James A. West

Queen of the North

Prologue

Have you come again to taunt me, Gavin, or will you finally grant me the blessing of death?

Hearing the Oracle’s voice deep inside his head, far below the fertile soil from which sprang dreams and nightmares, left the man befuddled. Gavin? That’s not who I am … or is it? Despite that uncertainty, he knew he stood in the Celestial Chamber of the Ilesma Temple, a place where only a select few could question the Oracle and obtain the secrets of unborn tomorrows.

He glanced toward the ghostly radiance, the essence of the Oracle caught within a spherical cage of silver mesh hovering above a forelimb of graven silver, itself thrusting up from the marble floor. Its carved obsidian talons curled below the sphere, frozen in the act of snatching it from the air. The ensorcelled metalwork of both the cage and the forelimb caught the starlight falling through the portal in the domed ceiling, drawing the radiance into itself and setting the metal alight with a spectral glow.

Do you take pleasure from my torment? the Oracle asked. I have often thought it must be so, Gavin, even as I have long wondered why my suffering should please you.

The man hesitated to answer. A vague notion warned him there was a grave danger in responding to this being unless fully prepared. He stared at the throbbing light, drawn to it, yet repulsed.

Gavin? The Oracle’s voice was curious now, and somehow sly.

The man narrowed his eyes. Gavin. The name sounded familiar. Gavin is my name … but only here … and only to this being. Gavin, the real Gavin-the man saw in his mind the image of a towheaded boy with a lopsided grin-had been a favorite playmate. I took his name to use in this place-

All at once, his sense of self solidified. Just as quickly, he constructed an impenetrable barrier around his deepest thoughts. If given a chance, the Oracle could tear holes in the essence of a seeker’s mind as easily as it parted the veil guarding sight of future things. I am master here, the man-Gavin-assured himself, just as his predecessors had been masters of the Oracle in their time.

Gavin?

“I have never taunted you,” Gavin said, finally coming around to the spirit’s first question. As to granting your death, you shall never have it. “Nor have I ever taken pleasure in your suffering.” This was not entirely true, but what he felt concerning the Oracle was more complex than could be described by base emotions.

The Oracle didn’t respond to his assurances, but Gavin felt something move between them along their ethereal bond. Frustration, fear, killing wrath?

At length, the Oracle spoke again, its tone now sharp. Your mere freedom taunts me as much as your living flesh-two things your ancestors stole from me long ago.

Gavin waved a dismissive hand. “You speak of thefts, but you and your kind lost that war. How is your failure any fault of mine?”

Should the vanquished suffer for eternity? Should they never have the chance to live free again?

Gavin circled slowly over polished marble tiles the hue of deep ice, his shoulders banded with starlight and shadow. “Had your kind triumphed, how would you have treated my forebearers?”

Ringing silence met this.

“You cannot answer, can you? Not honestly, at any rate. For to do so would be to admit that your treatment of my ancestors would have been swift annihilation-as it always was, before our spellcasters bested your kindred.”

Not necessarily.

Gavin chuckled dryly. “How you deceive yourself. We have old histories and older songs reaching back to the days when my people were little more than beasts. Those tales speak of your conduct toward the folk you vanquished. You and yours were as gods-cruel, brutal, uncaring gods. Were our roles reversed … well, that would be rather difficult, since I’d never have been born, nor my father, nor his father, nor his father’s father, and so on?”

Would you not choose annihilation over eternal enslavement?

“Choice is of no concern here, but rules alone. If those rules happen to include repaying in some small way the cruelty you delivered upon my ancient kindred, such is but a spoil of war.”

At least admit that your people won the war through trickery.

“Has there ever been a war fought and won through purely noble deeds? I think not,” Gavin answered quickly, before the Oracle could attempt to twist obscure legends into fact. “Victory is victory, no matter how it is achieved.”

Would you believe me if I told you my kind had grown beyond seeking victories, and that we had chosen instead to seek companionship and alliances?

Gavin had heard these lies before. “No Oracle, I would not believe that in the least.”

The Oracle suddenly asked, What do you seek?

Gavin paused in his circling. “A sickness infects Targas.”

The sickness you speak of came with your kind. Your enduring presence has only further befouled this once great city to its heart. I cannot help you.

Gavin resumed his circuit around the silver cage. “Cannot, Oracle … or will not?” Silence held within his mind. He knew the answer the Oracle would give before it came, but this was a game he never tired of playing. A game of boundaries and authority, of victors and the vanquished, of rulers and the ruled.

If I knew the answer you seek, came the Oracle’s grudging reply, you know I would have no choice but to give it to you.

Gavin chuckled softly. The Oracle was simply delaying the inevitable revelation. As was his wont, Gavin played along. “Of course, of course. You must forgive me. Such trifling matters regarding your submissiveness often slip my mind.”

I forgive you nothing.

Now Gavin laughed outright. “Don’t be so petulant!”

Free me, the Oracle warned with true anger, and I shall redefine petulance for you.

Gavin halted, an uneasy tingle flashing over his skin. “You know I can no more free you than you can free yourself,” he said more sharply than he intended-fear of reprisal did not trouble him, but rather the fear that he had somehow let the Oracle rattle him. He couldn’t allow the imprisoned spirit to gain even an inch of ground within his mind. I’m Gavin! I’m master here! he thought, reinforcing the barriers against the caged spirit.

Silence again, wide and dark and complete.

Gavin waited, breathless, a sudden suspicion growing large in his heart that the Oracle had somehow kept hidden a secret resistance or power, something as ancient as itself. Yet, if the Oracle had any secrets, why not use them before now? The answer, obviously, was that there was no secret power.

Gavin gave himself a shake, laughed off his jitters.

You sound afraid, the Oracle said.

“Now who is doing the taunting?” Gavin disliked the tremor in his voice.

How could I taunt you, Gavin, the master of me, my ruler, my persecutor?

“Enough!” Gavin shouted. When the Oracle had spoken his name, he heard a question, felt a probing for his true identity. His fear grew into yawning gulf. He must learn the answers he sought, and then promptly leave the Celestial Chamber. “Tell me how to heal my city!”

Your city? Is that how you think of Targas, the Everlasting City of Light?

“If Targas is not my city,” Gavin said, “then it belongs to no one.” He and the Oracle might bandy about lies and ambiguities, but in this, there was only a single truth. Targas sheltered his people, but the city was his, and he would happily destroy its glorious walls, its crystal spires, and its undying light, before he let anyone push him from his rightful place. After a time, the Oracle spoke the words he wanted to hear.

Ask of me what you will, Master.

Much better, Gavin thought, a fitful grin tugging his lips. He wanted to savor the Oracle’s defeat, but for some reason he found it rather unfulfilling tonight, even bitter. Irritated, Gavin rounded on the silver sphere. “The oldest histories claim your kind have been here since the founding of Targas.”

Much and much longer than that, Gavin. My ancestors, like your own, were once nomads roaming the frozen wastes in search of sanctuary. When they deemed such a secure place must not exist, they built one-first the vast warrens under the city, then the city itself.

“Do you love Targas?”

A pause. As if it were my own child.

“Then tell me how to restore Targas and drive to ground those who plot to destroy-” Gavin hesitated, calculating “-our city.”

To suggest to me that we share some common purpose proves you are the cruelest of all my former masters.

“Tell me how to succeed,” Gavin demanded.

Seek the man and his mark.

“What man? What mark-” Gavin’s breath grew thick as jelly in his chest as an image of a sinister-looking creature filled his mind. With the image came the face of a man, and with the face came a vision of Targas lit not by everlasting light but by leaping mountains of flame. With all the images came a sudden and complete understanding of the means Gavin must employ to save his city. It was terrible, unthinkable, but there was never a doubt in his mind that he would do what was required.

After the vision faded, Gavin stammered, “Th-Thank you,” his voice tinged with a reverence, and below that was something else. Boundless fear. The Oracle had never so fully invaded his mind as to show him visions as if they were his own, and he knew not what it meant.

I will do anything to save Targas, the Oracle answered. You must hurry, for the time between success and absolute loss is far narrower than you can imagine. Many already plot against you, and their utmost desire is to supplant the rule of the Munam a’Dett priesthood.

“Who would dare?” Gavin cried. “Reveal them to me!”

It is enough for you to know that there are more than you would believe, and far more than you could ever hope to defeat alone. Find the man who bears the mark of his namesake, or you shall lose Targas and all else you hold dear. Go with haste, Gavin. Go!

Gavin fled the Celestial Chamber, not realizing until later that he had gone forth with the eager swiftness of one commanded.

Chapter 1

Winds laden with fat snowflakes hooted mournfully over Valdar, over Queen Erryn, over torn fields filled with the dead and dying. Bitter that wind was, full of winter’s breath that tugged and gnawed at her cloak of dark leather and silver-gray wolf fur. Will I be remembered as the valiant Queen of the North, she wondered, surveying what her commands had brought upon her army, or will I be despised as the Queen of Blood?

Beyond the palisade, wounded Prythians waved slowly to their comrades, like men drowning in a mire. Some of her soldiers were more energetic, trying to kick and claw their way back to the walls, but they were betrayed by their shattered limbs. Swords, Erryn had learned, broke bones more often than they cut cleanly. Hammers and beaked mauls were worse yet, mutilating everything they struck. Some of the injured, such brave and strong men a few hours ago, now lay moaning, too damaged to do anything but wait for their brothers to load them into rickety carts as if they were a late and rather poor crop of gourds.

A treacherous gust brought a charnel scent to her. If that had been all she detected, maybe her guts wouldn’t have twisted so violently. But there were other smells to war, that of urine and excrement, which seemed to cling to to everything. Erryn swallowed, closed her eyes. I did this-I chose to do this-but I cannot surrender. Then as now, her decision was firm, her resolve true, because life north of the Shadow Road didn’t favor merciful hearts or weak stomachs. I did this, she thought again, this time with the same sense of righteousness that had filled her heart the day she, Queen Erryn of Valdar, formerly a simple orphan girl with too much fire in her heart, had begun her war….

Many weeks before, King Nabar’s emissaries had come in the plush and curtained comfort of gilded white carriages, each drawn by a six-horse team. Four mounted companies of Kingsguard formed a bristling wall around the carriages, the standard-bearers hoisting aloft the new banners of Cerrikoth’s Royal House. The single white rose of Qairennor had become many, and they wreathed the horned bull of Cerrikoth charging over a crimson field. This new banner proved that King Nabar had indeed wed Princess Mirith, the daughter of the Qairennoran witch-queen, who Nabar’s own father had made war against before his death.

Erryn marveled at the soldiers’ shiny clean breastplates and gold-trimmed crimson cloaks, at their burnished helms, and at their lances so long and sharp. Oh, and how their horses marched, as if they were as proud as their riders!

Just beyond Valdar’s weathered gray gate, the Kingsguard halted at a crisp command, banners fluttering in the gentle breeze. This was a proper army. Clean and orderly. Her Prythian forces, which Erryn had hired at Lady Nesaea’s suggestion, their scruffy wolfskin cloaks and armor of scale and boiled leather, looked and sounded like a horde of plainsmen in comparison.

The emissaries popped out of their carriages, clad all in rich finery better suited to the warmer southlands. When the chill of the north hit them, they huddled together and gazed about with expressions of horror.

With General Aedran on one side, her steward Breyon on the other, and half a hundred Queensguard at her back, Erryn marched through the gate to meet her uninvited guests. She did her best not to look overawed. As they walked, Breyon instructed her on the ways of highborn.

“They dip into each other’s puckered arseholes like they’re loaded with honey,” he assured her with a knowing wink. With his gray-whiskered face smudged in dirt, he seemed more a beggar than a steward.

“He has the way of it,” Aedran agreed.

“Surely you jest,” Erryn said.

Breyon shook his head. “They cannot get enough arse-licking. Only thing they like better than licking each other’s arses, is to have a lowborn on his knees with his tongue wagging. Reckon it makes ‘em feel all noble and charitable, like they’re givin’ us a treat.”

Erryn was not keen to have her arse licked, nor to lick these flowery arses before her. Nevertheless, she did her best to appear friendly and proper. Pleasantness was easier when you had a thousand blood-hungry Prythians guarding a fortress at your back, even if it was only a lowly wooden one. Her Queensguard, armed with great swords and huge iron axes, and well-known for their love of cutting foes to pieces for the sheer enjoyment of it, also helped keep a warm smile on her face.

Standing about in the dreary weather, recoiling at the soggy muck under their fine silken slippers, the emissaries shunned introductions and got right to business. They graciously offered to name her Reeve of Valdar, complete with a gold-and-ivory rod of office.

“Accept the stewardship of Valdar,” they told her, stumbling over each other in their apparent eagerness to insert their tongues into her bottom, “and King Nabar will overlook your trespass.”

Trespass? Is that all I did by naming myself queen, just step a little beyond the bounds of my birth?

Erryn took the proffered rod, hefted its engraved length in her hand. It was too pretty to use for stirring stew or thumping heads. So, as far as she was concerned, the thing had no use. “It’s beautiful,” she said in a wondering voice, as if greatly impressed.

The emissaries smiled and nodded. Two bald men, and another pair with short, snow-white curls. The sweet perfume they wore threatened to gag her. She went on.

“The man who held the position of reeve before-a raping bastard by the name of Mitros, whose fat head I took great pleasure in liberating from his equally plump body-never carried such a fine rod as this.”

Seemingly put out by her response, the emissaries quietly conferred with harsh whispers and sharp gestures. When they turned back, they were all oily smiles again.

“This man, Mitros, was not appointed by our good and generous liege,” they informed her gravely, one picking up where the other left off so smoothly that she had a hard time following the conversation. “Should you accept the king’s offer, you’ll be more than a mere reeve, you’ll also be Lady Erryn,” they finished as one, speaking as if lady sounded so much finer than queen.

To Erryn’s mind, they were fools. Anyone could name herself a lady. Look at Nesaea, who had been her mentor for a brief time, if never her friend. She was no more a born noblewoman than Erryn was a born queen. Names and titles meant nothing, unless you could make others believe they were true. At worst, Erryn was halfway to being a queen already-she had named herself, it was true, but held no illusions that she would not have to fight to keep her claim. As such, becoming Lady Erryn was akin to going backward. Still, she decided to hear these men out, because as Nesaea had told her, “Listening to your enemies leads to understanding them, and understanding them will help you defeat them.”

“Should I accept,” Erryn said, voice neutral, “what recompense will your ‘good and generous liege’ offer me?” She had never been to any court save her own-the common room of the Cracked Flagon, with its ale- and wine-stained wooden floor, and slipshod plank walls covered in hides, antlers, and ten lifetimes of soot-but she felt sure her question had a courtly ring to it.

A question instead of immediate agreement distressed the emissaries anew. They pushed their heads together yet again, faces twisted into scowls. They recovered quickly and pressed closer to her, their tongues all but wagging in her direction. Erryn decided Breyon was right about highborn arse-licking, and couldn’t help but clench her buttocks under her snug leather leggings.

One of the bald emissaries, the tallest and most spindly of the lot, swept back his ermine-lined cloak of scarlet wool and stepped forward. “Should you accept, milady, you’ll be expected to resume delivering shipments of gold-ore to the King’s City of Onareth. In return, King Nabar will provide you with enough soldiers to ensure that Valdar is protected from ravening plainsmen, as well as the bandits known to frequent these lands.” His eyes failed to conceal his opinion that Erryn herself was little more than a common brigand. “Assuming your willingness, King Nabar has granted you lands and, of course, a true title.” From the depths of his cloak, he produced a scroll with a blob of blue wax sealing it closed. A moment later, out came a leather sack that clinked when he bounced on his palm.

“Truly?” Erryn asked, feigning interest. They offered her more every time she showed the barest reluctance, suggesting that they were conniving and untrustworthy-not that she had expected anything less. These fools were the picture of all she hoped to avoid in her own rule.

“Indeed, milady. King Nabar has even agreed to provide funds necessary to pay for the construction of a fine manse hereabout, one suitable to your station….” Just short of cringing, the emissary’s words trailed off as he looked around at the wide fields beyond the palisade, with their dying grass and wildflowers, the stubble of recently harvested crops gone a dirty yellow within fieldstone hedges, and finally to the dark forests of pine, fir and birch ringing it all about. He cleared his throat, shivered. “Enough gold, I daresay, for you to build a woodland palace, if you wish.”

“Oh my, a woodland palace?”

General Aedran leaned in close to Erryn. “If you poke your dagger into his gob, I’ll give you ten woodland palaces.”

A giggle escaped Erryn. The bald emissary scowled. Before he could waste anymore time, Erryn eased back her wolfskin cloak to caress the hilt of the short sword gifted to her by Nesaea. It was a pretty thing, fitted to her stature, the pommel set with a large oval sapphire, the crossguards fashioned of engraved silver, and the blade sharp as a midwinter wind. She barely knew how to use long steel-concealable knives suited orphaned village girls better than swords-but the way she touched it widened the eyes of her audience. The tall bald emissary retreated a few dainty steps, his fine slippers squelching in the mud.

“My lords,” Erryn said, putting on a winning smile, “I prefer to keep my current title and my gold, which is far more than King Nabar could ever give me. As for manses and palaces … as you can see, I already possess an entire fortress full of soldiers. And, as you surely know from the map I sent your good king, I’ve claimed the lands between the Shadow Road and the Gyntor Mountains east to Pryth, and west to Qairennor. Anything less from your liege is simply unacceptable.”

The emissaries looked at her with bulging stares and purpling faces, as if she had ordered their manhoods seared with hot irons. She took their silence as an invitation to proceed.

“Be that as it may, I’m open to trading with your king, and I’m willing to pay the highest price for all southern goods.” Feeling generous, she dropped a saucy wink. “Perhaps even better than top price … say, as much as a third better over the next five years?” That seemed more than generous.

Purpled faces gave way to bewildered blinks and slack lips all around. Before they gave her an answer, she slapped them with her conditions.

“Of course, King Nabar and his court must openly acknowledge that I am Queen of the North, and yield up the lands that I’ve claimed for myself and my people.”

