'd made her attempt, Horse's momentum had carried him slightly further forward and, with the aid of a horn that he suddenly thrust forward, she was able to flail and grab again, flinging herself up onto his back behind Slowhand. At the exact moment she did, all three of them succumbed to gravity and they fell.
The world disappeared around her.
Reappeared.
Horse impacted with the ground so hard that his hooves shattered the stone flagging.
But they were down.
Safe.
Almost.
"Thanks, Slowhand," Kali said, and leaving a stunned and naked archer behind, began to run off along the street.
"Where the hells are you going?"
Kali produced the prism from her equipment belt, waved it in the air.
"Have to see a man about a god!"