All in all I was glad I’d never taken up that career in the guards, and that I’d have made a really crap Special. Then again, at least I wouldn’t have been perched on that rock like an idiot, trying not to think about falling off.
The three of us were silent as we each surveyed what was below us.
“What do you think?” I said in the end. I’d twisted one of the big guns, but the other had been beyond me, too far, too much. One was a start but I knew we’d have to sort the other sooner rather than later, because at some point the Storad would finish their inspection and the boom-shudders would start all over again, against the inner gates this time. I had no idea how I was going to sabotage that machine – there was no way I could reach it from inside the city, and I didn’t fancy the tunnels again one little bit.
“I think we’re screwed,” Pasha said. “Can you do the same again with that machine? Or something worse? Worse would be better.”
“Doesn’t matter,” Allit said in a dreamy voice. “More on the way. Lots more. We won’t do it in time… I think… I…” He shook his head and went quiet.
“I can try,” I said, and I’d had a few evil plans hatch in my head. “But…” Shit, I couldn’t believe I was saying this. “I can do a bit from here, same as before, though that one’s too far really. Like you said, Dench knows what we can do. Or at least, thinks he does. But if we got close, I could make it so they couldn’t repair it, or not without a lot of replacement parts.”
“You want to go down there, in that lot?”
“No. No, I really don’t. But I think I might have to.”
Pasha gave me a funny look, like I’d grown an extra head or something. “All right,” he said in the end. “We’ll see what Perak’s plans are first. And then we’ll both go. If I let you go on your own, no telling what might happen.”
We made our way back, and I was glad to have a few buildings between the gate and me so I couldn’t see the drop any more. Perak wasn’t down in the office though, of course. He was up in Top of the World. We stopped off to see Lise, who was staring through the telescope.
“Well?” she demanded.
“Well, I’d get that thing going if I were you, and preferably so it doesn’t screw over the mage in it. Look, have you had any other ideas? Any other plans? You know, better guns? Something nice and explosive? We could really use something explosive about now.”
“One or two, over and above the guns we’ve got coming, but they aren’t ready. They’ll take a day or two to make, more, even if I can find enough raw materials, and even then I can’t make many – not enough, that’s for sure. Then the factories need a pattern set before they can churn stuff out. But that’s not the main problem. It’s steel we’re short of. They may not work even then, and I should really be concentrating on the shield.”
An idea struck me, harmonising quite nicely with my idea for attacking the working machine perched up in the valley. I couldn’t help what was probably quite an evil grin. “I might be able to help you out there. With the steel, that is. See what you can do, because I think we’re going to need everything you can give us, as soon as the factories can make it.”
She frowned at me but for once she didn’t argue and we left her muttering under her breath about tensile strength and minimum carbon content. Or something.
Top of the World was a long way from the lab, but with the Glow back on I managed to snaffle a vial to power up my carriage. It was a pretty shit ride, with knackered suspension and ripped upholstery that had been torn out by unhappy “customers” in my former life as a bounty hunter, but it beat walking, or screwing with my hand any more to rearrange myself and Pasha up there.
Away from Trade, up into Heights and past the want-to-haves, through neighbourhoods that got to see the sun at least twice a day for perhaps an hour at dawn and sunset, lucky bastards. Up along the twisting Spine that led from the bottom of Boundary, threading its way through every layer till it broke free of the city and surged past the vast estates of Clouds that balanced precariously over the grubby unwashed of Under, and on like a thread of hope to Top of the World.
The Archdeacon’s Palace was the part of Mahala that everyone looked up to – we didn’t have a lot of choice really. Atop a platform that from Under looked mythical, it was as different from the rest of the city as I am from a model of chastity. I’d been up there a few times by then, but it still got me, every time. The sense of space, of buildings with room to breathe rather than squashed in together, squeezed by the buildings above, below, to either side. No squashing here. Here was space and beauty. Glow lights in the shape of flickering birds in cages and fluttering rainbow moths. Even flowers, real ones. The ones I hadn’t accidentally lopped off, that was.