That snapped them out of their shock. “Your people!” they said as one.

The spindly one stepped forward again, his bald head gone to an alarming shade of plum. “You filthy, dog-rutting whore,” he hissed. “If you jest, it is best to say so now, for I can assure you, the very serious game that will commence upon our departure is nothing you and this pack of inbred, lack-witted rabble can hope to win.”

Erryn’s Queensguard shifted. A few even chuckled. One thing a Prythian admired more than sharp steel was a sharp tongue. Of course, they also had a penchant for cutting out such tongues, and few were averse to wearing those bloodied bits of meat on leather strings around their necks.

It was a close thing for Erryn to resist drawing her sword and teaching the bald bastard some respect, but insults didn’t bother her overmuch. While he had lived, that bastard Mitros and his men had taken turns raping her when she dared speak against his harsh dealings with the village folk. So, in a way, suggesting she had lain with dogs was not far from the truth. As much as she ever would, she had overcome the shame and disgust of that abuse. So what was it to have this whining abuser of boys soil her good name?

“I wouldn’t stand for that,” Aedran whispered in her ear. Of all her men, he seemed the most troubled by the insult.

“What would you have me do?” Erryn whispered back.

Aedran’s gaze flickered to her sword in answer.

Still resistant, Erryn thought about Aedran’s words. She decided that the most galling thing was the emissary naming her a whore. Other than those who had ravished her, she had never been with a man for coin or for love. Naming her a whore belittled her suffering and more to the point, was an affront to her her station. What king or queen would ever tolerate such flagrant insults? Not a one of them would, Erryn was certain.

In a blink and a slash, her sword ended the emissary’s insults. Almost. Her steel sank deep, but halted when it met the bones of the emissary’s neck. He loosed a gurgling squawk and wrapped his hands around the blade. The razor edges cut deeply into his fingers, adding to the blood pumping like a wellspring from the side of his neck.

With their faces now freckled in crimson, the rest of the emissaries gaped at each other, at her, at their dying but still standing leader. By the sudden ripe stench, at least one of them had filled his silken smallclothes.

Erryn jerked her sword loose, and the emissary’s bones seemed to melt. He hit the ground with a wet slap, his stunned features slathered in a mess of blood and dripping muck. His mouth worked like a landed perch, but no sound came. As her soldiers and those of the Kingsguard began moving, Erryn had time to think that murdering the emissary was not only a heinous breach of etiquette, but an open declaration of war.

“Hold!” she cried, once and again, before her men obeyed. The three remaining emissaries didn’t heed her in the least. They stumbled in the mud and wet grass, making for their gaudy carriages. The Kingsguard, far outnumbered by Erryn’s arrayed forces, lowered their lances and prepared to charge. One of the curly headed emissaries warned them off with a string of desperate shouts, which grew muffled when he hurled himself into the pillowed gloom of his carriage.

“We kill them all now, it will save us the effort of killing them later,” Aedran said. “Kill them now, and we can send their heads back to Onareth in baskets.”

“Why would I do that?” Erryn asked, genuinely curious.

“To let King Nabar know you’re serious about laying claim to these lands. It will also get an army worth fighting up here before winter sets in. If my brothers don’t get a little blood on their hands before long, they’re like to start killing each other.”

“What’s starting a war before winter have to do with anything? Fighting is fighting, cold or warm.”

Aedran gently tapped the tip of her nose with a forefinger, like a father instructing a daughter. The gesture peeved her, but at the same time made her blush. “That’s where you’re wrong, Queen Erryn,” he said, a hint of laughter in his voice when he spoke her title. “And that’s at the heart of the reason you hired me and my men. You need proper guidance in winning this war you’ve now started.” He glanced at the emissary at her feet, who was good and truly dead. “And what a beginning!”

By now, the drivers of the carriages had turned them off the road and into the field, where they bounced and rattled over rough ground. From inside, Erryn could hear the remaining emissaries shrieking like little girls. After getting turned around, the carriage drivers whipped the horses into a gallop back the way they had come, taking their screeching loads out of earshot. At a word from the commander of the Kingsguard, the soldiers raised their lances in preparation to ride away. Their eyes showed no fear but plenty of hate.

“You see,” Aedran said urgently, “wise kings don’t make war in winter, especially these thin-blooded, southern wretches. Trust me on this, I have many brothers who’ve sold their swords to the kings of Cerrikoth. Now is the time to strike, before they flee.”

“Would it not be better to take the time to build up the fortress?”

“Perhaps,” Aedran admitted. “But what would be the fun in that? Come, you’ve already gone and killed one of these pompous fools, why not kill them all?”

Erryn looked at the dead emissary. She had laid claim to her title and to Valdar after killing Mitros, and here was yet another dead man. With his death, war was sure to follow. She decided enough blood had been spilled for now. And Despite what Aedran advised, she felt certain that building up Valdar’s fortifications was the highest priority.

“Let them go,” she ordered, as Nabar’s Kingsguard broke into two columns and wheeled to follow after the fleeing emissaries.

Aedran shrugged. “I suppose that’ll save us the waste of good baskets.”

Erryn glanced at the sky, gray and cold as usual. Snow could fall at any time of year north of the Shadow Road, but true winter was still a ways off. She guessed they had a month at most before King Nabar reacted to the news that she had murdered one of his men. “Trust that we’ll have plenty of war before long.”

“I suggest you triple your army.”

“A lot of gold,” she said warily.

Aedran spread his hands. “The barest pittance to keep Valdar and your crown, don’t you think?”

“I don’t have a crown, save in name.” That was true enough. The folk of Valdar were miners, not goldsmiths.

“Be that as it may, what are your orders?”

Erryn raised herself up, assuring herself that she had acted rightly against the emissary, if not properly. “Dispatch a rider to Pryth, at once….”

King Nabar, it turned out, had reacted slowly and without enough force to crush Valdar, suggesting he either knew little of war, or was a weak sovereign, as rumored. Erryn’s Prythian reinforcements had arrived long before Nabar’s forces, and were able to use their skills and backs to quickly fortify the fortress.

Thinking on the day she had killed the emissary, and all the battles that had followed, Erryn rested a gloved hand on the raw logs of a turret she had taken shelter beside. Woodcutters had stripped most of the bark off the new logs, but reddish strings remained. Winter would gray them, but for now they fluttered in the breeze like bits of withered skin attached to yellowed bone. She shivered. Is it getting colder?

“Erryn,” Aedran called, his heavy boots thumping near.

When he halted, the smell of him engulfed her. Sweat, horse, steel, blood. The same scents cloaked all the Prythians, but on Aedran it seemed … sweeter. She frowned at the thought, as much as at his lack of courtesy. Come to think of it, he had stopped calling her queen some time ago. She thought to correct him, but when she looked into his eyes, her breath froze in her chest.

“What’s happened?”

His answering grin was huge and a touch wild. “Nothing,” he drawled, “unless you’re of the mind to gain an entire realm, instead of holding this tiny patch of frozen ground.” He thrust a worn bit of parchment into her hand.

She opened the missive and scanned words written in a blocky script. Her own hand might have penned the words, except that she avoided writing almost as vigorously as she avoided reading. Nesaea had taken it upon herself to teach Erryn to read and write during their short time together. She had been a quick study, but was still far from proficient.

As Erryn carefully reread the message, Aedran waited in silence. When she began again, the toe of his boot drummed impatiently. Erryn looked up. “What does this mean?”

He raised his finger toward the tip of her nose, as was his wont. Instead of letting him touch her, she flinched back. “Tell me, you fool.”

“It means,” he said slowly, unperturbed by her reaction, “that the gods have favored you with a rare chance to crush your greatest foe. Most never get an opportunity such as this. Most never dream of one.”

She thought again about the message, put that with what Aedran had said, and in their mingling she began to see. “But what of Valdar? If it falls to my enemies,” she said, pointing at the brooding forest, now half lost behind swirling curtains of snow, “all the gold of the north falls back into Nabar’s hands.”

Aedran laughed. “Those cowards have had all they can bear of the cold, snow, and Prythian steel tearing out their guts. My scouts informed me an hour ago that Nabar’s men have decamped and are riding back to Onareth. This time on the morrow, they’ll be south of the Shadow Road.”

Erryn hesitated. “Still, there are bandits and worse. If we leave, Valdar will be defenseless.”

When Aedran shrugged, a clump of snow rolled off the shoulder of his wolfskin cloak. “Leave most of the army here to defend the village-believe me, two thousand of my brothers are more than enough for any band of brigands. With winter upon us, Nabar won’t bother sending any more soldiers, as I promised. And if we succeed, why, you’ll never have to worry over Nabar again.”

And if we fail?

The missive shivered in her grip, but she didn’t know if it was from the wind or the tremor in her fingers. She had a thousand questions and misgivings, but only one held sway. “Can I trust this report?”

“With your life,” Aedran said at once. “And remember, that goes for the both of us, and all those who follow you.”

Erryn turned toward the Gyntors, but saw only a depthless wall of shifting clouds. She glanced out at the fields, the snow gradually covering the signs of battle. Last, she faced Aedran. He waited expectantly. Her eyes narrowed in concentration, and her mouth grew bitter with the fear of losing what little she had gained. What have I really gained, save a patch of frozen ground, as Aedran said? And when springtime comes, Nabar will send enough men to lay siege to Valdar. Yet here was chance to act in a way that no one expected, especially King Nabar and his advisors.

With good reason, spoke a small voice of warning. To do this is to risk everything. And, as you’re reacting to Nabar, it might be that you are charging headlong into a trap. Erryn silently agreed with that reasoning, but if Nabar was setting a trap, it was the most foolish of ploys. All that aside, she still had one prominent concern.

“You told me wise kings don’t make war in winter, but now that winter is nearly upon us, you’d have me make war.”

“You are right on both counts,” Aedran admitted. “But wise kings are not always the best kings. They’re rarely bold, and almost never remembered. Besides, you’re a queen, young and brash. What better way to extend your rule than by slashing a wide and deep mark across the minds of all who stand against you now, and all those who will oppose you in the future?”

Erryn began folding the parchment. There was no time to plan, but as Aedran said, now was the time to act boldly, even recklessly, for what sovereign of renown had ever stood idle? There’s never been a one, she thought. The greatest rulers spoken of in legends always pressed forward, seeking, taking all that lay in their path. In the stories, those mighty men didn’t stop until old age crippled them or death took them.

Her fingers had reduced the parchment into a tiny square before she met Aedran’s eyes again. It seemed her decision warranted a fanfare of trumpet blasts and rousing cheers, but all she had was her voice. “Make ready to march.”

Aedran smiled. “Give me a few days to put everything in order, and I’ll give you kingdoms.”

Chapter 2

“We must hurry,” Thaeson gasped, as if his shuffling gait were not the reason for the company’s slow pace. “The girl must be near the Shield of the Fathers by now. We cannot allow that to happen.”

“Yes, Essan.” Edrik spoke his master’s title with respect, but he was glad the night hid his scowl. We can hurry, but I fear we’re already too late. He caught hold of the old priest’s elbow to hurry him along.

They traveled one of a score of cobbled roads radiating outward from Targas like the spokes of a great wheel. These roads arrowed straight and true through miles of wedge-shaped farmlands, now still and silent under the canopy of darkness. As ever, the warm night air was bursting with the scents of good rich soil and ripening crops. High above, Edrik glimpsed a faint sparkling glow from both the stars and the nearly transparent arc of the Shield of the Fathers.

Normally that light filled him with a sense of peace, but not now. Tonight was Hanyata, one of four nights during the year set aside for the ceremonial sacrifice necessary to restore strength to the Shield of the Fathers, which in turn kept the city eternally warm and hid Targas from the corrupted world of the deycath-those folk not born within the blessed sanctuary. With the girl’s flight, all the celebration and joy of Hanyata was in jeopardy. The only good he could see was that her escape seemed to have gone unnoticed. But for how long?

Of late, too many girls had taken to fleeing their duty to the people, Targas, and the Munam a’Dett. Betraying the citizens of Targas was a terrible and selfish sin, but standing against the benevolence of the Munam a’Dett Order of priests was a mortal sin worthy of the severest punishment. Even as a low-ranking priest of the vizien caste, and but a summer out of his acolyte’s robes, Edrik understood that dissent of any sort was more dangerous than a killing plague. Having girls flee their obligation showed a great unraveling that, in time, would upset the peace and harmony of Targas, which the Munam a’Dett had worked diligently for centuries to maintain.

“A moment!” Thaeson stumbled to a halt, coughing, his thin fingers clutching the sigil of their order embroidered on his chest, a blue dragon encircling a blood-red lily that floated amid a knot of green vines, the symbol of life and its holy guardian.

Edrik put a hesitant hand on his master’s shoulder, praying he would not collapse. The company’s twenty sets of eyes passed over Edrik and Thaeson, before resuming their search of the night. Edrik knew what his fellows were thinking, for it was also on his mind. They never should have told Essan Thaeson about the girl. It was true he would have found out in due course, but with him in tow and slowing the company, the chance of capturing the girl was almost lost.

“We must hurry,” Edrik urged.

“A moment is all I ask,” Thaeson puffed, before a fearful bout of gagging bent him double. He hawked and spat, then went back to sucking wind.

I’ve already given you more moments than we can spare! It was all Edrik could do not to shout his thought aloud. Instead, he took a deep breath and looked askance at his master.

Tufts of pale hair had come loose from the essan’s conical white-and-gold headdress, making him look wholly undignified. Worse still, mud covered his sandals, and more speckled the snowy hem of the ankle-length tunic hanging below his blue-and-gold quartered vestments. Edrik could not remember having seen Thaeson, or any essan for that matter, looking so rumpled and dirty.

“All may not be lost,” Danlin said. Shaved bald like all in his caste, tall and broad enough to stretch his vizien’s vest of quilted green wool, he was a hard-faced young man better suited for armor and crushing foes. Not that the Munam A’Dett had lifted a finger to crush foes since raising the Shield of the Fathers.

Edrik cocked his head toward the distant sound of chanting voices and pounding drums.

“They’re beginning the ceremony,” Thaeson said, sounding as relieved as Danlin. “If that’s so, then none of my fellows have raised the alarm about the missing girl. Surely they know, but have found a suitable replacement.” As he spoke, the voices and drums merged to become a harmonic throbbing that mimicked the heartbeat of all life.

“By Blood and by Water,” Thaeson said. Everyone around him repeated the sacred words, eyes on their home.

How long will those words guard us? Edrik wondered, studying Targas, the Everlasting City of Light. And all alight the city was, its walls glowing like spun gold in the darkness, its crystal towers, lofty spires, and countless domes burning as if pieces of the sun had been set within each one of them. Adding to the radiance were hundreds of bonfires lit for Hanyata and the lamps set on every window sill of in the city. A far greater light shone where the Ilesma Temple stood at the center of the Targas.

As always, Edrik’s breath caught when he looked upon the temple’s majesty. Ilesma is our true heart. The temple was a mountainous ziggurat, its terraced flanks crossed by dozens of sheer stairways. A dome of golden crystal crowned the structure, and it burned not as if a mere piece of the sun had been laid within it, but as if the sun itself had decided to take its nightly rest there. The great bulk of the Ilesma Temple towered above the tallest spire in Targas, as well it should, since it was the resting place of the sacred Oracle. Even with the distance, Edrik could make out the temple’s primary staircase, which climbed up the stepped face of the temple and ended at a sprawling terrace just below the dome.

“There still might be time to catch the girl and bring her back,” Edrik said. “But only-”

“-if you leave me here?” Thaeson cut in. He let out a wheezy gasp. “No! If any of you get too near the Shield, you’ll die as certainly as the girl.”

“I intend to catch her before then,” Edrik said, voice tight, “but standing around discussing the issue isn’t getting us any closer to her.”

Thaeson straightened. “I’m ready,” he said, but looked far from it.

The company set off again, and to Edrik’s surprise Thaeson stepped livelier. The ponderous song thrumming out of Targas hurried them toward the Sleeping Wood encircling the vast farmlands and stretching a mile deep before coming to the Shield of the Fathers. On the far side of that nearly invisible obstacle waited a boundless land of frost and death, the realm of the deycath. The oldest tomes named those lands the Iron Marches, a barren place the ancestors of Targas had escaped long ago.

As they neared the Sleeping Wood, a brief tremor shook the cobbles under Edrik’s feet, and soon after a short breath of frigid air washed over him. Had he not been looking for those signs, he might have missed them.

Edrik peered ahead, but deep shadow clung hard to the trees, making it impossible to see much of anything.

“She’s escaped us,” Thaeson said, halting the company.

Edrik was horrified to see his breath steaming before his eyes. It was not the first time he had seen that, but it was no less shocking than before. Did anyone in the city notice the shaking and the cold? Some of them must have, and most assuredly those sneaking ingrates who whispered that the old ways were dying, those like the girl, who had chosen to run instead of to serve. But most don’t yet know what the signs mean, and they still believe in and trust the priesthood.

For Edrik, this idea was more of hope than a belief. Too many had begun to take notice of the changes around the city, too many had begun to speak aloud questions that should never have entered their minds, and too many had begun to doubt the power of the Munam a’Dett Order and, more pointedly, the quidan, leader of the order and presiding ruler of Targas.

“She’s lost to us,” Thaeson said, his thin shoulders slumping. Edrik knew the girl was beyond them all now, save for Thaeson.

“Come, Essan,” Edrik said. “We must retrieve the girl’s remains, lest any of her fellow traitors chance upon the body and think to use it against us.”

Thaeson rubbed his wizened face and sighed. “Lead on, my boy.”

The company marched into the ancient forest, the scent of loam and sweet sap filling the night air. Thick boughs intertwined overhead to form a leafy shroud. As the company began picking their way along a faint trail bounded by bowing ferns, Edrik noticed an unnatural quiet, as if the night creatures had vanished. Adding to his woes was the cold current of air flowing along the ground like an unseen river. He told himself he was imagining it, until Thaeson went still.

