The Deathless. Peter Newman

Dogkin’s mouth a second time.

      Glider whined pitifully and lowered her head but Chandni resisted the sudden urge to cuddle her, and kept her expression stern.

      ‘Better. Now get up.’

      Glider stood up.

      ‘Good.’ She reached into the left hand pockets of the cook’s cloak, searching, and found one that contained some dried sausage. She held it up in front of Glider. ‘If you run fast and without complaint, I have more.’

      Glider’s mouth opened and Chandni threw the sausage in. The little chunk of meat vanished, like a coin into a well. Glider’s mouth remained open however.

      ‘No more until you’ve earned it.’

      The Dogkin made to lick the grease from Chandni’s fingers but she pulled back her hand. ‘No more I said, not even a sniff.’

      With another noise of disgruntlement, Glider padded over to the front of the wagon, where Varg stood staring at Chandni in astonishment.

      ‘Well don’t just stand there,’ she said, ‘help us up.’

      She placed Satyendra within the wagon but was forced to rely heavily on Varg’s strength to climb on – her own was fading fast.

      ‘You don’t look right,’ he muttered. ‘Are you sick?’

      ‘No. Just tired.’

      Varg didn’t look like he believed her but gave no argument, fitting a harness over Glider’s head and untangling the reins.

      Chandni looked back to the castle. The great doors remained shut, and all appeared far too peaceful. On a normal day the early risers would already be up, preparing for business, and Chandni was always one of them. It forced the staff to match her example and made sure things started when they were supposed to.

      She didn’t believe that people were inherently lazy, but it was better to take away the temptation just in case.

      How many of the castle’s inhabitants would be rising early today? she wondered. How many would not be rising at all?

      Varg leapt up alongside her on the seat, bumping against her as he settled into position. ‘Sorry,’ he muttered.

      She glared, about to reprimand him, when she realized she’d naturally sat dead centre of the driver’s block. He’d been forced to squeeze onto the end, one of his buttocks hanging, precarious, from the side.

      Not quite willing to apologize, she made a noise that she hoped sounded sympathetic and slid away from him.

      It only took one shake of the reins and Glider was off, pulling them bumping across the courtyard.

      ‘You certainly got a way with Glider,’ he said. ‘She’s been a stubborn one ever since she was a pup.’

      ‘Animals know authority when they meet it,’ she replied.

      ‘Usually have to scream murder to get her arse off the mud.’ He shook his head. ‘Never seen her so obedient.’

      ‘Not even for your mistress?’

      ‘Pari?’ He laughed, a short and nasty sound. ‘Pari’s no good with Glider. They can’t stand each other.’

      Chandni quickly turned her head away so that Varg wouldn’t see the pleasure she took from hearing about Pari’s shortcomings. She’d felt usurped by the Tanzanite in her own castle and it had awakened a petty need to score back some points. However, it wouldn’t do for Varg to realize that. Sapphires were supposed to be above such things.

      The wagon was soon approaching the gap in the outer wall, big enough to manage a unit of ten soldiers marching shoulder to shoulder. A short lip of rock stuck out on the other side before cutting off, abrupt, leaving a long fall to the chasm below, and then another, longer fall after that.

      There was nothing to bar their exit, no gates, no guards, which was odd as there was usually someone posted at the outer wall at all times.

      Chandni shook her head, feeling sleep draw her in.

      As they continued forward the Bridge of Friends and Fools came into view. Made of chains and planks, it was the only way back to earth. It had to be flexible to account for the air currents that moved the castle in constant, shifting increments.

      The bridge was also the main defence. Two mechanisms held it fast to the rock. If the castle came under attack, it took only one soldier to release them both and send the bridge, and any unfortunates still on it, plunging to their doom.

      She remembered being terrified of the bridge as a child, and a single look down reminded her why.

      Through gaps in the slats she could see the crack in the earth far below. And from those depths, plumes of mist rose, pale purple, green, and yellow, seeming to hold some shape as they first broke free before dispersing, like mouths stretched so far they tore themselves open and scattered on the wind.

      It was the power of the rising mists that held Lord Rochant Sapphire’s castle in the sky. Chandni did not understand how or why, but accepted it as part of life.

      Meanwhile, the wagon bounced its way across the bridge. Satyendra watched for a while but it soon became too much stimulation for young eyes and he buried his head in Chandni’s chest.

      ‘Sshh,’ she said, stroking his dark gossamer hair.

      ‘Be best if you get in the back,’ said Varg. ‘Keep quiet and out of sight. There’s a little den back there you can use.’

      This was true though it was also smelly in the back of the wagon, a mixture of musty cloth and Pari’s perfume. The idea of resting in a place where Pari had no doubt slept filled her with horror but she did not complain. Varg was right about the need to hide.

      Her mind was full of worries, for her own health, for the safety of her son, and how this treachery and murder would impact on the family in general. She tried to process what she’d seen and make appropriate plans, but as soon as she’d arranged herself and Satyendra had settled down, the warmth of his body and the exertions of her own lulled her into a swift, dreamless sleep.

      Even as she fell, and Pari’s mind was questioning the sanity of her decision, her body was reacting, adrenaline overriding fatigue, lifetimes of training overriding fear.

      The chute was short and steep, taking a near vertical route through the floor of Rochant’s floating castle. In the seconds it took to reach the end of it, Pari cursed that she had left her climbing claws in the wagon. But in her belt she had her silk rope, and the gland of the Spiderkin that spun it. Twisting her body, she pushed her feet against one side of the chute, pressing a shoulder and one hand against the other. Warmth then pain flared against her palm, and rough stone scraped viciously across her scalp. Her descent slowed but did not stop as she gripped the rubbery gland in her free hand and raised it to her mouth.

      The flesh of the organ slid under her teeth as she found purchase, then stretched out absurdly, before tearing open. One end of the rope was still joined to the gland, the other to her belt. Pari squeezed hard to force the milky ooze to the surface of the new hole before jamming it against the roof of the chute. With a sound like a wet kiss, it adhered to the stone, sticking fast.

      There was just long enough for Pari to shudder at the flavour on her tongue – a muddy bitterness with a stomach-turning gritty aftertaste – and then the edge of the chute thrummed past her feet, past her fingers, and she was spinning through space.

      She tumbled for only a second before the silk jerked taut at her back, stopping her fall but leaving her at the mercy of the winds. And if Pari had thought the breeze that blew up the chute was cold, it was nothing compared to being fully exposed to the elements.

      As she spun there, like a child’s toy dangled between the underside of the castle and the great chasm waiting below, buffeted back and forth, Pari considered her options.

      In many ways the simplest thing to do would be to detach