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reasonably be getting stretched by the strain of this endless flight into a
northern nowhere, with no idea of when they might flush their quarry-or
themselves become the hunted.
But Pnarr ignored Blade's tone and obeyed his orders, swinging the flier
around in a wide circle while recording the indicator's readings as he did so.
At the end of the circle he turned to Blade and said, "About a thousand valh,
bearing two sixty. Do you want to fly directly over it?"
Blade nodded. "I want to attract attention. We'll never find out who's up here
if they stay in hiding."
"Or what," said Pnarr shortly, and turned back to the controls. The flier
banked again as he turned it onto a course that would take it nearly over the
source of the scanning. Then he throttled back the engines, while Blade and
Leyndt took up positions at the windows, staring down through the sun glare of
the ice for any trace of radar screens, buildings, or anything built by
hands or claws or tentacles, Blade reminded himself.
They made three passes over the area, while the scanning from the ground
remained steady. Blade and Leyndt stared down until the glare made their eyes
burn and run, without seeing anything. Blade was not sure whether he was
disappointed or not. Pnarr sent the agreed-upon "first contact" message back
to the refugee's station in the woods near the lake; Blade hoped somebody was
also listening out there among the glaciers. The more seriously the Ice
Master or somebody took this flight, the happier he would be. They flew on,
with Blade hoping his sensation of having crossed somebody's trip wire was
correct.
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The hours rolled by, the glaciers rolled by; Pnarr put on the auto-pilot and
came back into the cabin for a meal of assorted concentrates, each one more
tasteless and less chewable than the preceding.
Leyndt curled up on the floor in a pile of blankets and went to sleep.
Watching her made Blade yawn and want to join her; instead he splashed water
on his face and went through a series of exercises until the knots in his
muscles untied themselves.
More time went by, and both Pnarr and the fuel gauges made it
plain that they were finally approaching the northern limit of their
range. Another half-hour, and they would have to turn back southward. Then it
was another twenty minutes, another ten, another five& Pnarr went forward to
disengage the auto-pilot and take over the controls for the turnabout; Blade
went aft to wake up Leyndt and tell her the bad news. He was on edge with
frustrated anticipation; his great blow had after all been delivered into the
empty polar air. He would have to settle down to the fight against the Ice
Dragons alone, without knowing whether they were only pawns expended by the
real
The emergency alarm screamed like a trapped animal. Pnarr sat bolt upright in
his seat, staring at the detector screens. Blade dashed forward into the
cockpit and stared over the pilot's shoulder. Swimming in the darkness of
the screens like luminous fish in a dim aquarium were five blips.
They were approaching from the left, at a speed three times that of the
flier, a speed that should bring them within sight almost at once. Blade
lunged toward the left-hand window, stared out and seconds later felt a
churning mixture of cold apprehension and exaltation.
The five needle-slim shapes pacing the flier, wingless, finless, exhaustless,
more featureless than the glaciers themselves, were as far beyond the flier as
it was beyond the boats and pony carts of the
Treduki. Their formation was so perfect and so rigid that they might have been
fastened together by invisible bars, then suddenly it split apart in a
metallic shimmering of sunlight spraying off polished hulls, as the five
machines scurried to take up positions around the flier two dead ahead, one
dead astern, one off either wing. They matched its course and speed with as
little effort as two men walking side by side might have done. For a moment
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