“Something is wrong,” Thaeson warned. Without the benefit of starlight, he was just one more shadow in the company of many. “Look there,” he said sharply. “See how the mist rises?”

Edrik cast about, wondering how the man could see anything, then stiffened in alarm. Barely seen tendrils of fog were curling up from the ground, like drowsy serpents.

“What’s happening?” Danlin blurted, dancing back from one of those seeking shapes. “Essan, what is this?”

The others had taken notice, and a murmur of disquiet rose from them.

“There’s nothing to fear,” Thaeson assured them, though he looked uneasy.

Edrik scrubbed his hands up and down his arms. The soft linen sleeves of his tunic felt damp. No, he thought, distressed. It’s frost! As added proof, delicate white feathers of hoarfrost had begun spreading over the ferns, weighing them down. More frost grew like a plague of pale fungus over nearby tree trunks.

“We must reach the Shield of the Fathers,” Thaeson said, his calm breaking. “Quickly, now!”

He spoke too late. The others had turned to run back the way they had come.

“Cowards!” Thaeson snarled.

Edrik wanted to join them, but he forced himself to stand fast beside the man who had released him from the dreary existence of a farmer’s only son, and placed him within the powerful bosom of the Munam a’Dett Order. If it came to it, he would give his life for Essan Thaeson.

“What now?” Edrik asked.

Thaeson faced the mist, now waist-deep off the forest floor, and silently spreading out through the trees. “First we must retrieve the girl. After, if it’s possible, we have to find out what has happened, and repair the damage.”

Damage? Edrik could not contain himself. “What do you think happened?”

Thaeson turned, his timeworn face nearly lost in shadow. “I … I don’t know, boy, but whatever this is, it’s not a welcome omen.”

They pushed on, carefully wading through the fog. Roots and stones threatened to trip them, but they kept on. Edrik swallowed the dry lump in his throat. He had occasionally suffered doubts about their purpose-only a fool refused to question the consequences of his actions-but now he deeply considered that maybe the priesthood ought to let things alone, allow the malcontents to have their way, and let Targas fall. If the Munam a’Dett stayed strong and true to itself, the Order’s adherents could build another city somewhere else, attract new and faithful followers. In short, begin again.

“Perhaps we should go back,” Edrik said, coming as close as he dared to speaking his thoughts aloud.

Thaeson stumbled and caught Edrik’s arm to steady himself. “By the Fathers, boy, I’d not have expected you to turn back at the first sign of trouble. Maybe those other cowards, but not you. That’s why I let them run off without a word. I’ve always counted on you to stand with me.” His eyes narrowed. “Was my trust misplaced?”

Edrik felt a surge of pride at Thaeson’s praise, but at the same time, he felt shame that the essan saw the need to question his loyalty. “I’ll stand where you stand, walk where you walk, Essan,” he said humbly, but he could not leave their ultimate purpose alone. “Yet, what Quidan Salris plans, what he expects of us, is dangerous, as you’ve often said. If he has us move too quickly, too forcefully, the faith of our people will shatter.”

“For some,” Thaeson reasoned, “it will shatter anyway. Such is always the price of change-particularly when that change involves turning people from what they mistakenly believe they want. Trust me, what many of the citizens of Targas think they desire is nothing but a well-crafted lie spread by blind fools.”

“Such as escaping the authority of the Munam A’Dett?”

“Especially that,” Thaeson said, his lips turning down in distaste. “More foolish still is their belief that life beyond the Shield of the Fathers, a life spent amongst the deycath, would be better than a life spent amongst their own kind. For their sakes, we must never allow them to see the ugliness and horrors beyond our border. Targas is their home, and within the bounds of the Everlasting City of Light, they shall remain.”

“I understand,” Edrik said. “Still, maybe we should try to show the folk that we share their concerns, convince them that the Order is still powerful, and that they can rely on us to keep their best interests at heart.”

“Thinking like that might earn you the Staff of the Quidan, one day,” Thaeson said, speaking of the symbol of authority carried by the head of the Munam a’Dett Order. Edrik’s grin faltered when Thaeson added, “Or it might get you hunted down and killed by those who want no truck with the likes of us, the quidan, or the priesthood.”

Thaeson said nothing else until they came out of the forest, where he stopped dead at the sight of what was awaiting them. “This is why we must press on with our plans. Time, I’m afraid, has grown far shorter than any of us feared.”

“By the Fathers,” Edrik said, eyeing the band of white mist caught between the edge of the Sleeping Wood and the Shield of the Fathers. Beyond the trees, starlight filtered down through the barrier, turning the mist into a river of milk.

Edrik raised his eyes, searching. He found an undulating breach in the faintly glimmering wall. With a moaning sigh, frigid air poured through the gap that should not have been possible.

“How did this happen, Essan?” Edrik asked, having always believed the Shield of the Fathers was impenetrable.

“Wait here,” Thaeson said in answer.

Edrik caught his arm. “I can help, if you grant me the power to do so.”

“That time will come sooner than you think or want,” Thaeson said, sounding regretful. “But this, my boy, I must do alone. Do not come any closer, or you will die.”

Thaeson tottered off through the mist, leaving swirling eddies in his wake. Edrik dared not let his eyes wander. Shivering from the unnatural cold, he watched until the essan had vanished, his hand held before his face to ward against the bitter chill of the Iron Marches coming through the breach.

A long time later, Thaeson came back into view, a girl’s limp figure held in his arms. He struggled closer under the burden, then he abruptly knelt down amid the restless ground fog.

Edrik waited, tense, sure his bones were about to crack from the cold, sure that his master hadn’t knelt at all, but had collapsed. Should I go to him?

His answer was Thaeson’s earlier admonition to stay put, lest he die from proximity to the Shield of the Fathers. Every citizen of Targas learned the same from childhood. Even without the vizien patrols that kept watch on the Sleeping Wood, most folk never considered venturing too close to the wall, for fear of a terrible and painful death.

And here you stand, a mocking voice whispered, afraid as all your flock. Yet not an hour past, you thought of dying for your master, if he but asked it of you.

Edrik began to step forward, but an unpleasant gurgling sound halted him. His eyes widened as the rift in the Shield of the Fathers began to close. As the gap shrank, the gurgling noise became a hissing scream, like a well-heated teapot. As soon as the fissure cut off the river of mist, nighttime silence fell.

He was again considering taking his chances with approaching the Shield of the Fathers, when Thaeson stood up and moved laboriously toward him. The girl he had left buried in the mist. Edrik guessed Thaeson would send some others to fetch her remains. For the sake of secrecy, members of the vizien caste, perhaps even him, would bury her without ceremony. The girl’s family and friends would wonder what had happened to her, but the farmlands around Targas were extensive, the Sleeping Wood dark and deep, so it was not unheard of for people to go missing from time to time. And if she had told any accomplices she intended to flee, Edrik supposed they would assume she had made good on her word.

“By Blood and by Water,” Thaeson said, “we are yet safe.”

“How was the wall breached?” Edrik asked. Insofar as he knew, the Shield of the Fathers was as eternal as the Everlasting City of Light, and only those who drank of the precious Blood of Life could pass through unharmed.

Thaeson shook his head. “All that matters is that it’s whole again, and we’re safe.” Before Edrik could press his concerns, the essan added, “The hour to act as come.”

Edrik swallowed. “The Oracle’s foretelling?”

Thaeson’s answer was a simple nod.

“There is no other way?”

This time, the essan shook his head. “Quidan Salris has waited as long as he dared. When I tell him what has happened, he’ll sanction your journey to seek the man of which the Oracle foretold.”

Edrik imagined the endless cold beyond the wall, and how even the diluted touch of it gushing through the breach had threatened to freeze him solid. How can anyone survive out there? It was not the first time he had entertained the thought since learning of the mission he was to embark on, but now it seemed far more important. His fears got the best of him.

“Are you sure there’s no other way-is Quidan Salris sure?”

Thaeson put on a somber face. “We are sure because the Oracle is sure, my boy.”

“What if the Oracle is wrong?” Edrik demanded.

Thaeson caught his shoulders in a surprisingly firm grip. “Such questions are what have led us to the brink of calamity, boy! Do not allow such discontent to blacken your heart. You must believe what we do is right.” His face softened. “Trust in this, boy, if nothing else. After you’ve completed your mission and returned, you’ll see with your living eyes the darkness that infests the hearts of the traitors who stand opposed to us. You’ll understand the vile, filthy darkness they seek to sow into the hearts of the good folk of Targas. Keep your doubts if you must, but in time, you’ll learn that the Munam a’Dett is the only virtuous faction in our blessed city.”

Edrik nodded. “I must prepare myself … and tell Kyreen.”

“Tell your wife only that I’ve sent you and the others to the far side of Targas on Munam a’Dett business.”

Edrik bowed his head, seeing his pregnant young wife behind his eyes. Kyreen was his strength. He hated the idea of lying to her, but it was for her sake, and for the sake of their unborn child, that he had agreed to travel into the ugly and blasphemous world of the deycath. “Of course, Essan.”

Thaeson produced a small golden flask and placed it into Edrik’s palm. Gently, the essan closed the younger man’s fingers around it. “The Blood of Life will grant you, and those who join you, leave to pass through the Shield of the Fathers unharmed. Take a sip, my boy, and feel the power of the Munam a’Dett.”

The flask’s worn engravings pressed against his hand, but it was the heat of the object, warm as living blood, that drew his attention. The Blood of Life, he thought. The day he had donned his acolyte’s robes, he learned of the hallowed potion, its purposes and powers, but it had never crossed his mind that the Blood of Life might actually be blood.

Mesmerized, he pulled the stopper, raised the flask, and took a tentative sip. Just as he feared, the flavor of salt and rust swarmed over his tongue. The elixir was far thicker than blood. When he began gagging, Thaeson clutched his arm.

“Keep it down, boy! It is far too precious to spew on the ground.”

Edrik gagged again, gulped at the saliva and bile flooding the back of his throat, and somehow managed to swallow the Blood of Life. He kept swallowing until the worst of the taste was gone from his mouth.

“Good,” Thaeson said. “Very good.”

Edrik could only nod. The Iron Marches awaited him, along with a man bearing the mark of his namesake. Such a mark could only be a sign of evil and pain … and yet in this man rested the hope of Targas. By Blood and by Water, protect me, Fathers!

Chapter 3

Fumbling his coin purse, Rathe stooped to retrieve it from the ground. Yesterday’s slushy quagmire of mud and snow had frozen into an uneven crust overnight, leaving him to brush dirty bits of ice off the leather sack. Before he straightened, eyes darting imperceptibly, he searched up and down the street for any sign of followers. He saw nothing suspicious.

Two turns back, he had paused to look through a chandler’s window, feigning interest in the displayed candles and soaps, while at the same time taking pains to see if anyone seemed out of place. Perhaps a watchful man leaning against a doorframe, or the flash of someone ducking into an alley. Then as now, Rathe had seen only the folk of Iceford going about their daily tasks.

He tilted his head back to scratch idly at his dark-whiskered chin, his gaze flickering across the rooftops to a pair of chimneys rising above a baker’s shop. Other than a line of watchful crows perched just beyond the lazy plumes of rising smoke, there was nothing alarming.

Where are you? he wondered, picturing the thin face of the fellow he had named the Shadowman, who had trailed him across the Gyntors, and who he had fought in the halls of Ravenhold. Despite what Loro, Nesaea, and Fira believed, Rathe was sure the murderous bastard had also been stalking him during their time in Iceford. His belief was so strong that he had shaved off his black locks and grown a short beard, in order to disguise himself against the Shadowman, who moved about the world with ghostlike ease.

Hiding his disquiet behind a bored expression, Rathe set off again, glancing at the stone-and-timber shops and homes lining the narrow street, their thatched roofs thrusting toward a lowering gray sky. Being from the warm climes of Cerrikoth, the frosty reaches of the Iron Marches were strange to him in many ways, but he knew weather when he saw it. More snow would soon fall. Over the last fortnight, it snowed more days than not.

Snow and increasingly bitter cold distressed Rathe almost as much as the unseen eyes he sensed, for Captain Ostre had warned of the need to reach the White Sea before the River Sedge froze. Rathe’s companions were confident Ostre would get his ship in order, and the burly captain impressed Rathe as a man of his word, but after walking the decks of the Lamprey, Rathe was not so sure the wallowing tub could meet its master’s demands. More troublesome were the continual setbacks that plagued ship and crew. As it stood now, the Lamprey was not sailing anywhere.

Not for the first time, Rathe weighed the option of riding west along the River Sedge to the White Sea, and there boarding a merchant ship bound for the south. He drew up his hood as the first flakes of snow began to fall, knowing in his heart the time for riding downriver was long past. If Ostre failed to get the Lamprey fit to sail, Rathe and his friends would be stuck in Iceford until the spring thaw.

There are worse things than spending a long winter in the arms of a beautiful woman, he thought, envisioning Nesaea’s raven curls falling over her smooth shoulders, her violet eyes, her-

He cleaved the visions of his lover before they became too distracting. All his fruitless cautions had put him behind schedule. He needed to reach the far side of the village by noontime, for those awaiting him were the most impatient lot he had ever met.

Wending his way across the village took him through Iceford’s market square, where hordes of men in drab woolen cloaks and women in heavy, unflattering dresses slowed him further. He mingled with the crowds, and the watched feeling faded a bit.

The market was little different from any others he had been to. Noisy children ran about underfoot. Chickens clucked in their wicker cages, and geese honked in theirs, each unknowing that cook pots waited in their future. Wood smoke mingled with the scent of pigs and sheep, sweat and cooking meat.

When Rathe passed by a pen holding a handful of yaks, he wondered about his fidgety friend Horge who, it had turned out, was a shapeshifter. When Loro had queried about eating yak, Horge had explained that folk prized the wooly beasts’ milk and cheese over their meat. Horge, Rathe expected, was doing fine in his new home of Ravenhold.

Soon after he escaped the market square, the weight of unseen eyes fell on him again, heavier than before. The sensation was so strong that he ducked into an alley beside a cooper’s workshop. A glance over his shoulder showed him nothing, and he fell into a crouch between two wagons loaded with barrels and casks. Looking through the wheels, he watched folk leaving the market square, and others going toward it. Am I imagining watchers?

Rathe stood up and hurried down the alley. He came out on a side street, searched both ways, then headed toward a rutted track that led to the eastern edge of Iceford. Here the forest tumbled down off the snowy feet of the Gyntors, and grew thickly amongst a scatter of hovels. Neither Iceford nor Wyvernmoor, farther east, had defensive walls. With the fall of the once powerful Iron Kings some five hundred years before, the last hostile armies of the north had long since dwindled to nothing. Roving brigands kept to the River Sedge in hopes of finding a grounded barge or river trader. They knew better than to attack villages inhabited by able-bodied woodcutters, miners, and trappers, folk who would dispatch a troublesome sort without hesitation, and then happily dump what was left of the marauder in the forest to feed bears, wolves, or frost leopards.

Rathe kept on along the frozen track until coming to a long, low, weathered-gray building. Iceford’s tannery. Despite the increasing snowfall and the deepening cold, the reek of rotten hides filled the air. The lower, riper stench of urine and dung fermenting in large vats, both used to soften rawhide into leather, made Rathe wish he had chosen a different sort to do his bidding. But Nesaea had told him urchins tended to see more than adults, as their lives very often depended on keen observation. The children he had employed were not the usual urchins found in a city, but dung-gathers serving the tanners.

He angled away from the track toward a stand of firs cut through by a frothy creek, its banks rimed in ice gone a poisoned brown from tanning wastes. The waters burbled by, taking their befouled load around Iceford, and emptying it into the River Sedge well downstream from the village. There was no sign of those he sought, so he waited.

Stiny came alone, a young boy of twelve years or less carrying a wooden bucket loaded with dung. Had it been high summer, doubtless flies would have plagued him. Now only the stench of his burden perfumed the frosty air. Short and skinny as he was, the ratty collection of moth-eaten wool he wore as a coat made him look as if he were wearing an older brother’s clothes.

Rathe glanced around. “Where are the others?”

Stiny dropped his bucket and gave a languid, one-shouldered shrug. “Berry had to go fishing with her da,” he said, speaking of the young girl with the large red wen growing on her chin. “An’ last night, Amers tried to steal a stew bone back from a bastard of a cur-dog and got bit-lost a finger, he did.” Stiny wiggled his little finger to indicate which one. “Helmund … well, he says you’re naught but a lack-witted arsehole, if you think shadows are after you. He wants no part.”

Rathe took no offense. “Then I take it you haven’t seen any shadows?”

“Oh, I see ‘em all the time.” Stiny rubbed a hand through his tangled nest of wheat-colored hair, making it stand up in greasy knots. “Course, they ain’t really shadows, so much as folk who think if they stay in the dark, no one will know what they’re up to.”

Rathe’s interest sharpened. “Who?”

Stiny bobbed his head. “Nina the cobbler’s wife, for one. She creeps out after most decent folk are abed, and then sneaks like a cat all the way across the village to Aeril’s shack-he’s a woodcutter. By all Nina’s moaning and crying when she’s there, Aeril must be a mean whoreson.”

Rathe hid a smile. Nina, the cobbler’s cuckolding wife, was of no interest to him. By Stiny’s smirk, Rathe suspected the boy also knew what Nina was up to at the woodcutter’s shack. “Nothing else?”

Stiny’s face screwed up in concentration. “Morning before last, I saw a few strangers. I’d judge they’re too stupid to be dangerous.”

Rathe was not so sure. King Nabar had put quite the reward on his head, and that much gold would tempt all manner of bounty hunters. “What did they look like?”

“Outlanders from the south, like most outlanders hereabouts. I’d guess they’re merchants.”

“Why?”

“They’re too well-fed, and their clothes are too fine, to be otherwise,” Stiny said, casting a pointed glance at Rathe’s garb.

Rathe had seen many mercenaries and men who earned their way collecting bounties. These strangers didn’t sound the sort. Likely, Stiny had the way of it.

“So, you haven’t seen anything else I should know about?”

“You mean to say shadows?” Stiny asked, a hint of a smile turning his lips.

