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Mulvaine, who had slept through the experience of being half eaten alive by a claw-caterpil, started moaning and shifting as soon as they moved his body. He tried to turn over, muttering. Tighe examined the wound at the end of his thigh; it was covered in some sticky saliva-like substance, which was presumably what prevented it from bleeding out. Perhaps the monsters especially relished blood, Tighe thought; their spit kept their victims from bleeding dry. Tighe then – although it made his stomach turn over – plucked the severed bottom of Mulvaine’s leg from the cradle made by the material of his trousers. He held it in both hands: a naked human leg, bloody at one end. There was a strange smell to it, not merely the blood, but a fiercely pungent and foetid smell at the wound. The skin near the top looked green and was starting to decompose, although the foot looked so exactly like a human foot, down to the horny toenails and the tiny hairs growing out of the tops of the toes, that it was somehow deeply saddening. Tighe took it by the ankle and hurled it as far as he could, hearing it rattle through the leaves in the distance.

They carried Mulvaine up and along to the spring, where they all drank. It took them most of the morning and they twitched or cried out in terror at every rustle in the blanket of leaves.

At the spring Tighe had the idea of laying Mulvaine under the flow of water, so that it washed down over his swollen face. Tighe reached into the splashing to lever apart his lips to make sure water was going into his mouth, and with a lurch Mulvaine started coughing. So they pulled him out of the line of water and he shuddered and thrashed back and forward.

They sat him up with his back against the wall. He mumbled something, but the words were lost amongst the sloppiness and mess of his lips. Then he fell asleep again and they could not rouse him.

‘Should we wash his wound?’ suggested Pelis. ‘In the spring, perhaps?’

Tighe considered: ‘I think the claw-caterpil spit keeps the blood from coming out,’ he said. ‘I think we should not disturb it.’

‘It is a monster,’ said Ravielre, his voice fall of loathing. ‘Its spit is poison. We should wash it away.’

‘If it is poison,’ said Tighe, making sure to fix each of them in the eye with his glare as he spoke, ‘then it is already in his blood, and washing will do no good. If it is not poison but healthful, then we must leave it. We will carry him up.’

‘He is dying,’ said Ati. ‘We should leave him here and go on ourselves.’

‘He is not dying,’ said Tighe. ‘We will carry him.’

‘He has only one leg!’

‘He is not dying. We will carry him.’

Ati grumbled and the others looked crossly at Tighe, but nobody defied him. They spent an hour by the spring, finding and eating what insects they could, although chancing upon none of the larger kind. Then Ravielre and Pelis took up the burden of Mulvaine.

They made a slow and precarious way up from trunk to branch. At one stage they discovered a gouge in the worldwall that was backed with some manstone in slabs, and which ran diagonally upwards. It was heavily overgrown, but Tighe and Ati went first, clearing a path, and Ravielre and Pelis followed carrying Mulvaine.

They decided to stay inside this ledge for the night and spent the rest of the light scavenging for insects. Tighe sat expectantly beside Mulvaine, thinking he might wake up at any moment, but he slept on uneasily.

In the morning they were lucky enough to find a grey fat-worm nosing its way through the moss and bracken of the ledge, and they all enjoyed a good breakfast. ‘We must try and feed Mulvaine,’ said Tighe.

‘He is now an obsession of you, I think,’ said Ati sourly.

But they all lent a hand, holding Mulvaine’s mouth open and popping in little gobbets of meat. ‘He is not swallowing,’ Ravielre pointed out.

‘Perhaps the meat will dissolve in his mouth,’ said Tighe. ‘Then the goodness can run down his throat like water. Come!’

‘I hate the way you say
come!
’ Ravielre growled. ‘As if we were pets. You are only a barbarian, a turd for brains, after all.
I
was born in the Imperial City.’

Tighe looked hard at him. ‘Do you think it a good idea to move on now?’ he asked. ‘Or should we stay here all day?’

Ravielre was silent for a time, glowering sullenly at Tighe. ‘Perhaps we should go on,’ he said, eventually.

‘Ravielre says come!’ Tighe announced loudly. ‘And so we must.’

They hauled Mulvaine out of the trench and up through the forest. By ninety they reached a fairly broad ledge, hardly overhung at all. It marked a
path away both east and west and the grass was well trodden. ‘I do not remember this ledge,’ said Pelis.

‘It is easier than making our way through Meshwood,’ said Ravielre. ‘We should walk along this ledge, perhaps to the far side of the Meshwood. Then we would be away from the claw-caterpils at least.’

