Mogget did not tell her that he had an uneasy feeling all along his backbone and up his tail, a feeling compounded by a look around the back of the chair. There was a small speck high on the horizon behind them. It was a long way away, but it was a Paperwing, flying as fast or faster than the dragon.

‘No,’ said Clariel. She touched the mask again with her left hand, sliding her gauntleted fingers up the cold metal to her forehead. She could feel nothing behind it, not the faintest glimmer of the Charter. But the baptismal mark must still be there, she told herself. It was just too difficult to feel through the woven stone of the gauntlets and the thick bronze of the mask. Kargrin, or Ader, they could help her, once her task was done. But she must not make it worse.

She had already forgotten the sword she held across her lap, her hand tight around its hilt. There were no Charter marks on that gauntlet now, and the material was becoming thin, her skin almost visible beneath.

‘Fly to the west of the city, and approach the Palace from that direction. We must avoid Coiner’s Hill and there are … there were ships to the north of the Palace – they may also have bolt-throwers.’

‘We shall go high, with your permission, Mistress,’ whispered the dragon. It was Baazalanan speaking. ‘Then drop fast, too fast for bolt or spell to strike us.’

‘Like a kite upon a vole,’ said Mogget, licking his lips. ‘The osprey upon an unsuspecting fish.’

‘Yes, let us do that,’ said Clariel. ‘Look ahead, Mogget. What can you see of the Palace? Does the royal banner fly above the gatehouse?’

‘The smoke is too thick,’ said Mogget. ‘I cannot see.’

‘Faster,’ mumbled Clariel. She said it again, and wondered why her mouth was dry. Then she remembered that she had neither drunk nor eaten since dinner the night before, and now it was the fourth or fifth hour of the afternoon. But she was not hungry, or thirsty, and in a moment she forgot the dryness of her mouth and throat.