“Strange shadows, boy, those shaped like men, but when you look at them, they vanish.” Fear hones a man to his sharpest. That was something the mysterious swordsman had said once, and Rathe believed it. But at Ravenhold, it was he who had put fear into the Shadowman’s heart. From what little he had gathered of the man’s ways, Rathe suspected the fellow hadn’t enjoyed the reversal. In time, he would come again.

“Shadows shaped like men?” Stiny offered another lopsided shrug. “Ain’t seen nothin’ like that. An’ the only strangers in Iceford besides merchants are you, your friends, an’ a few sailors off that accursed ship.”

The Lamprey had gotten a reputation for bad luck around Iceford, but Rathe was sure Captain Ostre’s troubles had nothing to do with luck, good or ill.

Rathe rummaged through his purse until he found a silver coin. It was ten times the amount he usually paid Stiny and his friends, but theirs was necessary work that he greatly valued. He held it out, and Stiny wrapped his grimy fingers around the coin with a comical look of awe.

“You’ve done well,” Rathe said.

“For this much, I s’pose I could find a man or three who’d poke a knife into any shadow that troubles you.”

Rathe went still, mind working. It took less than three heartbeats to decide how best to keep Stiny from doing something that might get his throat slit.

“Keep the coin for yourself, boy, for there’s no more coming. Forget about shadows, forget about me. You’ve done all I asked, and our arrangement is finished.”

With a final shrug, Stiny collected his dung bucket and headed toward the tannery. Looking after him, Rathe shouted, “If you see a shadow, especially one that looks like a man, you run.”

Stiny turned a little, waved a dismissive hand. “Shadows are everywhere,” he said, grinning wryly. “I’ve one, an’ so do you. Every man casts a shadow. To run from them all would make for a pair of awful tired legs.”

Rathe found himself hoping Nesaea was right about the craftiness of such children. After the boy disappeared into the tannery, Rathe made his way back through Iceford, hurrying to another appointment.

Chapter 4

Master Abyk, renowned as the finest tailor in Iceford, and a better than average armorer in a former life, used his hand to slash a few errant white hairs back from his wrinkled brow and gave his handiwork a critical glare.

Rathe had never been knowledgeable of fashion, but in his estimation, the garb Loro wore had looked better before he stretched it over his girth.

“We must start over,” Abyk said after a long consideration, and reached for a measuring string tucked into a pocket of his woolen vest.

Looking put out, Loro fingered one of six straining buckles on his new jerkin, the front and back of which were covered in burnished steel scales. Rathe decided it was best not to tell his companion that he resembled a gleaming, overfed trout.

“What did you do wrong?” Loro asked.

At Abyk’s pained look, Rathe spread his hands in sympathy. He was more than satisfied with his own clothing. It was not nearly as extravagant as Nesaea preferred, but he had been a soldier too long to change. His heavy woolen coat was red, and the shirt beneath it brown linen and plenty warm. His leather trousers and stout boots, both lined with wool, were black. Simple garb, if better than what most of the folk of Iceford wore.

“I made no mistakes,” Abyk said, scowling more fiercely than ever. “The problem isn’t with my workmanship, but with you. You’re built all wrong, and-” his forefinger circled around Loro’s prodigious belly “-and exceedingly bloated besides.”

Loro frowned as he scratched his bald head. Generally, he did the insulting. Being on the other end seemed to have fouled his mood. “Listen here, you twiggy little fool, if you want payment, then you’d better make this right.”

“How can I?” Abyk blurted, and promptly jabbed a finger into the bulge of Loro’s gut, making him retreat, eyes wide, mouth opened in shock. The tailor gave chase, every step of the way using his finger like a dagger to prod the portly warrior.

“Your arse is smaller than your belly, which forces your trousers to fall.”

Loro slapped at the man, trying to ward him off. “That’s why I have a belt, idiot!”

Another jab. “Your teats sag worse than my grandmother’s!”

“Teats!” Loro yowled, cupping his hands to his chest. “I’ve the strength of a bull!”

Another poke. “Your legs are stumpy and broad as barrels.”

“You ought to see what’s nested between them, you wilted bastard!”

Another stab, driving Loro into a corner hung with samples of cloth. “Your neck is a flabby pillar of suet.”

“It only looks bunchy because you made the collar too tight, you ham-fisted buffoon!”

This time Abyk delivered a ringing slap to the side of Loro’s skull. “Your head is like a fat, brown egg.”

“What difference does that make? I didn’t ask for a hat,” Loro growled, hauling out his sword and slashing it under the Abyk’s nose. “Now back away, or I’ll chop off that finger of yours, and stuff it up your bony arse!”

Rathe suppressed a chuckle, but chose not to intervene. Presently, Loro didn’t have that particular crazed light in his eye that signaled he was ready to cut a man’s life short.

Abyk danced back. Once he gained a safe distance, he pressed his fists to his hips, looked Loro up and down. With a sniff, he pointed a finger at Rathe. “Your companion is the picture of what you should seek to attain in yourself. He’s lean where he should be, tall and straight, and proportioned after a sculptor’s vision of an ideal hero.”

“My thanks,” Rathe said, bowing to hide a grin from Loro.

“He’s barely off his mother’s teat,” Loro countered. “Why, when I was that young, I looked the same-better, even.”

Abyk eyed him doubtfully.

“Be that as it may, heroes come in different shapes and sizes,” Loro said defensively. “Why, if it weren’t for me, Rathe wouldn’t be standing here soaking up all your sunny praise.”

“That is true,” Rathe admitted. The short of it was, Loro had a knack for showing up when the fighting was at its worst, and he never hesitated to throw himself into the thick of things.

Abyk snorted. “Even so, he’s still more of an ox than a man.”

Loro gave Rathe a bemused look, but in this Rathe could not help him. Truth told, all the fat Loro had lost trekking through the Gyntor Mountains had returned during their time in Iceford. It was not all Loro’s fault, as Fira, the fire-haired Maiden of the Lyre he had reunited with at Ravenhold, took great pains to keep him well fed.

Abyk looked to the ceiling, as if beseeching a helpful spirit stashed in the cobwebby rafters. “How does someone, even with my exceptional skill, change the unchangeable?” He dropped his gaze. “There’s nothing I can do for a … a man-ox, I say. Nothing at all.”

“I don’t need to suffer this horseshit,” Loro snapped, flinging a pair of silver pieces at the tailor and heading for the door. “Come along, Rathe, unless you want to hear more of this wrinkled bastard’s tripe.”

After retrieving his earnings off the floor, Abyk straightened. “If you want miracles,” he called after Loro, “then speak to the gods. Otherwise, find a curtain to wrap yourself in-better yet, a tapestry!”

“Piss on you, your gods, and your drapery!” Loro slammed open the shop door and strode out.

“You must overlook his manners,” Rathe said. “Loro doesn’t look it, but he’s sensitive.”

Abyk folded his arms across his chest and answered with a disparaging grunt.

Outside, the sun had dropped behind the rooftops, and the air was growing chillier by the moment. With most of the day’s chores ended, the villagers had retired to their homes to prepare supper. Rathe’s belly growled at the scents of roasting meat and baking bread. Alert as always for any indication of trouble, he was able to ignore his hunger.

Loro had no such mastery, and he made straight for an open-sided tent set up on the stoop of a butcher’s shop. “Master Kato!” he bawled.

Kato the butcher, caught in the final acts of packing up for the evening, glanced up from a huge cast iron brazier. A lonely haunch of roasted meat hung from a spit over the brazier’s ruddy coals.

“My friends!” the man called, offering Rathe and Loro a toothy grin. He was a huge man, easily twice Loro’s girth and several hands taller, with a mane of greasy brown hair that fell well below his sloping shoulders. “I feared you’d sailed without saying farewell.”

“Never think it, Kato,” Loro admonished, eyeing the spitted meat. “You’re the only merchant in this blasted town I enjoy seeing.”

Kato eyed Rathe and Loro’s new clothes. “You went to see Abyk, didn’t you, even after I warned you against it?”

“Aye,” Loro said ruefully.

“Ah, well, he’s the best tailor in Iceford, so what choice did you have?” Kato put on a broader grin than before. “Here, I’ve something special for you.” He took hold of a cleaver roughly the size of a battle-axe, and began sawing the haunch of spitted meat.

“What is it?” Loro asked, an eager gleam in his eyes.

“Bear seared in a blackberry glaze,” Kato said, thrusting the dripping meat into Loro’s waiting hand.

Loro took a bite, and his eyes widened in ecstasy. “Food fit for gods! Have some, Rathe.”

Seeing the clotted purple smears on Loro’s chin, Rathe declined. “Alas,” he said to Kato, who had already hacked off another chunk of meat, “I’ve already eaten.”

Kato’s grin never faltered. “I’ll wrap it for you,” he said, slapping the meat onto a square of cheesecloth. “’Tis just as tasty when cold.”

While Loro gobbled his food, Rathe fished a few coppers from his coin purse, and dropped them into Kato’s waiting hand.

“I’ll take that,” Loro said, snatching the packet of meat from the vendor.

“Just so!” Kato said, chuckling. “Just so! Be sure to come back on the morrow for my frost leopard stew.”

Loro made his promises, and they left a whistling Kato to his tasks.

As they walked along the quiet street, Loro licked his fingers clean. “Much as I appreciate Kato’s skill, I hope to find that Captain Ostre has his ship in order. I was ready to sail from Iceford a week ago. Too cold in these parts for our southern blood.”

“It is at that,” Rathe agreed.

As twilight deepened, Loro weighed the packet of meat in his hand, then unwrapped it. What was to have been Rathe’s meal vanished down his gullet in a few large bites. “Where do you think Nesaea’s sister is?” Loro asked, tossing a greasy bit of fat to a slat-ribbed dog nosing about a midden heap. The dog wolfed it down, then growled at him. In answer, Loro cocked his leg and broke wind, sending the mangy beast running down the alley.

“Seems best to head to Sazukford,” Rathe said, thinking of the last place Nesaea’s half-sister had been. “If necessary, we can call on Lord Arthard, of Dionis Keep.”

“I hope the girl has been sold off before we arrive.”

Rathe gave him a sharp look, and Loro explained further.

“Well, it’s not as if you and highborn get along well. If not for killing Lord Sanouk, we’d not be stuck here in Iceford. You kill another lord, and we might end up running to the far side of the world.”

Rathe could not argue the point. For the last two seasons, trouble with one highborn or another had turned him from being one of the most beloved warriors in Cerrikoth, to a hated and hunted man.

As they moved onto a short street populated with shabby taverns, gaming houses, and brothels, Rathe glanced down an alley and saw a shadow moving within a shadow. His heart sped up, his fist clenched around the hilt of his sword, but he kept walking, as if nothing were amiss.

“Did you see that?” he asked quietly.

Loro looked askance at him before fixing on a group of women laughing raucously on a rickety stoop. They were whores, but dressed nothing like their sisters of the south. The Iron Marches was no place for sheer garments. Here, thick wool hid and warmed flesh, rather than revealed it. Loro’s gaze shifted again, following Rathe’s eyes. The shadows had gone still.

“You’re not still on about that shadowy fellow, are you?”

“He’s still alive,” Rathe said, thinking he must have seen a hunting cat down the alley. “And if he hated me before, he hates me more now that I know his weakness.”

“Don’t fret over that pathetic fool and his fear of the light,” Loro advised. “I expect he scampered back over the Gyntors, and has holed up somewhere to lick his wounds.”

“Pride is a prickly thing,” Rathe said. “I’d wager I stung his sorely.”

They strode past the whores, ignoring their halfhearted invitations. The street slanted sharply downward, taking them toward the quays and the river. The smells of cold moss and old fish grew stronger.

“Have you heard from your spies?” Loro asked, laughter in his voice.

Rathe was not about to argue the merits of employing Stiny and his friends. “None of them have seen anything, save a few straggling merchants and Nina, the randy cobbler’s wife.” He hesitated. “I told them to stop looking.”

Loro nodded approvingly. “First sensible thing you’ve done since we got to Iceford.”

Rathe began to smell tarred pilings about the same time he heard the squeal of pulleys and booted feet clocking over wooden decks, punctuated by Ostre’s curses. A bend in the street abruptly put them in sight of the lone vessel moored at the quays. Dozens of lanterns hung from the ship’s spars, providing light for the bustling crew to coil lines and store cargo about the main deck of the fat-bellied cog.

“Looks like she’s ready to sail,” Loro said.

“The Lamprey has looked much the same for a fortnight,” Rathe said flatly. As far as he could tell, Captain Ostre seemed intent only on keeping his crew busy enough to stay out of trouble.

“Do you have to be so gloomy? We’ve not yet talked to Ostre, and you’re behaving as if he’ll only have bad news.”

Rathe pointed out the captain, standing at the stern and looking up at the naked mainmast. A fierce scowl etched his craggy features, and his curly black beard seemed to quiver. “His expression tells me all I need to know.”

“So he looks grumpy,” Loro observed. “Nothing new there.”

“Maybe not,” Rathe said, now eyeing the sluggish black waters of the river. The lantern-light showed chunks of ice drifting by. There had been no ice the day before.

As they began up the gangplank, Loro called, “Ho the ship!”

Ostre clumped across the deck, looking like a great oaken barrel fitted with stout arms and legs. “Ship! Ship? I’ve shat in buckets with less leaks. My cook can’t keep the food stores from spoiling, though ‘tis cold enough to freeze the teats off a sow. And just today, I find the mainsail rotted, and the spare full of holes.”

“Holes?” Rathe asked.

“Aye, from rats! Rats!” Captain Ostre glared from under the brim of his wide-brimmed felt hat, his brows bushy and black as his beard. “You’d think the canvas had been bathed in honey, the way those vermin went at it.”

“Can it be repaired?” Loro asked.

“Aye, but folk hereabout mostly float log-barges and rafts down to the White Sea. They know little about sailing ships, and have few of the supplies I need. My brother Robere knows a fellow who might have canvas enough on hand to patch the sails.… Abyk by name, tailor by trade.”

Loro groaned, but Oster ignored him. “Worse than the rest,” the captain continued, now looking more uneasy than furious, “the river’s starting to freeze up. Unless we get a warm stretch, we’ve only a few days before the Lamprey is locked in tight till spring.”

Before Rathe could say a word, Captain Ostre added, “Might as well head back to the inn, lads. When the Lamprey is seaworthy, I’ll send a runner.”

Chapter 5

When Captain Ostre had suggested Rathe and his companions lodge at the Minstrel’s Cup, he had held out no hope for decent accommodations. Having spent the first ten years of his life working a croft with his father, and the next twelve years rising through the ranks of the Cerrikothian legions, Rathe was accustomed to sleeping rough, and eating fare better suited to dogs. The few inn’s he had ever frequented were little more than drafty shacks which offered, at best, a place to rest your head without undo fear of having an adder slither into your bedroll.

It turned out that the Minstrel’s Cup far exceeded his expectations. The common room was large, reasonably clean, and two blazing hearths kept the chill of the Iron Marches at bay. The second-floor sleeping quarters were tidy, warm, and appointed with crude but sturdy furnishings. The oversized mallet hanging on the wall behind the bar, which Master Tyron used as a bung-starter and for thumping unruly guests, ensured that his customers never got too drunk or too rowdy.

Loro called to a reedy barmaid to bring ale and a bowl of stew, as soon as he and Rathe entered the Minstrel’s Cup. “If you need me,” Loro said, turning away, “you know where I’ll be.”

“Of course,” Rathe answered, watching his portly friend plod toward a group of rough men dicing in the corner nearest the common room’s narrow stage. Gaming and ale might entice Loro, but Rathe knew his real desire was to sit close to Fira, who was presently singing a bawdy song and dancing a bawdier step for a small crowd of men and women. Each time Fira’s legs flashed from under her snug green silk dress, the audience clapped and erupted with laughing shouts.

They’re starting early, Rathe thought, but knew things would only get livelier as the evening progressed. After nightfall was good and settled in, the normally taciturn village folk would throw off their reservations and join in the singing and dancing.

Rathe sought Nesaea, but didn’t see her. Knowing her, she had already done all the entertaining she intended to do for the day, and was in their room readying herself for supper.

Before heading upstairs, Rathe made his way to the bar, eyes passing over the trappers and miners come to the Minstrel’s Cup for a calmer setting and finer drink than what the taverns nearer the river offered. Most of the folk he saw he knew by appearance, if not by name-folk in Iceford tended to keep to themselves, while at the same time, gleaning everything there was to know about everyone else. Especially outlanders.

Rathe had almost completed his survey, when he spied a corner table surrounded by faces he didn’t recognize. There were six men together, all young, all sporting shaved heads. They look like Prythians, he thought, then quickly amended that. While they were pale-skinned and obviously tall, even while sitting in chairs, they were far more slender than any Prythian he had known. All save one, who had the look and bearing of a fighter, if lacking the scars of one. Their unadorned cloaks were of heavy wool, as were their quilted green vests and brown trousers. He would wager these were the wandering merchants Stiny had mentioned seeing.

Rathe took a stool at the bar and motioned to Master Tryon for a tankard of ale. When his drink arrived in Tyron’s thick-fingered hand, Rathe slid him a pair of coppers-Tyron might not offer whores under his roof, but his drinks were top quality, and cheap.

“Getting colder,” Master Tyron observed.

Rathe sipped the ale. “And Captain Ostre is none too pleased about it.”

The stout innkeeper used a rag to mop a dribble of foam off the blackwood bar, then tucked it back into the apron tied around his ample waist. “Well, Capt’n Ostre need not fret overmuch about the cold-not for a few more days, at least.”

Rathe took another sip, eyebrows raised in question.

Master Tyron tugged his rag free again, swabbed another spot. “Storm’s comin’. Feel the damp of it in my bones, I do. Be wet and muddy, come morning.”

“Do your bones say how long the storm will last?”