‘For now’, said Tighe, ‘we can rest at any rate.’

They deposited Mulvaine on the ledge, sitting up with his back to the wall, and sprawled themselves out. Ravielre and Pelis had undertaken the majority of the day’s carrying and were worn out.

Ati lay on his stomach for a while, but soon grew restless. He paced up and down the ledge a little way, never going out of sight of the others but exploring as widely as he could. ‘I think’, he said, coming back to them, ‘that we might go west along this ledge. That is, back towards the Empire.’

‘We are on the eastern side of the Meshwood,’ said Pelis. ‘We are closer to the eastern side.’

‘But the east is controlled by the Otre.’

‘Perhaps the west is controlled by the Otre as well.’

Ati bristled. ‘What do you mean?’

‘Perhaps,’ Pelis explained laboriously, ‘perhaps the Otre have conquered the whole Empire by now in war.’

‘Don’t say that! Don’t say so!’

‘I only mean that it would be better to get out of the Meshwood sooner rather than later. It would be better not to have to encounter any more of the claw-caterpils, that is all I mean.’

‘You are only a girl and you are scared,’ said Ati, puffing up his chest. ‘I am a warrior and I am not scared. Besides,’ he said, sagging down and sitting cross-legged on the ledge. ‘I want to go to my home and my home is westward not eastward.’

Ravielre said, ‘I am hungry.’

‘Perhaps this ledge runs all the way through the Meshwood to the west,’ Ati continued. ‘Perhaps it would lead us easily and clearly out of the Meshwood to the west.’

‘More likely it peters out a little way in that direction,’ said Pelis, pointing west.

‘What shall we do, Tighe?’ asked Ati, tugging at Tighe’s raggedy sleeve. ‘Shall we go eastward or westward?’

‘We’ll rest for now,’ said Tighe, looking west along the ledge. The tangles of meshwood sprouting over the ledge hung down in weird patterns, casting interlocking shadows over the backing of the wall.

‘There,’ said Pelis, pointing eastward with her arm outstretched.

Everybody looked. Half a dozen grey-suited figures were advancing up
the ledge, all holding either a rifle or one of the short-barrelled rifles that looked a little like stubby knives.

They were, very pointedly, looking directly at the four kite-pilots.

‘Otre,’ hissed Pelis.

‘Go!’ called Ati, hurling himself forward up to his feet and sprinting westward away down the ledge.

Ravielre, Pelis and Tighe followed almost at once.

‘You there!’ called the nearest of the Otre soldiers, in a voice that carried powerfully. ‘Stop running, surrender. Surrender, or we shall shoot.’ His Imperial was heavily accented.

Tighe’s groin-hurt was not bad, but he rapidly fell behind the others because of his bad foot. He limped with a desperate stride, pounding down with his right foot and trying to skim over the step of his left, as the first shot rang out.

Pelis was directly ahead of him. There was a second shot and a hand-sized wet red mark splattered out of her shoulder. She stumbled and fell hard to the ground.

Tighe had to leap awkwardly to avoid tripping over her. He skidded, span, and saw her lying face down on the ledge. Then, surrendering himself to the urge to run, he picked himself up and simply sprinted.

‘Down!’ he called ahead, at Ati and Ravielre. ‘Down into the Meshwood!’

Ati looked back over his shoulder and Tighe signalled to him with an arm gesture. Down! They could lose themselves in the Meshwood and evade the Otre soldiers.

Without slowing his pace Ati ducked to the left and slid off the ledge, landing easily on a broad meshwood trunk. He called out as he did this and Ravielre skidded to a halt. There was another rifle shot from the soldiers behind Tighe; he sensed the bullet whizzing past him.

Ravielre was scrambling down after Ati. Tighe, sweating now, ducked as another bullet shot through the air. There was a scream from up ahead, although Tighe couldn’t be sure if it was Ravielre or Ati screaming.

He pulled himself down and swung from a branch; on to a broad nexus of meshwood tree roots, all tangled in together. From there it was a series of easy hops down and away from the ledge through the leaves. He chanced one glimpse over his shoulder, but the ledge was invisible through the cloud of foliage overhead. He heard no more shots either.

For a little while he concentrated on making his way as quietly as possible, moving cautiously from trunk to branch. After a while he decided it was time to hazard a cry; he called out to the others. ‘Ati! Ravielre!’

There was a moan from close ahead. Tighe hopped awkwardly through the leaves and found Ravielre sitting astride a trunk clutching his head. Tighe’s heart sank. Blood was oozing from between his fingers.

