A Pechaqueh head appeared over the wall next to her and Xessa smashed its face with the butt of her spear, sending them backwards into the dark, but to her right another had climbed up and over onto the walkway. She blocked his spear and thrust back, but slowly enough for her opponent to duck on instinct. In the tiny gap his flinch gave her, she stabbed at yet another man, this one closing with Tiamoko. She sliced his leg, and then jumped sideways, deflecting a jab from the man facing her and following up with a blow to his temple with the haft of the spear. He fell to one knee and Ossa tore his throat out.

Xessa went to Tiamoko’s aid again, now being pushed back by three opponents. She ripped her spear down the flank of the nearest, parting his salt-cotton and the flesh beneath and Tiamoko was able to slide out into space. He forced a woman back, bleeding from leg and shoulder, as Xessa batted away at the other, defending desperately. She feinted, slid her spear over a clumsy parry and into the shoulder. Tiamoko took him in the back, his hatchet chopping into the man’s spine. In the seconds of stillness, surrounded by corpses, they looked both ways along the wall and saw it was lost, defenders being overwhelmed and falling like trees succumbing to the sheer weight of strangler vines. Xessa met Tiamoko’s eyes. He pointed down into the city. ‘Run.’

There were no non-combatants any more. In the intermittent light of torches and cook fires, the sudden blazing of houses burning, Xessa saw greyhairs and youngsters, pregnant women and spirit-haunted ejab take up weapons and fight for their families and themselves. Fight for their city and way of life. Fight and die.

The Melody was methodical: those who offered battle were engaged and cut down without mercy; those who surrendered were roped, forced onto their knees, and put under guard.

It was carnage. It was death on a scale Xessa couldn’t comprehend, even seeing only slivers through the flame-flecked night.

The inside of the Sky City wasn’t built for defence. Hundreds retreated into one of the healing caves, holding the entrance against their enemies, but there was no other way out. Perhaps they simply wished to die a little closer to Malel; perhaps they were praying for rescue. Others climbed the stairs onto the few buildings big enough to have stone roofs and held there, but again, they had nowhere to go.