“They’re mute on that, lad-” Tyron rapped his knuckles against his skull “-but this old chunk of wood’s been around enough years to know late autumn storms have a way of stayin’ on a goodly stretch. Snow’ll fall deep in the high country, but in these parts, it’ll be naught but rain and slush for days and days, till you think winter passed us by and spring’s returned. After that, the cold’ll sweep in, bringing snows that’ll stay until you’re mad from all the endless frozen white of it. If Capt’n Ostre ain’t on his way afore true winter sets in, why, he won’t be on his way at all. Though, I can’t say as I’d be opposed to that.”

“No?” Rathe asked, finishing off his ale and wiping his lips.

Master Tyron nodded in Fira’s direction. She had given up dancing for a chair and a lute. “That lass and Nesaea have brought in more coin than I usually see in a year. Hate to see ‘em go.”

“I’ll miss you too, Master Tyron,” Rathe said, laughing.

The innkeeper gave Rathe a familiar clout on the shoulder. “Lad, you know if I needed someone to tame a few scoundrels, I’d call on you and Loro straight off.”

Rathe nodded, but his mind had shifted. “Seems Fira has brought in a few new faces,” he said mildly, cocking his head toward the men in the corner he had seen earlier.

“I’d name ‘em young adventurers,” Tryon said.

“Why is that?” Rathe asked, curious. As far as he knew, he had never actually met an adventurer.

“You can tell by those fancy clothes they wear. Like as not,” Tyron said in a conspiratorial whisper, “they’re noble brats up from south of the Gyntors-Qairennor, mayhap, pale as they are. I’ve seen it before. They get bored dandling wenches on their knees, get tired of buying up baubles in the city, and set out on nonsense quests. Mostly, I think they’re just looking for wenches who’ve never heard their lies.”

Having considered their garb rather drab, Rathe self-consciously fingered his new garments. Master Tyron saw him.

“Didn’t mean no offense, lad,” he said hastily, as if mortified by his flapping tongue. “I’d expect a man who’s walkin’ about with a lass as comely as Nesaea to dress in his finest. But, as you can see, those peacocks yonder ain’t got no women. Far as I can tell, they’re not lookin’ for any.”

“No offense taken,” Rathe answered, noting how the men in question had put their heads together over the table, and were speaking with quiet urgency. After a moment, one of them gestured sharply, and they all sat up, eyes downcast. The one who had gestured sipped from something-a tiny golden flask, Rathe thought-and his face twisted into a hellish grimace. Between scrubbing his lips with the back of one hand, and tucking the flask under his cloak with the other, he glanced toward Rathe. He froze when their eyes met, looking startled, then looked away. He must have said something, because his companions abruptly shifted their chairs about until he was almost lost from sight. Rathe swept his eyes toward Fira, as if looking at her had been his intention all along.

“How long have they been here?” Rathe tried for a casual tone, but heard an edge in his voice, felt a tightness in his posture. Whether they were wandering merchants or adventurers, these fellows might be the reason he had felt eyes on him all day.

“Since noontime, or thereabouts. Come to think on it, they’ve been nursing the same ale I give ‘em two hours gone. If they’re highborn brats, they must’ve spent all their coin.”

“No one spends so foolishly as a highborn or his brat,” Rathe agreed with a rueful smile.

“There’s the truth,” Master Tyron laughed. “S’pose if they’re still here on the morrow, I’ll warn ‘em they ought to head back to wherever they come from, afore their stones turn black with frost and drop off.”

Rathe laughed too, but there was no laughter in his heart. During the moment it took to glance at Fira and back, the stranger he had locked eyes with had vanished. He searched the common room, but the man was nowhere in sight. Rathe thought first of the Shadowman, but quickly dismissed the idea. The two men looked nothing alike. His next thought was that the stranger had left to relieve himself. Possible … even likely, Rathe considered, but how did I miss seeing him go?

After begging leave from Master Tyron, Rathe slid off his stool and made for Loro. He walked at an unhurried pace, shamming interest in Fira’s newest song, and offering greetings to a few regular customers he and Loro had gotten to know.

When he reached Loro’s side, he leaned over and whispered, “There are strangers here, and they seem too curious by half.”

“I saw them,” Loro whispered back, then laughed uproariously, as if Rathe had just told a fine joke. Wiping false tears from his eyes, he warned, “Could be King Nabar’s men.”

“They don’t have the look of common bounty hunters,” Rathe said quietly.

“Might be they’re new to the game.”

“Just so,” Rathe allowed, but didn’t quite believe it.

Loro laughed again, but this time his mirth was real. “We ought to take them out back and work the truth out of them.” Not only was the fat man clever, he took immense pleasure in cracking heads, which explained why he had made a fine soldier-at least until his penchant for causing trouble had put him on the same path as Rathe.

Rathe knew questioning the strangers was exactly what they should do, but hearing it spoken aloud, envisioning the bloody outcome of such a confrontation, gave him pause.

“For now, just keep an eye on them.”

Loro looked disappointed. “Are you sure?”

“As much as I can be,” Rathe said, not sure of anything at the moment, especially why he resisted what instinct told him he must do.

“Good enough,” Loro said, rattling a cup of bone dice at the insistence of his opponents. They were a surly lot, clad in rank, untanned furs, but with Master Tyron about, they minded their manners.

Rathe left them to their game.

At the top of the stairs, he came face to face with the vanishing fellow. Even as Rathe’s hand tightened on the hilt of his sword, the man caught his arm and leaned in close.

“I’m Edrik, a vizien priest of the Munam A’Dett Order. You must come with me.”

Putting on an apologetic smile, Rathe extracted himself from the man’s grasp. “I’m afraid I’ll have to disappoint you.”

Unbelievably, the fool drew a dagger. Its blade was clean and bright, with golden crossguards fashioned after a winged serpent.

Rathe set his feet. “Unless you intend to clean my nails, you’d best put that pretty blade away.”

“You must come with me,” Edrik insisted. Sweat beaded on his brow and upper lip. That didn’t settle Rathe’s mind a whit. The most dangerous men he had ever faced were the nervous ones. They tended to do stupid things, heedless of their own safety.

“Why must I come with you?” Rathe asked, his tone reasonable, as if he might consent.

The dagger lowered a bit. The man licked his lips. “You’re known as the … the Scorpion, yes?”

Rathe schooled his face to calm, but his blood went to ice. It seemed this fellow was not a merchant, adventurer, or even a priest, but rather a bounty hunter. “You’re mistaken, friend. I’m only a traveler seeking to return to warmer lands before my balls freeze solid.”

Edrik gawped at him with sheeplike stupidity. “But … you must be the one I seek. The Oracle described you, foretold where you would be. Please, you must come with me.” He cut off, licked his lips. “If you do not, many thousands will perish. You are the hope of Targas.”

That set Rathe back a step, but he recovered quickly. “I do not know this Scorpion, but I ceased being the hope of anyone or anything some time ago. I suggest you tell your fellows, and this Oracle, that you should save yourselves, and leave me be.”

A stubborn look crossed the man’s face. “You will come with us.”

Rathe shrugged. “Since you put it that way….”

The instant Edrik’s face relaxed, Rathe caught his wrist and bore down with all the strength of a swordsman who had spent most of his life swinging killing steel. With a strangled whimper, Edrik’s fingers sprang open, and the dagger popped free. Rathe plucked the weapon out of the air, twirled it against his palm, and presented the hilt to the priest.

Still holding the fool’s wrist, Rathe said, “Take this knowing I could’ve buried it in your heart. As it happens, I’m feeling benevolent today-now there’s a priestly term, yes?” The man nodded, hesitantly reached for the dagger, but Rathe drew it back. “Come at me again, and you’ll learn that all the gold in the world cannot buy back your life.”

The man stared in confusion. “The Munam a’Dett has no need of gold. We only seek your help.”

Rathe decided then that the man truly was a priest, and was glad he had decided not to kill him. Helping Edrik, though, was out of the question. “Take yourself and your friends out of Iceford, and go back to Targas, or wherever it is you really came from. What you seek is not worth the price you’ll pay to have it.”

Rathe dropped the dagger and shoved Edrik aside, every muscle tensed to strike, every sense alert for a sign that the man had ignored his advice, and was coming after him.

Before he reached the door to his room, he heard clattering footsteps descending the stairs. Some fools can learn, he considered, and breathed easier for the first time in days. He had been jumping at shadows and looking for trouble that, save for Edrik and his band of idiots, had refused to show itself. Perhaps he really had escaped King Nabar’s bounty hunters and, too, the Shadowman.

He reached for his door, but found it standing open a crack. Neither he nor Nesaea ever left without closing it. His sword flashed out, all his good thoughts blowing away like ashes. Rathe slammed open the door and dropped into a guarded crouch, sword poised.

Instead of an intruder, he found Nesaea sitting on a cushioned chair, her legs crossed. She was facing partly away from him, peering into a small mirror hanging on the wall. She held a hairbrush frozen in mid-stroke through her fall of dark waves. She was also completely naked.

“Gods, woman,” he growled, shutting the door behind him. Without taking his eyes off her, he ran the bolt home. “I could’ve been anyone bursting in here.”

She finished pulling the brush through her hair, and then placed it on a low dresser. “Not unless that ‘anyone’ could mimic your footsteps,” she said, voice husky.

He thought to tell her about the foolish young priest, but when she stood up, his mouth became too dry for words. Before she could take a step toward him, he set his sword aside and went to her.

Chapter 6

Caught in a pleasant and satisfied reverie, Rathe slowly ran his hands along the smooth length of Nesaea’s legs, one settled on either side of his waist. His caress continued over the narrow flare of her hips. Her breasts seemed to float before his eyes. He reached out, cupping them in his palms. At his light touch, she rocked gently, a wicked smile playing over her lips. A ripple worked its way from his belly to his loins, and he bit back a groan.

She abruptly sat up straight and pushed her hair back over her shoulders, her smile widening. “We’ve only just finished, and you’re ready again?”

Looking into her violet eyes, he matched her grin. “You give me little choice.”

“You must forgive me,” she said playfully, her breath coming quicker, her rocking more insistent.

“Of course,” he said, pulling her down for a lingering kiss that gave rise to many more.

Sometime later, they were both lying crosswise on the bed, Rathe on his back, and Nesaea on her side with one leg thrown over both of his.

“I could get used to all this lolling about,” he said.

“Is that what you call this?” Nesaea asked, running her fingertip around one of his nipples.

Laughing, he caught her hand and kissed the palm. “Gods, woman, do you ever stop?”

“I was merely getting ready for dinner, when you barged in and threw yourself at me.”

“I’d say you laid a trap for me … unless most women are given to sitting naked in cold bedchambers while brushing their hair?”

She laughed.

“So you did lay a trap for me?”

“I suppose I did.”

“As far as ambushes go, yours was not half bad.”

“I deserve more praise than that,” she said, her fingertip now tracing a scar angling across his chest.

He tried to remember how he had gotten it, but each time he reached into his mind to pluck out a particular battle or face, they all converged on one another.

“So much hurt for one so young,” she said distantly.

He turned his head, eyes wandering over her own marks of past pains. Before she had founded the Maidens of the Lyre, Nesaea had been sold into slavery. She had told him very little of the abuses she suffered as a pleasure slave in Giliron, but he knew those wounds were deeper than any made by a sword. “Seems I’m not alone.” He hesitated, then asked, “Does it ever end?”

She met his eyes. “The pain?”

Rathe looked back to the ceiling. “Not just pain … but all that causes it.” After the silence stretched long, he began to fear what she might say, so he abruptly changed the subject.

“It seems we’ll not be sailing for a few days,” he said, and told of Captain Ostre’s problems with the Lamprey. Then, still trying to keep from going back to his vague, yet unsettling question, he said, “Stiny and the others haven’t seen anyone suspicious around the village, so I paid his final wages and told him to stop looking.”

“Perhaps that’s for best,” she said. Like Loro, Nesaea was of the mind that after Rathe had bested the Shadowman at Ravenhold, he had fled.

“I think so, too.” He didn’t tell her that Stiny had offered to find him an assassin.

Nesaea propped herself up on one elbow and peered intently at him. “You never let me answer you.”

“I’m not sure what I was asking, so maybe you shouldn’t.”

“I want to.”

“Very well,” he sighed, but she remained silent for a time.

“Every day begins a new round of battles,” she said at last. “Not all of them are bloody or painful, but they are battles nonetheless.”

He could agree with that, but the idea of such endless struggle wearied him. “What if we choose not to fight?”

“Some folk can decide to flee their troubles, but your troubles cannot be outpaced.”

“Because of the Black Breath,” Rathe said. He had never believed in demons harboring in folk, until he had seen the Khenasith with his own eyes.

“Once the demonic spirit of the Khenasith has chosen its quarry,” Nesaea said, “it feeds off the misery inflicted upon its prey.”

Rathe shuddered at the memory of that creature of smoke, with its horned head covered by four ghoulish faces. He saw again how it had ripped free of the woman who had briefly taken it from him in a bid to tap the demon’s power for her own ends. Yiri, Horge’s sister, had been little more than a waif, but she had also been a born witch. The powers she sought to hold had ultimately destroyed her. Afterward, the demon had returned to Rathe, making his soul its home.

“I turned my back on a fight today, if not a true battle,” he said, frightened and exhilarated at the same time. Nesaea gazed silently at him, and he added, “Just before I came to you, I met a man, Edrik, some priest or other. He wanted me to come with him. When I told him no, he drew a dagger, and I took it away. I itched to plant that blade in his heart…. Instead, I let him go. I let him live.”

She touched his face, her fingers cool and soft. “It’s good that you denied the Khenasith its desires, but the demon won’t always allow you to do so.”

“I know,” Rathe said just above a whisper, imagining he could feel the demon’s ire building in his heart.

“I have something for you,” Nesaea said at length.

“A gift?” Rathe asked, surprised.

“Yes … but after what you told me, I’m not sure I want to give it.”

He laughed wryly. “There’s nothing you could give me that I would not want.”

“Very well.” She bounded off the bed and padded lightly to the wardrobe shoved against one wall.

He watched the sway of her hips. She cannot help but dance wherever she goes, my goddess of snow and silver. He tried to look away when she opened the doors and bent to root about on the lower shelf, but his eyes had a will of their own.

“Here it is!” she announced, spinning with a scabbarded sword held in her hands. He guessed her delighted expression had more to do with catching him looking at her, than with the weapon she held. Trapped me again. He smiled, because her traps were hardly traps at all.

As she came back, Rathe sat up, curious.

“I had it forged for you,” she said, holding out the sword. “Captain Ostre might count it bad luck that we’ve stayed in Iceford this long, but for me it’s been a blessing.”

The scabbard was of tooled black leather covered in intricate silver filigree. He gripped the leather-wrapped hilt above a silver crossguard fashioned into a pair of scorpions locked claw-to-claw. With a soft whisper of steel sliding over leather, he drew the burnished blade. The edge was free of nicks and deadly bright, and an etched chain of scorpions marched along the length of the fuller. The balance of the weapon was perfect. The sword was masterwork, making his previous weapons seem like crude utensils. It was also of virgin, unblooded steel. He wondered how long it would remain so.

“I can never repay such a gift.”

“I can think of a few ways you can try,” Nesaea said, joining him on the bed.

Rathe hid his smile. It seemed that she had fallen into his trap.

Chapter 7

Cloaked by a heaving and unnatural darkness, Algar’s lips twisted as the sounds of lovemaking began again, thrusting through the wooden door and into his ear like a cold dagger. His thin lips contracted in disgust. Do they ever stop?

He had trailed Rathe for years, ever waiting for the right moment to strike. As such, he knew well the man’s penchant for tumbling any woman foolish enough to have him. Nesaea, Rathe’s current wench, was mistress of an entire troupe of likeminded sluts who concealed their true purpose behind singing and dancing. She apparently didn’t mind that the once esteemed Rathe Lahkurin had fallen so low as to be considered a common brigand in his homelands.

But then whores were whores, and cared only for the coin they earned in pleasuring men. This Algar knew all too well, having suckled milk from the teat of a common slattern-his mother.

Kill ‘im, Algar, her warbling, wine-soaked voice crooned in his mind. Stray thoughts never failed to summon his dear dead mother. Carve ‘is heart an’ have yer revenge, boy. Slaughter him and the whore he’s plowin’! Do it now!

Algar gripped the hilt of his sword. The shadows around him boiled and pulsed, provoked by his hatred for both his mother and Rathe.

Do it, Algar!

Teeth grinding, he drew the blade an inch from the scabbard. He sucked in a breath and prepared to pass through the wooden door as easily as a ghost. Such was the gift of the dark magic nested within his flesh.

No more waitin’, boy!

Algar envisioned himself materializing in his enemy’s room from a cloud of shadow. He saw Rathe and Nesaea’s gasps of shock when they recognized him, the one they had named the Shadowman.

Now, boy!

A whine of tortured ecstasy squeezed from his throat, as he pictured Rathe and Nesaea’s astonishment become agony when he impaled them upon the length of his blade. Both at the same time! Two with one deadly thrust! Rathe and his filthy slut!

Do it, boy!

Algar saw them die in his mind, their corpses bound together by blood, steel, and the issue of their loins.

Now! his mother howled.

The spent breath burning in Algar’s chest burst out of him, cold now, foul, acrid. I cannot! He slammed his sword home. The shadows grew still as frozen smoke. Rathe will die, Algar promised the unrelenting harpy that had birthed him into such a detestable world, as will his whore … in time. But not yet. No, no, not yet.

When will you act, you pissin’ wretch? asked his mother. Though she was long dead, Algar hated her as much as he ever had, maybe more, as her spirit was with him more now than she had ever been in life.

Soon, he answered.

Soon? How soon? How soon afore you stop shittin’ down yer leg whenever tha’ black-hearted monk says you must, boy? How soon afore you stand on yer own, and do wha’s yours by right to do?

Algar tensed at the mention of his current accomplice. Jathen doesn’t command me.

Well then, you mus’ be affrighted, boy. Affrighted the Scorpion’ll beat you a third time … and mayhap that’d be for the best.

