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Like a high, sad flute note in a moment between drums.

“Rao.”

Bully Boy!

Lightning could free a sleeper from its spell, and so it had done now—my arm throbbed where the tattoo had been but was no more.

The sweet little blind tabby took a few tentative steps on the wet deck, confused and frightened by the violent movement of the cloud-ship.

I wished I could put him back, and waking or sinking a sleeper was the one bit of powerful magic I’d been taught, but I hadn’t the strength or focus to work such a labor now.

“You came out at a bad time for you, Bully Boy. But I’ll confess I’m glad to see your fond face.”

So saying, I grabbed him up as he awkwardly stiffened his legs, saying, “Rao? Rao?”

“Rao, indeed, you wee beastie,” I said, holding him tight against my chest to give him what warmth I could, bundling us both under the wolf pelt as the cloud-ship was lashed and tossed.

It was a very long night indeed.

Daybreak came with gentler winds that pushed a few tattered clouds about over the Thralls. The peaks hove nearer now. We had sunk a great deal, and I worried that we might crash into one of these stony old karks.

With the pinkish dawn light, I saw the Spanth and her bird had been tossed about. I arranged them in a more dignified posture of repose, crossing Galva’s arms over her sword like some queen in her tomb.

It occurred to me that if I dumped Galva and the huge bird over, the ship might climb higher, but for how long? If I did that, all it would change was which mountain I crashed into, and, with the stone around my neck pointing as much down as forward, I had the feeling that I was exactly where I needed to be.

43The Living and the Dead

And now the great red fish was breathing out its last sathium.

“You,” I said to one peak as we drifted too close to another. “It’s you, isn’t it?”

And only a few moments later, the big red belly of sathium over the deck scraped against rocks. I held Bully and said shushing words into his ear as he shook, for he couldn’t see a thing and only knew that the world was shaking and cold and full of noise.

I heard a hissing above us, and we dropped faster.

If we kept going straight, we’d pile into a sheer stone face over a drop.

If we went a bit right, we just might slide onto a snowbank.

Right, time to steer.

I pulled the levers for all I was worth, though they felt frozen and stubborn.

“Come on, you fatty, I’ve not come all this way to get crushed like a bug on your account.”

The balloon scraped rock again, and this time, it was punctured entirely, not merely nicked, and the last of the sathium whooshed warmly out of it for good and all.

We spun as we fell.

We fell hard.

I’ll spare you the curses I said when I fell hard on my tailbone in that way that makes you wonder if you’ll be able to walk after. We were sunk in snow, nearly but not quite level. A lucky fall, and no question—had the rocks been bare of snow, we’d have been sawdust and chowder.

The wind sounded desolate up here.

Snow blew, but it was from the ground and the peaks, there weren’t enough clouds for it to be fresh. Galva was a mess again, so I set her right, and even lay Dalgatha’s beak across her chest. I took up the farglass and the blackglass sword, closed the wolf pelt around me, took Bully under one arm, and said, “Right, let’s see where we are.”

The stone around my neck pulled me, and I followed.