Free Warlock by Glen Cook Page B

not understand after trying to see it as silth. “Mistress, I do not understand.”
    Dorteka had forgotten already. “What?”
    “Why should we not build a metal darkship if it is within our capacity? When it is all right for us to build a wooden one? Especially if the tradermales are working against us.” There was some circumstantial evidence that a tradermale faction was supporting the ever more organized efforts of the rogue males plaguing the Reugge.
    Dorteka could not explain in any way that made sense to Marika. She became confused and frustrated by her effort. She finally snapped, “Because that is the way it is. Silth do not do physical labor. They rule. They are artists. The wooden darkships were works of art. Metal ships are machines, even if they perform the same tasks. Anyway, we have tacitly granted that they fall inside the prerogatives of the brethren.”
    “We could have our own factory inside the cloister...” Marika gave it up. Dorteka was not interested in a pup’s foolish notions. Marika invested in a series of mental relaxation exercises so she could clear her thoughts to enjoy the flight.
    The darkship did not pursue a direct course toward Akard. It roamed erratically, randomly, at times drifting far from the river, on the off chance contact would be made with nomads. The day was far advanced when Marika began to see landmarks she recognized. “There, Grauel. What is left of Critza.”
    “The tradermales will not be restoring that. That explosion certainly took it apart.”
    Bagnel had set off demolition charges in what the nomads had left of the packfast, to deny it value to any nomads who thought to use it later.
    “Now. There it is. Straight ahead,” Barlog said as the darkship slipped around a bend in the river canyon.
    Akard. Where Marika had spent four miserable years, and had discovered that she was that most dreaded of silth, a strong darkwalker.
    The remains of the fortress were perched on a headland where the Hainlin split into the Husgen and an eastern watercourse which retained the Hainlin name. It was webbed in by scaffolding. Workers swarmed over it like colony insects. The darkship settled toward the headland.
    It was a scant hundred feet off the ground when Marika felt a sudden, strong touch.
    Hang on. We have a call for help.
    That was the Mistress of the Ship with a warning so powerful even Grauel and Barlog caught its edges.
    Marika barely had time to warn them verbally. The darkship shot forward, rose, gained speed rapidly. The robes of the Mistress and bath crackled in the rushing wind. Marika ducked down through to examine the altered relationship between the Mistress and bath. The Mistress was drawing heavily on the bath now.
    The darkship climbed to three hundred feet and arced to the east, into the upper Ponath. A few minutes later it passed over the site of the Degnan packstead, where Marika had lived her first ten years. Only a few regular lines in the earth remained upon that hilltop clearing.
    Marika read grief in the set of Grauel’s upper torso. Barlog refused to look and respond.
    The darkship rushed on toward the oncoming night. Way, way to her left Marika spotted a dot coming down from the north, angling in, occasionally spilling a crimson flash as sunlight caught it. Another darkship. Then to the south, another still. All three rushed eastward on intersecting courses.
    Marika’s ship arrived first, streaking over a forest where rifles hammered and heavier weapons filled the woods with flashes. A clearing appeared ahead. At its center stood an incomplete fortress of logs. It was afire. Huntresses enveloped in smoke sniped at the surrounding forest.
    Something black and wicked roiled around Marika. The darkship dropped away beneath her, plunging groundward. The darkness cleared. The Mistress of the Ship resumed control of her craft, took it up. Chill wind nibbled at Marika’s face.
    Screams came from the forest.
    The second and third darkships made passes