Algar ignored her last slight. First Rathe must know who will kill him and why … the Scorpion must acknowledge who is the better of us … the Champion of Cerrikoth must admit that he took for himself what was mine! And when he does, I’ll make him watch as I slaughter his whore, so that he feels the loss I felt at his treachery.

You been makin’ the same promise for years, Algar. Methinks fear stays yer hand. As the boy was, so now is the man-a snivelin’ coward. Tha’s why you failed to cleave the Scorpion’s stinger not once, but twice, and tha’s why you stand here shakin’ now.

No.

No?

No! Algar screamed in his mind. He cheated me of my honor and the king’s blessing! He took everything from me!

Even now, years after their first meeting-a meeting Rathe no doubt didn’t recall-and long before hounding him over the Gyntors and crossing blades with him in the halls of Ravenhold, Algar could still hear the roaring jubilance of the crowd, could still feel the shame of defeat while lying in the shadow of the man who’d humiliated him. Rathe Lahkurin, with his upraised sword glittering in the summer sun, turning slowly before the King of Cerrikoth and the folk of Onareth. He was only boy then, as was I. The sharpest memory of that day was the cocky victor’s smile that had spread across Rathe’s lips when he leaned over Algar, hand outstretched like a father reaching to lift his fallen child.

Taking my glory was not enough! Algar seethed. No, the bastard had to twist the dagger of disgrace by shaming me in front of his legions of admirers … in front of the king … in front of the entire realm … even in front of you, mother!

Hard, that’d be, his mother snickered, as I was naught but bones an’ dust by then. You mus’ remember that, don’t you, m’sweet boy-

Leave me!

For a wonder, she did go, though he sensed her mirth waiting to bubble to the surface. Most times, she refused to leave him in peace, choosing instead to squat in the back of his mind like some humpbacked fiend, endlessly prodding him, endlessly belittling him. He hated her, wanted to kill her again, a thousand more times and in a thousand different ways-

Behind the door, Nesaea let out a soft cry of pleasure. Guts churning, Algar edged back, his face knotted like a fist.

As a child in various flesh-houses of Onareth, Algar had had no choice but to listen to his mother’s false cries as strangers labored between her legs. Sometimes after those men spilled their seed, they would then defile him. A shiver of remembered pain and humiliation gripped Algar’s lean frame, for that was not the entire truth. Rather, his mother had coaxed a few more coppers from the purses of those men by offering up her son to use as they wished.

Sneaking footsteps coming up the stairs dragged a startled hiss through Algar’s teeth. Still cloaked within shadows, he wheeled in absolute silence and merged with the natural shadows farther down the hallway.

He squatted on his heels, the fingers of one hand parting the collar of his tunic to touch the source of his power, a cloudy gray gemstone the size of his fist, sunk deep into the raw meat and knitted to the fractured bones of his chest. A necromancer living amongst the highest crags of the Mountains of Arakas had placed it there at great cost, but Algar had never considered the price anything less than a bargain.

Marking the approaching footsteps, he muttered arcane words he had engraved upon his heart and mind. The hue of the Spirit Stone changed to charcoal shot through with veins of red and gold. It grew warm within his breast, then hot, then blistering. He felt himself changing, becoming less than flesh and blood, less even than air.

A scream of torment clogged the back of his throat as the searing fires spread, filling him up until he thought he must soon burst into flame. When the agony had stretched him to the limits of endurance, the stone went as cold and gray as a chunk of dirty ice. He let out a panting gasp and lifted his head.

The details of the hallway remained unchanged, but all was darker to his eyes, as if a thunderhead had blotted out the light of day.

And he was no longer alone.

Hidden as he was between two worlds, he saw spirits flitting through the walls, floor, and ceiling. The gossamer figures, their distorted features smudgy and smoke-gray, ignored him as always. In this place between life and death, what the necromancer had named the Zanar-Sariit, Algar was not truly dead, nor was he truly alive, yet he could pass through the worlds of each, as if he were both. The necromancer had warned him that the Zanar-Sariit was a dangerous place to visit often, unless you fancied losing your soul. Yet Algar had never felt threatened here. If anything, the between realm was the only place he had ever know true peace.

Invisible and untouchable to the dead and to the living alike, Algar watched a pair of shave-headed men in thick brown cloaks creep up the stairs, unaware of the roving spirits passing through them.

Algar instantly recognized the fellow who had named himself Edrik. He had been waiting for Rathe when Algar came out of the Zanar-Sariit earlier. Edrik had babbled some nonsense tale about needing help. When Rathe denied him, the fool had drawn a dagger. Rathe had easily disarmed the youth. If Edrik was a bounty hunter, Algar judged that no man had ever been more ill-suited to the task. Instead of cutting Edrik’s throat, Rathe had let him go. During his years of hunting the man, Algar had seen his rival slaughter many foes without hesitation. He supposed mercy, just this once, had stayed the Scorpion’s sting.

Mercy is for fools, Algar thought, watching Edrik fish a small golden flask out of an inner pocket of his cloak, pull the stopper, and take a sip. Grimacing, he handed the flask to the hulking man beside him. Of the pair, the second looked a man suited for battle. But when he drank from the ornate flask, he grabbed his belly and bent double, gagging like a boy taking his first taste of wine.

Algar’s stifled chuckle died when the two men began to grow dim, insubstantial. Soon, they had vanished entirely. For a moment, Algar feared they would emerge within his refuge, but they never did. They were simply gone.

After a few anxious moments, his fear abated, replaced by covetous admiration. Now that’s a trick worth having! But where did they get off to?

His eyes narrowed when a linty ball of dust skittered down the hall, as if disturbed by an errant breath of air. What’s this? Before the thought was complete, something unseen squashed the fluff against the wooden floor. Algar blinked in amazement. The two men hadn’t gone anywhere, but had become transparent. Unlike him, it seemed they had no need to lurk within shadows. What other tricks do they have?

“You’re sure this is the room, Edrik?” a gruff voice whispered.

“I’m no fool, Danlin.”

“Never said you were, but mistakes happen.”

“Not this time,” said Edrik.

Algar marked their progress by their voices and the way the grit on the floor shifted at their passage. They halted at Rathe and Nesaea’s door. If he acted swiftly, Algar knew he could kill them and take their potion for himself. Yet if he did that, doubtless the bustle would alert Rathe. Also, in killing the two, he would rob himself of finding out where the potion had come from, and how to acquire more.

“We should kick in the door and take him,” Danlin said.

Having survived his first encounter with Rathe, it seemed Edrik was more cautious. “I’d rather persuade him to join our cause. If we hold him against his will, he’s not likely to help us. We must convince him.”

“You tried that already. As I recall, you’re lucky he didn’t kill you.”

“I’ve no fear of death at his hands,” Edrik said, his confidence sounding forced.

A pause. “A foretelling from the Oracle?”

“As befitting his station, Quidan Salris never reveals all of the Oracle’s tellings to Essan Thaeson, but our master was able to glean enough for us to find Rathe. More than that, I looked into Rathe’s eyes, and it was not my death I saw.”

“Well,” Danlin said dubiously, “now that we’ve found him, and he’s refused you once already, how do you plan to ‘persuade’ him to come to Targas?”

Another pause.

Algar waited, scarcely breathing.

The thin layer of dirt outside Rathe and Nesaea’s door scuffed about. Behind the door came soft, breathless laughter.

“Can you hear them?” Edrik asked.

“I’d rather not,” Danlin said. “But, yes.”

“Have you seen the way they look at each other?”

“I have, but I cannot see how that helps us.”

“Love, Danlin, is a potent tool.”

A gasp. “You don’t mean to…?”

“I’ll do whatever it takes, Danlin. We all must. This man, the Scorpion, has given us no other choice.”

“I suppose.”

“Come, Danlin, we must prepare.”

Algar waited until the sounds of stealthy feet moved off, then touched the cool gray stone buried in his chest. With a thought, he sank through the floor, shadows dancing across his vision, until he was standing in a dank storeroom below the inn’s lowest basement. He had no worry of anyone finding him. By the age of the masonry blocking what had been a doorway, and by the dusty bones clad in a man’s rotted clothing in one corner, he guessed murder had been done here, and the storeroom then sealed off for several lifetimes.

Still fingering the Spirit Stone, Algar murmured a different phrase than the one that had brought him into the Zanar-Sariit. The stone went cold and colder, freezing his bowels, stiffening his limbs. Gradually, he began to feel the cracked floor tiles under his boots, the familiar heaviness of his body. The iciness fled, leaving him shivering but otherwise unharmed. With his return to the world of his birth, the darkness of the storeroom dropped over him.

Reaching into a pouch at his belt, he withdrew flint and steel, then moved by touch to a fat candle tucked into a small nook in the wall. After a few tries, he sparked the candle wick alight, then collected a coarsely woven sack off a stone shelf. He sat down next to the bones, and propped his elbow on the dusty skull. By the dead man’s gap-toothed grin, he didn’t mind.

Algar swung the leather sack before his eyes. The seeing glass hidden inside was an orb the size of his fist, but it was not made of glass, at least none like he had ever seen. I never should have returned to Skalos, Algar thought. And I never should have taken the glass, or Jathen’s gold.

But he had returned to the mountain citadel governed by the brothers of the Way of Knowing, and he had taken the warrior monk’s tainted gifts. While the Spirit Stone granted him the ability to become the finest thief or assassin the world had ever known, he despised those who practiced such illicit and disreputable trades. He was a man above reproach, a man of honor. As such, he needed honest gold to replace that which he had frittered away while chasing Rathe from one kingdom to the next, from Onareth to Fortress Hilan, and finally across the Gyntor Mountains to Ravenhold. To earn gold in a way he deemed respectable, he’d had no choice but to form a tenuous allegiance with Brother Jathen, which in turn forced him to meld his plans with the monk’s.

I raised you to be more than a puppet-boy, his mother said within his mind.

Always there! Always! Always! Always! Algar ground his teeth together, tamed his silent raving. I was never more than a ‘puppet’ for you to earn a bit more coin.

Does a puppet cut his strings?

This puppet did, Algar thought, a smile tugging his lips. In truth, he had cut more than the imaginary strings his mother had used to make him dance for men who enjoyed a boy’s sweet favors. Isn’t that so, mother? Do you remember how you screamed? Do you remember how you bled … how you burned?

You’re an evil, vicious brat. Always were!

When he sensed her fleeing him, a blurt of harsh laughter gurgled from his throat. The blackest memories of his heart always made the rancorous whore take flight. She would return, she always did, but for now he was alone with a stack of companionable bones.

Algar spilled the cloudy sphere from the sack into his palm, and traced a pattern over the curved edge of the seeing glass, just the way Jathen had shown him.

The familiar low chiming sounded.

“A moment’s peace!” Brother Jathen shouted, spinning away from his map table. Here he was trying to plan a war to ensure Skalos became the rightful seat of power in the Iron Marches, while at the same time nurturing a feeble alliance with a distant king, and his shadowy ally could not leave him alone.

I never should have recruited Algar, he thought, despite knowing he’d had no choice in the matter, not if he was to meet his rather lofty goals.

He marched to one of a dozen wood and glass cases standing around the immaculate chamber, each holding an array of precious weapons and artifacts. He jerked open the door and snatched out the twin to Algar’s seeing glass. Jathen held the milky orb up before his eyes, took a calming breath, and reminded himself again that Algar was very useful, as well as full of secret knowledge.

After speaking at length with Algar, Jathen had concluded that Nesaea, not Rathe, must have been behind the disastrous alchemy that had destroyed the Wight Stone and the Keeper’s Box … along with Jathen’s face.

He resisted touching the hideous pink scar of wrinkled and puckered skin marring half his brow, but he could feel the dead stiffness of that flesh every time he frowned or smiled. When he went outdoors, the northland cold did little to cool the scar’s ceaseless burning. When he was indoors and warm, only copious amounts of wine could sooth the crackling heat that still burned there. The vaults of Skalos had a thousand and a thousand forms of magic locked away in its stony vaults, yet none could alleviate the burning deep in his flesh. Some of his brothers of the Way of Knowing, those who followed the Path of Healing, had tried to tell him the pain was all in his mind, an undying memory. As none of them bore his wounds, he doubted their wisdom on the matter. Since he could hardly stay drunk and still properly perform his tasks, he had learned to bear his suffering in silence.

The low chiming came again from the seeing glass, and a tingling sensation raced through Jathen’s fingers. He bobbled the orb, almost lost hold, then wrapped his other hand around it, forming a tight cage.

Moving back to the map table, he placed the seeing glass on a stand, and sat down. Looking at the pale surface, he could imagine his grim friend within the odd crypt he had taken for his shelter, staring impatiently at his own glass, waiting for Jathen to respond.

For the moment, Jathen resisted. Though he had not yet learned the reason why, he knew Algar wanted to kill Rathe as much as Jathen wanted to make Nesaea suffer for ravaging his face. Unfortunately, that was the extent of his knowledge about the man, which made Algar unpredictable, and that in turn made him dangerous. His ability to become one with the shadows made him more so.

And he is quite insane, Jathen reminded himself, remembering the tightly reined madness in Algar’s eyes the few times he had come to Skalos as a man, instead of as a patch of living shade. If all went well, Algar’s insanity and hatred, guided by Jathen’s expert hand, would serve Skalos splendidly.

But I must have a care, he mused, not for the first time. As a brother of the Way of Knowing, there were many Paths from which to choose. Jathen had chosen to follow the Path of War, so care and caution were traits he had cultivated. Such had kept him alive, and such had placed him ahead of his peers.

The chiming came again.

Now we shall speak, dear Algar, Jathen thought, tracing a rune over the surface of his seeing glass. The mists caught within swirled briefly, then began to clear. Algar’s rather sinister face gradually took shape, framed by crumbly brickwork and hanging cobwebs.

“Algar! How are you, my friend?” Jathen said with practiced cheer, even as he wondered anew at the strange form of magic Algar used to become one with shadows. He suspected it must have something to do with necromancy, as the sorcerers who practiced those foul arts favored anything to do with darkness. One day, you will tell me your secret.

Algar’s jaw flexed, and Jathen thought sure he heard the grinding of teeth. “We’re not friends, monk.”

“More’s the pity,” Jathen said, not meaning it in the least. “So, what news do you have?”

“Same as ever. Time and again, I’ve ensured that the Lamprey cannot sail from Iceford. The last trading vessel departed days ago. Our quarry isn’t going anywhere, until Captain Ostre gets his ship in order.”

“No one has grown suspicious?”

Algar ground his teeth again. “Rathe’s wary, if no one else.”

“Perfect,” Jathen said happily, just to savor the ripple of annoyance that crossed Algar’s face.

“Wait much longer, monk, and you’ll be waiting all winter. I warn you, I will not be so patient. Bargain or no bargain, I mean to have Rathe’s head.”

“And have it you shall,” Jathen said merrily, ignoring the threatening tone. He glanced at his maps, did a hasty calculation. “There’s no reason to delay the Lamprey any longer. Depart Iceford as soon as you’re able. I’ll meet you where we agreed upon.”

“It will take days, perhaps as much as a fortnight.”

“As long as you are there before the Lamprey sails past bearing our mutual acquaintance.”

“Very well,” Algar said slowly. “But I still don’t understand why you want Rathe and Nesaea to leave Iceford, when taking them in the village would be easier.”

Jathen decided to give the man just enough information to appease his curiosity. “The first thing Rathe did when he arrived in Iceford was to hire many spies-”

“Shit gathering urchins,” Algar said dismissively.

“Be that as it may,” Jathen went on, “he might have hired more than you know. Should these unseen friends rise against us, the resulting chaos would prove a hindrance for Skalos and my brothers’ future endeavors. Better that Rathe and his companions come into my hands with none the wiser.”

“Our bargain gives you Nesaea and that redheaded slut-”

“Fira is no slut,” Jathen growled before he could stop himself. He had dreamed of bedding that sultry wench since the day she arrived at Skalos with Nesaea. True, he had willingly sent them off to Ravenhold-and to certain death at the hands of the Lady of Regret-but it had been a choice he always regretted. He could not forget Fira’s witty banter, and the way she had looked so wantonly upon him. That she had survived Ravenhold only made her more desirable. Such a wench as that would bear him strong sons.

Algar smirked. “Do what you want with the women, monk, but remember that our agreement puts Rathe into my hands…. Unless you’re planning to cheat me?”

“Of course not,” Jathen said.

Expressionless, Algar stared at him.

Jathen reminded himself that the man was not like the common scum he usually sent chasing after enigmatic artifacts of a magical nature. Oh no, not at all. This fellow often displayed startling measures of insight, proving he had at least a bestial level of cunning.

“Rathe will be yours to do with as you wish,” Jathen promised, fully intending to keep his word. Of course, at this juncture, his word was no longer final. Certain other interested parties had joined the hunt, and their goals most certainly didn’t match Algar’s. If any tensions resulted … well, that was between them and Algar.

“There’s another matter I must bring to your attention, monk.”

“Pray tell.”

“There are others seeking Rathe.”

Jathen sat straighter. “Who?”

“Strange folk. They have the look of Prythians, but are not.”

Jathen thought a moment, and decided they must be bounty hunters late to the game. “Do they seem formidable?”

Algar snorted. “Not in the least.”

“Be that as it may,” Jathen said, “I charge you with keeping Rathe and his companions out of their hands.”

“So I must protect the man I will soon kill?”

“You will, if you want him to die by your hand.”

“There’s nothing I want more.”

“Then keep him safe, friend. If it serves you better, think of Rathe as a chicken you’ve been fattening up for a fine supper.”

“A chicken?” Algar said derisively. Cold seemed to seep out of the seeing glass, and for a moment Jathen thought sure Algar could see him. He shook that off, knowing only one seeing glass of the pair-his, in point of fact-allowed the user to see as well as to hear.

Algar abruptly nodded. “I’ll do what I must.”

There came a rustling, Algar’s face vanished, and then Jathen was left to sit peering at darkness swirling inside his seeing glass.

