The journey across the pitching, heaving, often awash floes of ice proved frantic, perilous and exhausting. Upon reaching the rearing wall of wicker, they found no sign of Baaljagg or Garath, yet could follow their tracks on the snow-crusted raft, which seemed to be holding afloat most of the Meckros structure, round to the unwalled, broken side.

Within the chaotic framework of beams and struts, steeply angled, thick-planked ladders had been placed – no doubt originally built to assist in maintenance of the city’s undercarriage. The frosted steps within sight all revealed deep gouging from the wolf’s and the hound’s passage upward.

Water streamed down the jumbled, web-like framework, revealing the sundered nature of the street and houses above.

Senu in the lead, followed by Thurule then Mok, with Lady Envy last, the travellers climbed slowly, cautiously upward.

They eventually emerged through a warehouse-sized trap door that opened onto the pitched, main floor of one of the houses. The chamber was crowded along three of its four walls with burlap-wrapped supplies. Huge barrels had tumbled, rolled, and were now gathered at one end. To its right were double doors, now shattered open, no doubt by Baaljagg and Garath, revealing a cobbled street beyond.

The air was bitter cold.

‘It might be worthwhile,’ Mok said to Lady Envy, ‘to examine each of these houses, from level to level, to determine which is the most structurally sound and therefore inhabitable. There seem to be considerable stores remaining which we can exploit.’

‘Yes, yes,’ Lady Envy said distractedly. ‘I leave to you and your brothers such mundane necessities. The assumption that our journey has brought us to, however, rests in the untested belief that this contraption will perforce carry us north, across the entire breadth of Coral Bay, and hence to the city that is our goal. I, and I alone, it seems, must do the fretting on this particular issue.’

‘As you like, mistress.’

‘Watch yourself, Mok!’ she snapped.

He tilted his masked head in silent apology.

‘My servants forget themselves, it seems. Think on the capacity of my fullest irritation, you three. In the meantime, I shall idle on the city’s street, such as it is.’ With that, she pivoted and strode languidly towards the doorway.

Baaljagg and Garath stood three paces beyond, the rain striking their broad backs hard enough to mist with spray. Both animals faced a lone figure, standing in the gloom of the opposite house’s overhanging dormer.

For a moment, Lady Envy almost sighed, then the fact that she did not recognize the figure struck home. ‘Oh! And here I was about to say: dear Tool, you waited for us after all! But lo, you are not him, are you?’