I grimaced again, and began to work my way up the crack. The oily stink intensified, and shreds of torn webbing began to adhere to my suit. The chameleochrome system blanched to match wherever the stuff touched. I stopped breathing through my nose. A quick glance down past my boots showed me the others following, faces contorted with the smell.

And then, inevitably, the crack ran out and the display said that the next set of holds were buried beneath the webbing. I nodded drearily to myself and plunged a hand into the mess, wriggling fingers around until they found a spur of rock that resembled the red model in the display. It seemed pretty solid. A second plunge into the webbing gave me another, even better hold and I hacked sideways with one foot, looking for a ledge that was also covered in the stuff. Now, even breathing through my mouth, I could taste the oil at the back of my throat.

This was far worse than the climb over the bulge. The holds were good, but each time you had to force your hand or foot through the thick, clinging webs until it was secure. You had to watch out for the vague shadows of embryos hung up inside the stuff, because even embryonic they could bite, and the surge of fear hormones they’d release through the webbing if you touched them would hit the air like a chemical siren. The sentinels would be on us seconds after, and I didn’t rate our chances of fighting them off without falling.

Stick your hand in. Flex it about.

Get a grip. Move.

Pull clear and shake your hand free. Gag at the liberated stink. Stick your hand back in.

By now we were coated with clinging strands of the stuff and I was finding it hard to remember what climbing on clean rock had been like. At the edges of a nearly cleared patch, I passed a dead and rotting hatchling, caught upside down by the talons in a freak knot of webbing it hadn’t been strong enough to break before it starved to death. It added new, sickly sweet layers of decay to the stink. Higher up, a nearly-grown embryo seemed to turn its beaked head to look at me as I reached gingerly into the gunge half a metre away.

I drew myself up over a ledge made rounded and sticky by webbing.

The ripwing lunged at me.

Probably, it was as startled as I was. Rising mist of repellent and the bulky black figure that came after, you could see how it would be. It went for my eyes with a repeated stabbing movement, punched the mask instead and jerked my head back. The beak made a skittering noise on the glass. I lost my left-hand grip, pivoted on the right. The ripwing croaked and hunched closer, stabbing at my throat. I felt the serrated edge of the beak gouge skin. Out of options, I dragged myself back hard against the ledge with my right hand. My left whiplashed out, neurachem-swift, and grabbed the fucking thing by the neck. I ripped it off the ledge and hurled it downward. There was another startled croak, then an explosion of leathery wings below me. Sierra Tres yelled.

I got another grip with my left hand and peered down. They were both still there. The ripwing was a retreating winged shadow, soaring away out to sea. I unlocked my breath again.

“You okay?”

“Can you please not do that again,” gritted Brasil.

I didn’t have to. Natsume’s route took us through an area of torn and used-up webbing next, finally over a narrow band of thicker secretion and then we were clear. A dozen good holds after that and we were crouched on a worked stone platform under the main battlement flange of the Rila citadel.

Tight, traded grins. There was enough space on the platform to sit down. I tapped the induction mike.

“Isa?”

“Yes, I’m here.” Her voice came through uncharacteristically high pitched, hurried with tension. I grinned again.

“We’re at the top. Better let the others know.”

“Alright.”

I settled back against the stonework and breathed out loose lipped.

Stared out at the horizon.

“I do not want to have to do that again.”

“Still this bit left,” said Tres, jerking her thumb upward at the flange. I followed the motion and looked at the underside of the battlement.

Settlement-Years architecture. Natsume had been almost scornful. So fucking baroque, they might as well have built a ladder into it. And the glimmer of pride that all his time as a Renouncer didn’t seem to have taken away. ‘course, they never expected anyone to get up there in the first place.

I examined the ranks of carving on the upward sloping underside of the flange. Mostly, it was the standard wing-and-wave motifs, but in places there were stylised faces representing Konrad Harlan and some of his more notable relatives from the Settlement era. Every ten square centimetres of stonework offered a decent hold. The distance out to the edge of the flange was less than three metres. I sighed and got back to my feet.

“Okay then.”

Brasil braced himself next to me, peering up the angle of the stone.

“Looks easy enough, eh? Think there are any sensors?”

I pressed the Rapsodia against my chest to make sure it was still secure.

Loosened the blaster in its sheath on my back. Got back to my feet.

“Who fucking cares.”

I reached up, stuck a fist in Konrad Harlan’s eye and dug in with my fingers. Then I climbed out over the drop before I could think about it.

About thirty hanging seconds and I was onto the vertical wall. I found similar carvings to work with and seconds later was crouched on a three-metre-broad parapet, peering down into a cloister-lined, tear-shaped ornamental space of raked gravel and painstakingly aligned rocks. A small statue of Harlan stood near the centre, head bowed and hands folded meditatively, overshadowed at the rear by an idealised Martian whose wings were spread in protection and conferral of power. At the far end of the rounded space, a regal arch led away, I knew, to the shadowed courtyards and gardens of the citadel’s guest wing. The perfume of herbs and ledgefruit blew past me, but there was no local noise beyond the breeze itself. The guests, it appeared were all across in the central complex, where lights blazed and the sounds of celebration came and went with the wind. I strained the neurachem and picked out cheers, elegant music that Isa would have hated, a voice raised in song that was quite beautiful.

I pulled the Sunjet from its sheath on my back and clicked the power on.

Waiting there in the darkness on the edge of the party, hands full of death, I felt momentarily like some evil spirit out of legend. Brasil and Tres came up behind me and fanned out on the parapet. The big surfer had a heavy antique frag rifle cradled in his arms, Tres hefted her blaster left-handed to make room for the Kalashnikov solid-load in her right. There was a distant look on her face and she seemed to be weighing the two weapons for balance, or as if she might throw them. The night sky split with angelfire and lit us, bluish and unreal. Thunder rumbled like an incitement. Under it all, the maelstrom called.

“Alright then,” I said softly.

“Yes, that’s probably far enough,” said a woman’s voice from the garden perfumed shadows. “Put down your weapons, please.”