Chapter 8

The celebration had escaped the common room of the Cracked Flagon, but still roared up and down the snowy streets of Valdar. Shouts, drunken songs, and laughter seeped through inn’s walls, along with drafts of cold night air. Queen Erryn had feasted her men, but now she was grateful for the relative quiet. Her mind had a will to wander without General Aedran or his captains bothering her with details of the coming march.

Sipping wine that she didn’t need, it struck her that a queen ought to have a bard. She laughed at the idea of having some grinning fool trailing her about, spouting clever turns of phrase.

Breyon shot her a questioning look from across the common room. She shrugged, and he went back to pacing. He was so silent that she had almost forgotten he was there. Crackling flames danced on the hearth, casting his crookbacked shadow across wooden paneling and racks of antlers. The Cracked Flagon was not much in the way of a keep, and its common room sorely lacked the majesty of a proper throne room-or, for that matter, a proper throne-but it was the best Valdar had to offer its first sovereign.

“’Tis not right for you to leave,” Breyon said abruptly, his tone scolding. He showed her about as much respect as General Aedran and the rest of the Prythians, which was to say very little.

That didn’t trouble Erryn anymore, for why should anyone show deference to someone who had not earned it? That was the way of the fat and pampered, those born to power, those who had never earned gold and glory with steel, blood, and sweat. The way she intended to win support harkened back to ancient times, before men had plopped their arses into cushioned chairs and settled pretty crowns upon their heads. As it stood, she didn’t even have a crown. But I will have one, and I will forge it with my own hands.

When Breyon cleared his throat, Erryn turned her mind to what he had said. “I must leave … unless you want to have a weak queen who points and commands, but otherwise never lifts a finger to achieve her desires?” She had spoken slowly to keep her words from slurring, and felt confident she was hiding her drunkenness fairly well.

Breyon mumbled under his breath as he moved to the feast table-not a proper High Table, but three rickety tables pushed together. Her steward searched the confusion of platters, wooden cups, and trenchers. He ripped a drumstick off a decimated chicken, and took a bite with his few remaining teeth. By the time he tossed the bone into the fire, grease shone on his whiskered chin. Wiping his fingers across the chest of his tunic, a ratty thing of patched brown wool, he set to pacing again. Each clumping step swayed hanks of oily gray hair around his long face.

Watching him plod one way, whirl, and come back, made it seem like the room was spinning more than ever. With a groan, Erryn reclined her chair, eyes lidded. She tossed one leather-clad leg up on the table, her foot kicking a bowl of half-eaten stew to the stone floor with a dull clatter.

A pair of wiry-haired dogs crept from the shadows toward the mess. They snarled and snapped at one another, and the larger dog gave ground without much of a fight, its tail tucked between its hind legs. The smaller one watched its beaten adversary with ears pricked, then set to lapping up the stew.

“Is that all it takes to win,” she asked, “be it a battle, or a crown, or a bowl of stew?”

“Eh?” Breyon had returned to the tables, and now held a heel of dark bread. One edge was soggy with wine. The steward took a bite so big he could not close his mouth.

Erryn waved her hand at the smaller dog. “To win followers, wars, whatever else you desire, is courage all you need to beat greater strength?”

Breyon squinted at her, soppy breadcrumbs littering his chest. “Eh?”

“Have the gods struck you deaf, you old fool?”

Breyon swallowed, his throat working convulsively. He managed to get the food down without strangling himself. He looked at what was left of the bread in his hand, made a face, and tossed it aside. “Courage? Strength? What do I know of such things? Till you come along, I was naught but a humble woodcutter and sometime gaoler for Lord Sanouk.”

“The dogs,” Erryn insisted, needing to hear from someone, other than the voices in her mind, that success could be won, if you had courage enough.

Breyon glanced around, baffled. “Dogs? What’ve dogs got to do with anything? They wallow in the shit of lesser beasts, eat their own vomit quick as they gobble what you toss ‘em. Gods protect you if you look to the way of dogs for answers to anything.”

Erryn exhaled a gloomy sigh. If she wanted promises and hope, false or otherwise, she was not about to get them from Breyon. That left the truth. “You said it was not right for me to leave. Why?”

“Well,” he said slowly, “who’s to lead Valdar, if not the queen?”

“Until I return, you’ll lead Valdar. I named you steward, you accepted, and that’s what stewards do. I also leave with you two thousand strong Prythians to secure my holdings. With winter nipping our arses,” she added, trying for a humorous tone, “most likely you’ll spend your days making sure the miners aren’t pilfering any gold they take out of the mountains, and your nights drinking wine and dandling whores on your bony knees.”

Face wooden, Breyon turned back to the fire. “Never led anyone but myself, an’ mayhap an ox or two.”

“And you’ve done well,” Erryn said, aware that instead of receiving assurances, she was doing all the consoling. Maybe, she considered, that was part of being a good queen.

“I’ve you to thank for most all of it.”

“As I recall, you played a part in sacking Fortress Hilan-a large part. I dare say we’d not have won, if you hadn’t led your woodsmen friends to join me, Loro, and Lady Nesaea’s Maidens.”

He shrugged off the praise. “Lord Sanouk was a cruel bastard-evil, if the stories of what he did to those folk down in Hilan’s catacombs are true-and he deserved what he got. Could be that the gods lent me a bit of strength and wits, just to bring him down a notch.”

Lord Sanouk had been brought far lower than a notch, Erryn considered. He was a corpse. And, even if it had been Rathe’s hand that made him so, the Scorpion of Cerrikoth would not have had that opportunity if not for the efforts of others, many who had perished that night.

“The gods might’ve played their part in helping you,” Erryn allowed, “but as I see it, you still have strength and wits enough to secure Valdar while I’m away.”

Breyon shook his head. “I’m just a woodcutter.”

“No!” Erryn said fiercely, sitting up straight and jabbing a finger at him. “You’re Steward of Valdar. If you don’t start acting the part, I’ll have off your manhood, and feed it to yonder dogs.”

He cracked a gap-toothed grin. “I believe you would at that.”

“If I cannot keep my word, I’ll not make much of a queen.”

He bobbed his head in agreement. “Aye, true enough.” A moment later, he grew serious. “You have a care in those accursed mountains.”

“As long as you promise to have a care here.”

Instead of agreeing, Breyon faced the common room’s north wall and raised his gaze toward the ceiling. His wizened face fell slowly, as if he could see beyond the planks and timbers to the Gyntors and all the dark mysteries that crept and crawled amidst their snowy crags, things that could drive a man to madness before devouring him. “May the gods keep you safe,” he whispered.

In the days that followed, Erryn had little time to contemplate the gods or their protection.

Chapter 9

General Aedran shouted into the frigid gale, but the howling winds ripped his words to shreds, and tumbled them away with gleeful menace.

Hunkered as deep as she could get within her hooded wolfskin cloak, Erryn sat her saddle wishing she were still warm and drunk in the Cracked Flagon. “What’re you on about?” she shouted back.

Aedran angled his horse closer to hers and leaned in. “We’ll get through!” His blue eyes burned with irrational confidence. Crusted ice hung from the deep red stubble on his chin, and clods of snow dangled from the fur lining his hood. He looked like a bear risen from its den at the first hint of spring.

Erryn nodded, too cold and weary to contend with the storm. She could not remember the last time she had been able to feel her fingers or toes, but her arse felt like frozen slabs of iron encased in the icy wool and leather of her trousers. The rest of her burned and tingled by turns from the constant touch of frost.

She looked from Aedran to the trail cutting through gorge around them. At dawn, sheer rock walls on either side, hung with beards of ice, had reached high to embrace a pale blue sky. Now the storm concealed everything beyond a few paces in screaming white.

Up ahead, she could just make out the shuffling column of Prythians beating a path through the snow. Eight hundred soldiers, fully three-fourths of the men she had brought with her, walked ten abreast on wide snowshoes. The front ranks wielded flat-bladed shovels. Laboring to a Prythian chant, they scooped the snow and flung it aside, creating berms along either side of the path. Those who trudged behind the first ranks carried stout poles attached to rounded squares of flat iron. Working to the same monotonous chant, the tampers beat down the snow in time with their shoveling brethren, creating a lumpy road. To gain a handful of leagues each day, they worked from first light to well after dark.

Behind Erryn came the rest of the Prythians, those who had worked the shovels on the first day, the iron tampers the second, and on the third day had earned the far easier task of guiding the supply train of four hundred blanketed horses, each harnessed to a sledge heaped with all the army would need to cross the Gyntors. All they would need, that was, if they could cross the mountains in the abysmally short time Aedran had allowed….

“We take longer than a fortnight,” Aedran had warned before setting out, “we will die.” To this, the Prythians had beat their chests with their fists, and roared a challenge to the mountains, as well as to the gods and demons who claimed those crags as their home.

What lives here? Erryn wondered, because thinking of that was better than wondering if her nipples might turn black and fall off from the cold. She had heard many grim tales, but had never believed them. Shadenmok hunted the forested foothills around Hilan and Valdar, a race of she-devils that took the seed of dead men into their wombs and gave birth to Hilyoth, a hellish beast with the form of a hound and the head of an ape. Most folk believed far worse lurked in the high vales of the Gyntors.

“The Gyntors frighten most folk who live in their shadow,” Aedran told her and Breyon. “But don’t fear. We Prythians are born to snow and cold, and our mountains are higher and far more merciless. The elders among my people say the Gray Horns of Pryth are the children of the gods of war and lust, fire and lightning, and that from the craggy loins of those mountains crawled their feebler children-the Gyntors.”

Breyon’s bulging eyes scanned the mountains in question. Their crowns, unusually free of clouds, had been made into ragged pink teeth by the light of the rising sun. If he had anything to say, the fear in him closed his throat.

“Nonsense,” Erryn declared, trying to imagine gods of stone rutting with each other to make what … rocklings?

“Perhaps,” Aedran answered blandly. “Either way, we know many paths across the Gyntors, and also the safest routes around places where men once lived, but where only the dead walk now. Make no mistake, it will be a hard go, for where winter winks and smiles at us here in Valdar, it rages in the high passes.” A dark, taunting gleam came into his eyes then. “Of course, those of my kindred who never returned home are out there still, frozen where they fell, or naught but lumps of dung shat out by whatever ate them.” He roared laughter at that.

Erryn managed a nervous smile that felt like a grimace. “Can you promise to get us across?”

“Aye,” Aedran said, all jesting gone. “I don’t want to freeze, and neither do I care to fill the gullet of some filthy beast … or worse. We’ll follow only the lowest valleys, which are nothing to fear, if you don’t mind a bit of cold….”

A bit of cold, Erryn thought now, squinting against the icy gale. What had decided her before setting out, and what kept her from ordering the column to turn around now, was that if they succeeded in striking Cerrikoth and its sovereign in this most unexpected way, she would never again have to worry about King Nabar and his armies. There would be other enemies, there always were, but Nabar was the most immediate threat. Besides, defeating him in the way she intended would make her a legend-and legends had a way of giving pause to any foe.

Yet first, her and her army must survive the crossing.

The storm grew fiercer every day they traveled. When Erryn lay in her billowing tent after marching all day, wrapped in a dozen blankets and still shivering, her breath turning into a sparkling mist in the light of an oil lamp, she saw herself crossing the mountains and entering the Iron Marches, said to be a great and frozen wasteland beyond the Gyntors. None of the tales of those lands ended with smiles.

One morning when Aedran came to rouse her from her blankets, she asked him about their destination. He cast a look over his shoulder and watched the men preparing to march, then crawled deeper into the tent, and closed the flap behind him. A shadow seemed to smother some of the normal brightness of his eyes.

“The Iron Marches are nothing compared to these blasted mountains,” he said, sounding nervous for the first time since she had met him. Always with Aedran it was charge ahead, laugh in the face of death, and die well. Hearing that hint of unease troubled and angered Erryn.

“You said the Gyntors were the lesser children of the Gray Horns, and nothing to fear.”

Aedran scraped nuggets of ice from the short beard he had started growing. He had to sit hunched over, but his head still brushed the top of the tent. “Aye, I did say that.” He flashed a rueful smirk. “And I hold that my words were true … but the Gyntors are often savaged by the most fearsome storms I’ve ever seen.”

“Maybe if you’d admitted that,” Erryn said hotly, “I’d not have marched my army until spring.”

“By then there wouldn’t be much reason to march anywhere, let alone to the Iron Marches.”

Erryn had been wondering about that, as well. “You also claimed we could trust the report-”

“Mayhap I left out the part about how terrible the storms are,” Aedran interrupted, “but I don’t abide with scaring folk for no good reason. Weather is just weather, sometimes bad, sometimes not, but still just weather. As to the doings of King Nabar, I did not deceive you, nor did the man who sent the message-a man I trust more than any other upon the face of the world.”

“Trust who you will,” she said, “but I want to know why King Nabar-a weak man and a weaker ruler, by all accounts-would act with such boldness?” She realized she should have asked about that long before now, but queenly thinking was new to her. After her father, a woodcutter, had felled a tree on himself, her mother had died of a wasting sickness, Erryn was left on her own to find hot meals and comfortable places to sleep until the day she named herself queen.

Aedran laughed, a deep rich sound that warmed her from the inside out, and brought a flush to her cheeks. “As to Nabar’s way of thinking, it could be the woman he married put a boot to his arse.”

“Mirith of Qairennor?” Erryn knew only that the former princess, and all of Qairennor, had been Cerrikoth’s enemy not a year gone. After the death of King Tazzim, Nabar had taken his father’s throne and ended the long war between Qairennor and Cerrikoth by taking to wife Princess Mirith. “What reason would she have to spur her new husband to such a course?”

“Many of my brothers who’ve sold their blades to the Crown of Cerrikoth all agree that Mirith is a very ambitious woman.”

“That doesn’t explain what King Nabar and his new wife are up to.”

“I couldn’t say,” Aedran admitted. “Highborn do things for their own reasons, and being as they’re highborn, they don’t often feel the need to explain themselves. Rarer still is the fool who questions them. All that need concern you is that King Nabar is acting the fool, and in doing so, he’s given you an opportunity to destroy him.” When she failed to respond, he added, “We’re nearly halfway across the mountains. If you want to surrender and turn around, now is the time to tell me.”

Erryn’s nostrils flared in anger. “Who said anything about surrendering?”

“No one … directly.”

Erryn flung aside her blankets. “I may not know what Nabar intends, but that doesn’t change my plans against him. We go on.”

“As you will,” Aedran said, bowing his way from her tent with exaggerated solemnity.

As soon as she crept from her tent, Aedran had more bad news for her.

“A dozen horses froze in the night,” he called above the wind, “and two sentries have disappeared. Like as not, they also froze.”

Fighting to stand against the frigid blow, Erryn peered at him above her scarf, already crusted with ice. What would a good queen do? What will I do?

At no more than ten paces, the men tending the horses and packing the sledges were slow-moving apparitions. She was tired and cold and hungry, but all she had been doing for days was riding on the back of a horse. Her soldiers had been cutting a path through waist-deep snow and ice. They had earned better treatment than abandonment.

“We must search for the missing men!”

Aedran shook his head. “If they’re not at their posts, and not in camp, then they are lost.”

“How can you know?”

Aedran raised his hands. “If the storm hasn’t buried them in a drift … then something took them. Sending others out to hunt will only end with more missing men. We must to go on.”

“Would you leave me behind?” she snapped.

“As you pay my way, I’d not let you out of my sight.”

“They’re your men-my men!”

“And they died for you here, much as others died for you at Valdar.”

“That’s not the same.”

“Death is death. If it makes you feel better to think they died for a cause, then believe they did so protecting the camp against frost leopards, or mayhap a hunting demon.”

I should never have led them here, she thought with a touch of helpless frustration. Her army had come too far to turn back without running short on supplies, but going forward would only lead to more dead and missing men.

“We have to find shelter!” She might not be a good and wise queen, but she was no fool. If they didn’t get out of the storm, none of them would live to see the Iron Marches.

Aedran laughed. “Unless you can claw a hole into these mountains with your bare hands, how do you expect to find a safe place?”

“There must be something. Even a cave would do!”

“A cave big enough for over a thousand men and near on four hundred horses?” Despite his doubtful tone, something flashed in his eyes, a glimmer of recognition.

A round of muted curses turned Erryn.

Several men were struggling to keep a horse standing upright. The beast tossed it head, stumbled, and crashed over on its side, taking three men down with it. After much effort, the men got back on their feet, buffeted by the wind, swaying with weariness. The downed horse lifted its head once, then gave up the fight.

Erryn spun back to Aedran, but he was still looking at the men and the horse. “There must be some place we can go. If not, we won’t last the day.” She thought about that flicker of recognition she had seen in his gaze, and in her memory heard him telling how best to get over the Gyntors, and something else.

She grabbed his arm with a gloved hand and pulled him around. “You said you knew the safest ways around the places where men once lived. If men ever lived here, they didn’t do so out in the open.”

“I also told you those were places where only the dead walk.”

“But there is shelter,” she insisted. Shadenmok and their savaging hellhounds were creatures to fear, but not ghosts.

He hesitated. “Aye,” he said at last.

“Take us there.”

He pulled away. “Have you heard nothing I’ve said?”

“Obey me, or I’ll find another who will.”

He didn’t bother denying the possibility that one of his men would gladly usurp his position, but his laughter was dry as dust. “You know not what you’re asking.”

“I ask for nothing,” Erryn said. “I am commanding you to help us survive.”

He looked into the howling face of the storm, then shrugged. “Who am I to deny a queen what she wants?” There was wry amusement in his voice, but it failed to reach his eyes.

He’s just cold and tired, Erryn thought, refusing to believe she saw fear in his gaze. “We should also bring the dead horses.”

“Do you wish to honor them for their service?” he scoffed.

“If we’re going to wait out the storm, we’ll need something to eat.”

He gave her a startled look. “You might make a fair warrior queen yet!”

“Only if I survive long enough for anyone to hear of me,” she said, trying her hand at a bit of dire Prythian humor.

“Aye,” he said, without a hint of mirth. That peculiar sheen had come back into his eyes. She told herself again that it could not be fear she saw, but it sounded very much like a lie.