‘Your head!’ he cried.

Ravielre groaned again. ‘It’s my ear,’ he said. ‘They shot my ear! I felt the bottom of the ear hurt and now it’s all blood. The shit-eaters!’

‘Let me see,’ said Tighe. He pulled Ravielre’s hand away and examined the sticky wound. ‘You have most of your ear still,’ he announced.

‘It hurts,’ said Ravielre, sulkily. ‘It hurts and I am hungry.’

‘Where is Ati?’

‘I don’t know.’

Tighe stood up. ‘Ati!’ he called. ‘Ati!’

‘Shush,’ whined Ravielre. ‘You will call the Otre to us.’

‘We are far from the ledge now, I think,’ said Tighe, ‘and they will have moved on.’

‘They shot me,’ said Ravielre, squirming with misery. ‘They shot my ear and they shot Pelis. Pelis and I were together. But my ear! It stings, it hurts!’

‘Come,’ said Tighe. ‘We will wrap your ear in cloth. Tear some from your shirt.’

‘Tear some from
your
shirt.’

‘It is your ear, after all. Ati!’ he called. ‘Ati!’

‘I am here,’ came a reply through the leaves.

‘Come to us,’ Tighe called out. He bent down and picked at the stitching of Ravielre’s shirt to rip free a strip of cloth. Ravielre grumbled that now his stomach would be cold at night, but Tighe ignored him to strap the cloth around the bleeding ear and the top of Ravielre’s head, like a headscarf.

Ati’s head popped up from below. He looked serious. ‘What happened?’ he said. ‘What happened to Pelis?’

Ravielre grimaced. ‘I am hungry.’

Tighe shook his head to warn Ati off the subject. Ati sat himself down and clutched his knees to his chest. ‘And Mulvaine,’ he said. ‘What about Mulvaine?’

Tighe said, ‘Ravielre hurt his ear, but I have bandaged it now.’

‘With my shirt,’ grumbled Ravielre, ‘and I am hungry.’

There was a rustling in the leaves, like a shower of dew falling early in the morning. The three boys fell silent, looking around them.

‘Otre soldiers?’ hissed Ati.

‘Or worse?’ said Ravielre. ‘Claw-caterpils perhaps?’

Tighe looked about himself. ‘We must move. Come, we have started going west and we should continue to go west.’

They moved west. The way was not easy and all three of them were feeling the pain of hunger. An hour or so into their journey they chanced upon a grey fat-worm. With Ravielre chiming over and over how hungry he was, they started after the beast, but it slid away, half wriggling and half falling downwards. They had to drop from branch to branch a fair distance before they could catch up with it. Ravielre and Ati gripped it and held it between them. Then the three of them started biting pieces from its side whilst it still twined and struggled.

‘We should find a spring,’ Ravielre said, his mouth full so that he spat out fragments of half-chewed worm. ‘I want to wash my wound, my ear.’

Tighe looked at him, wondering whether he had now made himself forget Pelis deliberately, or whether his mind genuinely had slipped away from that subject. It was similar to his attitude to Bel; he had barely said anything about her death. There was a blankness about his expression. ‘Wash your wound,’ he said. ‘That is a good thing.’

‘We should find a spring,’ said Ravielre. He took another bite.

The tail of the fat-worm curled round and thrashed at the leaves. Tighe caught hold of it and pulled it back, but the thrashing of the leaves continued. The head of a claw-caterpil emerged rapidly from the foliage. Ati shrieked and Ravielre shied quickly backwards, loosing his grip on the worm.

The claw-caterpil emerged fully and lunged forward at Ravielre.

‘Your blood!’ cried Tighe. ‘It smells your blood!’

But the three of them were already scrambling up from branch to branch.

Tighe fell to the rear again because of his bad foot. He had to tear his eyes from below to spy out handholds in the meshwood trees above; and the thought of the claw-caterpil drew his glance back down. ‘It smelt Ravielre’s blood,’ he muttered to himself. ‘It smelt his blood.’

From above came a shriek and Tighe started climbing more rapidly. Almost at once a body came crashing through the branches, clipping Tighe as it passed and tumbling on. The jarring shock almost knocked Tighe loose, but he clung to his branch.

From higher up came Ravielre’s high-pitched squeal of terror. ‘They’re all around! There’s hundreds! Hundreds!’

Tighe hung, bruised and a little stunned. He could see Ati below him, come to rest in a net of branches; but he had consciously to command himself to start to climb down. The claw-caterpil was down there somewhere.