Two hours before daybreak, while the drovers in the lower pens were still buried under their sheepskins and the night boy nodded beside the ash bucket, Ysabet climbed back onto the timber catwalk with a tallow swab and a pair of farrier’s pincers borrowed from Chaska’s glider kit.
Drawing an iron spike out of living wing-horn could not be done with a single wrench. If the metal tore sideways through the front main vein, the moth would bleed out its yellow lymph before noon and never lift its own weight. Ysabet worked from the west wall inward, greasing the rusted shaft of each pin with melted mutton fat, waiting until the old female moth’s breathing tubes slowed, and then easing the iron out a hair’s breadth at a time with her strong left hand while Chaska steadied the heavy spar from below.
When the first spike came free of the granite hole with a soft, greasy pop, the old female did not bolt. She shuddered once from head to abdomen, hooked her six foot claws deeper into the beam mortar, and let the freed left forewing sag three inches toward her flank so the cramped shoulder joint could drink blood again.