Chapter 10

Captain Ostre sent word that the Lamprey was ready to sail before dawn’s first glimmers began to brighten Iceford. The runner, a rat-faced crewman who introduced himself as Gnat, also let Rathe know that if he and his companions were not aboard within the hour, the Lamprey would sail without them.

“We could use an extra pair of hands,” Rathe said, reaching for his coin purse. Other than the Lamprey’s crew, he had never been around sailors, but guessed such men craved gold as much as any.

Gnat proved him wrong.

“Don’t have a moment to waste toting baggage,” he said, his long nose wrinkled as if he smelled something bad. He drew his hood over his filthy black hair and scurried from the room.

“The rain has given over to snow,” Nesaea said at the window, letting the curtain fall back. She wore a cloak of dark blue wool over green breeches and a voluminous shirt of cream muslin. “I loathe all this cold. Monseriq is never so bitter and wet.”

“I should hope not,” Rathe said. “The Sea of Grelar reaches far south before breaking upon the shores of your homelands. I’d like to see those lands one day.”

“One day soon,” Nesaea agreed.

“First, there’s the matter of finding your sister.”

“Yes, and that means getting free of Iceford and the Iron Marches.”

After squaring their bill with Master Tyron, they hired a pair of his stablemen to load their belongings into a small cart and wheel it through the snow-quieted streets of the village.

Rathe kept a sharp eye along the way to the quays. He saw no one resembling Edrik or the Shadowman skulking about. When he had told the others about Edrik, only Nesaea had seemed troubled, but soon agreed with Loro and Fira that the man had probably been lying about who he was and the reason he wanted Rathe to join him. Rathe had doubts, but he wanted to believe as his friends did. It was too soon to relax, but he felt a loosening of the knots in his shoulders. In a few hours, Iceford would lay leagues behind him. In a few days, the whole of the Iron Marches, and all the troubles these lands had brought him, would fall into memory.

They found the Lamprey’s deck teeming with crewmen. Captain Ostre bawled orders, and his Prythian quartermaster enforced his commands. While Nesaea took Fira below decks-the fire-haired woman had become greener every step closer they came to the ship-Rathe and Loro hauled their baggage to the cramped cabins Captain Ostre reserved for his infrequent passengers.

“A thief would never serve as a porter,” Loro grumbled. “Not unless he’s taking the measure of a future mark.”

Rathe straightened from stuffing a haversack into a compartment under the bed he and Nesaea would share. “You’re not on about that again, are you?” Ever since he had met the man, Loro had yearned for the life of a bandit-king pillaging along the shores of the Sea of Muika.

“Well, I can’t have you forgetting now, can I?” Loro asked, brushing melting snow off his bald head.

“I’m not sure Nesaea and Fira would enjoy that life.”

Loro spread his hands. “I enjoy their company well enough, brother, but those two are the best reason to run away and never look back.”

Rathe arched an eyebrow.

“Just look at us,” Loro said with a scowl, “fetching and carrying like a couple of servants-and that after spending little more than a fortnight with them. Soon, they’ll have us wearing fancy clothes and sniffing pomanders, like a pair of highborn dandies.” He cast a pointed glance at Rathe’s fine wool cloak draped over a red coat fastened with shiny brass buttons.

Rathe rubbed his chin, making a show of considering Loro’s words. “Could be you’re right,” he said in a low voice, as if concerned Nesaea might hear. “And I cannot deny an itch of late to gut someone who wants to gut me-not some crazed witch, mind you, or any freakish beasts, but man against man in a good, clean fight.”

Loro’s eyes lit up. “Aye, brother! We need a proper bit of bloodletting to make us right. We’ll not have any of that while running about with a pair of comely wenches.”

Rathe nodded as though growing excited by the prospect. “I don’t know about you, but all this rich food and wine of late doesn’t satisfy as well as a tankard of pissy ale, a heel of moldy bread, and a trencher full of gristly meat.”

A frown creased Loro’s brow. “Well, now, not all ale tastes of goat piss, and not every meal must be foul.”

“And these beds!” Rathe went on quickly, slapping his hand against the featherbed, which was finer than those in the Minstrel’s Cup. “These will make a man soft as butter. Better to sleep on roots and rocks, or maybe in a damp cave. Such as that makes a man stony, keeps him sharp and ready for all dangers.”

Loro’s frown deepened. “That’s so, but there’s no reason a good thief cannot enjoy a proper bed on occasion.”

“Just so!” Rathe said merrily. “And I ask you, who better to fill that occasional bed than a poxy whore? As long as she has a set of plump teats and a warm mouth, who cares if she might think to rob us while we sleep?”

“Not all whores are poxy or troublesome,” Loro said, sounding doubtful.

Rathe half closed his eyes and put on a sublime smile. “Once we’re south of the White Sea, we ought to just drop off Nesaea and Fira, and strike out on our own. Of course, we’ll have to worm our way into a known band of thieves, or they’re apt to see us as rivals. Course, that just brings us back around to killing any fools who want to kill us. I expect in a year, maybe two, we’ll have surrounded ourselves with a pack of worthy cutthroats-you can never truly trust such a man, of course, but that just adds to the adventure. I can hear the songs about Rathe and Loro, sung in all the winehouses and brothels along the coast. We will be famous, revered.”

“I suggest we not get too famous, otherwise we’ll have armies after us.”

Rathe brightened further. “Then it’s caves and moldy bread, friend. It’ll be grand, either way, this life of a thief.”

“Aye.” Loro’s frown had become a concerned scowl. “Before we go off on our own, we really ought to help Nesaea find her sister.”

Rathe blinked stupidly to hide his grin. “What? Why?”

Loro turned a fierce eye on him. “I thought you were a man of honor?”

Rathe chuckled darkly. “Honor is a dream for foolish children. We’re not children, but men of the sword.”

“Still … you gave your word,” Loro said gravely. “Thief or not, a man has to keep his word.”

Rathe bowed his head in thought. At last, he sighed. “I suppose you’re right. We’ll do this last good deed, then we can be shut of Nesaea and Fira, and never have to see them, or their baggage, again.”

Muttering something about checking on Fira, Loro strode out of the cabin. Rathe’s lips twitched toward a wry grin. He guessed he had bought himself a few days of peace from Loro’s absurd fantasy.

Topside, Rathe found the snow had turned back to a drizzly rain, which made misty halos around the lamps hanging about the deck. Captain Ostre stood near the gangplank talking quietly to Robere, his dour-faced brother. Both wore floppy, wide-brimmed felt hats pulled down to their ears. Liamas, the Lamprey’s golden-haired quartermaster, strode about waving a short-handled battleax overhead to ensure the crew stayed busy securing cargo and making ready to sail.

Rathe made his way to Nesaea, who was leaning on the rail at the stern. She had traded her blue cloak for a sturdier one of oiled leather. The fur-lined hood was up, but the rain had plastered a fall of dark waves to her brow. The only thing warm and welcoming about the day was her brief smile when he joined her side. Up close, he noted a touch of unease in her eyes.

“I expect Captain Ostre has the Lamprey well in hand,” he said, looking down at the waters of the River Sedge. There was more ice than ever scraping past the hull, and the ice along the rocky riverbank had grown outward to encase the tarred pilings of the dock. The Lamprey was an ungainly tub to his mind, but he hoped Ostre pushed the ship hard. He didn’t want to winter anywhere near the Iron Marches.

“Ostre’s a good captain,” Nesaea said, “but that’s the least of my concerns.”

Rathe frowned out across the river. Patchy fog had begun rising off the sluggish waters, adding to the gloom. He guessed if a man fell into the Sedge or the White Sea, he would freeze to death before having a chance to drown. He pushed aside thoughts of drowning and freezing.

“If the voyage isn’t troubling you, then what?”

“My sister,” Nesaea said softly.

“We’ll find her.” Rathe hoped he could keep the promise. Other than the girl being held captive to ensure her and Nesaea’s father returned to Dionis Keep-something impossible for Sytheus Vonterel to do, as the man was dead-they knew nothing about her. Not her age, not her name, and nothing of her appearance. “Not to sound a lecher, but if she’s even half as pretty as you, Lord Arthard may keep her for himself.”

Nesaea shook her head. “The comelier and younger this girl is, the more gold Arthard will see when he looks at her. I expect he’ll sell her on the blocks of Giliron-if so, hers will be a life of pampered misery.”

“Even the Isles of Giliron must have laws against taking a girl-child as a wife.”

“Where there are laws, there are lawbreakers,” Nesaea said, her voice edged with a grim familiarity that made Rathe’s stomach clench. He wanted her to unburden herself of those bitter experiences, but he would wait for her to tell him in her own time.

“We will find her,” he said again, but could not bring himself to promise that nothing terrible would befall the girl.

Nesaea squeezed his hand, but before she could say anything, Loro and Fira joined them at the rail. Rathe and Nesaea might not have been there, for all the notice the pair gave them.

“Don’t be a fool,” Fira snapped. In the misty half-light, the sickly greenish cast to her cheeks had become alarming.

“I’ve seen it plain on his face,” Loro growled. “And I tell you now, if that great Prythian dolt keeps ogling you, I’ll have off his head and toss it to the fish.”

Fira rolled her eyes, then abruptly closed them, gloved hands clutching the rail. “That would solve everything, wouldn’t it?”

Loro grinned darkly. “It’d make me feel better.”

“And afterward,” Fira said tightly, “what do you think Captain Ostre and his crew would do to you?”

“If they’ve any sense, they’ll keep their festering gobs shut, and their hands away from their daggers.”

“Liamas is a hero to these men, you blithering fool.”

“Hero? That lumbering oaf? Bah!”

“If you’d seen him against the crew of the Crimson Gull, you’d not be so quick to pick a fight with him.”

Now Loro rolled his eyes. “How dangerous could these pirates you faced be to have named their ship after a damned seabird?”

“Oh!” Fira snarled, green eyes flaring open. “You’re the biggest fool of a man I’ve ever known-and I’ve known more than my fair share!” With that, she stormed off, heels clumpy against the snowy deck like padded mallets.

Loro looked after her, mouth agape. “Your fair share! What’s that supposed to mean?” She made a rude gesture without turning, and Loro hurried after her.

Nesaea shook her head. “You’d never guess they’re in love.”

“They’ve a strange way of showing it,” Rathe chuckled, thinking of his and Loro’s earlier conversation. It made him wonder if Loro had actually wanted to be talked out of abandoning the women.

When Rathe turned back, Nesaea was looking at him, her eyes wide and beautiful in the murk, her lips parted slightly. He had seen that look before, and knew what she wanted him to say, but he did not dare. The words she sought would only serve as an invitation to the Khenasith to do each of them harm.

Rathe pressed his lips together and leaned against the rail. Nesaea’s expectant look melted smoothly into an expression of mild indifference, as if she had not wanted to hear anything from him. That made him feel worse, but he kept his silence.

It was a relief when Captain Ostre ordered the crew to unfurl the crisp new mainsail, man the push poles, and cast off the mooring lines. A few moments more, and the Lamprey was gliding into the main current of the River Sedge, and picking up speed.

Chapter 11

Loro gulped a breath and made a hasty retreat from the cabin he shared with Fira. Inside, the fire-haired woman rocked forward on her knees and retched violently into a bucket. She had been doing little else since they sailed from Iceford some days before. Kneeling beside her, Nesaea murmured soothing words and held back Fira’s hair.

“I expect you have this in hand,” Rathe said in a tight voice. When Nesaea nodded, he fled without the barest measure of guilt.

Loro had ventured far down the passageway, and stood at the stairs leading topside. “Think she’s been poisoned?” he asked, when Rathe drew near.

“It’s the motion of the ship, not poison.” He had heard of such illness afflicting some folk. So far, it hadn’t troubled him.

“Smells like she’s been drinking poison,” Loro said, nose wrinkling.

Rathe could not disagree.

Up on deck, the sun peeked through broken clouds, but the air had grown colder than ever. Rathe pulled his coat tighter, but it did him no good. His cloak was in his cabin, and there it would stay. Cold was better than suffering the rank odors below deck.

Ostre clumped near. “How’s Fira?” Loro made a face, and the captain nodded. “Expected as much. Last time she was aboard, she spewed for half the voyage. I’d guess that’s why she fought so hard against the corsairs on the Crimson Gull-a bit of swordplay tends to take your mind off a sour belly. She ought to get used to sailing quicker, this time.”

“Is there nothing you can give her?” Loro asked.

Ostre shrugged helplessly. “I’ve seen folk take all manner of remedies for such, but I’ve never seen a one of them work as promised.”

Liamas’s deep voice rose behind them. “I can help.”

“I expect you’d offer all sorts of help,” Loro bristled, looking the giant Prythian up and down.

Liamas ignored him. “After learning the lass was to sail with us again, I spoke with a woman in Iceford.”

“Mother Roween?” Ostre asked.

“Aye.”

“Who is this wench?” Loro asked suspiciously.

Ostre answered. “In these parts, she’s counted as a healer. South of the Gyntors, folk would name her a hedge witch.”

“We’ve had enough dealings with witches of any sort,” Loro snapped.

Rathe raised a hand for calm. “I doubt this Mother Roween is anything like Yiri.”

“A witch is a witch,” Loro said. “They offer you a cure with one hand, while the other steals close to take her price.”

Liamas went on as if Loro hadn’t protested. “Mother Roween gave me a tonic for curing the sickness that afflicts women with child.”

“Fira’s not with child,” Loro said. “Unless you’ve dreamed up a plan to change that?” Since setting sail, he had gotten more suspicious of the quartermaster. Fira’s praise of Liamas only made matters worse.

When the Prythian’s fists knotted, Rathe casually inserted himself between the two men. “Any help you can offer is welcome.”

With his icy-blue gaze locked on Loro’s face, the Prythian seemed not to hear, and one hand began caressing the head of the short-handled battleax hanging from his belt.

Ostre cleared his throat. “Go spill some of that brew down the girl’s throat. I don’t want my ship stinking any worse than it already does.”

With a last glare for Loro, Liamas turned on his heel and stalked away.

“If he touches her,” Loro warned, “I’ll put a blade in his throat.”

Captain Ostre brushed by Rathe and caught hold of Loro’s collar. “I’ll have peace on my ship, even if that means one of you goes over the rail.” By his deep scowl, he didn’t expect his quartermaster to take that particular swim. Some of the nearby crewmen had paused in their work to watch.

“I paid for passage,” Loro said, face flushing red in anger.

“I’ll be sure to toss your fare in after you. Mayhap you can figure a way for that gold to warm you, once you get free of the Sedge … that’s if you get ashore. All those steel scales on your jerkin won’t help for swimming, and the Sedge is a fearsome cold bitch any time of year-but especially now.”

Loro tensed, and Rathe began weighing the costs of defending his companion against letting Ostre toss him over the side. It was a damnable position. On the one hand, Loro was a friend, if unruly, uncouth, and wholly troublesome. On the other, there was Nesaea and her sister to think about. If Captain Ostre didn’t get them south of the White Sea before winter sank its teeth in, no one would, and that meant wintering in the Iron Marches. This far north, that also meant a long time for Nesaea’s sister to be sold in some far-off realm. Finding her would be hard enough as it was. If they delayed, it might be impossible…. Still, Loro had saved Rathe’s life more than once, and a blood debt was unbreakable.

With a weary gust, Rathe prepared to seal his fate, but Loro suddenly relaxed and put on a big, toothy smile. “No need for a swim, Capt’n. Why, I had enough baths for ten men, while in Iceford.”

Captain Ostre leaned in close enough that his beard swarmed over Loro’s chin. “I’ll take that as your oath.”

“Just so,” Loro said happily. The falseness of his good cheer cracked and became a smirk, after Ostre turned away.

Rathe gave the fat man a warning look, and Loro raised his hands in question. Rathe shook his head. He doesn’t even know he’s the one causing trouble!

“Back to work!” Ostre roared, sending some of the gawking crewmen scrambling across the deck, and others climbing into the rigging. Ostre spun back. “Come with me,” he ordered Rathe and Loro.

They followed him to the stern. Far below, the waters of the River Sedge swirled around the Lamprey’s rudder and came back together, thick with broken ice.

“Another week in Iceford, and we’d not have been sailing anywhere until spring,” Ostre said. “As it is, we’ll be lucky to make it all the way to the White Sea.”

“I have faith in you, Capt’n,” Loro said. “Besides, we seem to be breaking through easy enough.”

Ostre snorted. “For now, the Lamprey is making good headway. More worrying is that we may have a spot of trouble waiting up ahead.”

“How so?” Rathe asked.

“When the watch changed at dawn, Gnat reported seeing riders on the southern bank, maybe twenty in all. They were moving fast and trying to stay out of sight.”

Rathe glanced at the riverbank and the forest beyond. “As many trees as there are, it might be easy to mistake riding for hiding.”

“Aye, but my brother Robere brought ill tidings before we sailed. Strange folk-outlanders-bought out his entire stock of horses the day before we set sail.”

“Your brother ought to be happy,” Loro said, gnawing on a chunk of smoked venison taken from the pouch at his belt.

“Robere is never happy,” Ostre said, “but he’s rarely wrong about folk.” He cast Loro a sidelong look, as if Robere had made an unkind observation about the portly warrior. “Robere was of the mind that these men were too fidgety by half, and most of ‘em couldn’t ride to save their lives.”

“Did these strangers have the look of Prythians, but skinnier?” Rathe asked.

Ostre shot him a wary look. “How’d you know that?”

“I saw a few of them at the Minstrel’s Cup. One of them, a fellow named Edrik, who claimed to be a priest, tried to persuade me to help him.”

Ostre straightened. “If you’ve brought trouble on me and my ship-”

“If so,” Rathe interrupted, “it was not my intention.”

Ostre rubbed his nose with a thick finger. “Be that as it may, I don’t like having a score of men trailing my ship.”

Loro’s laughter broke the tension. “Have no worries about Edrik and his band. As you said, the river is too cold to swim, and no one on horseback is going to take a ship.”

Ostre accepted that with a nod. “Robere also mentioned a dark fellow.” Rathe thought he did a good job of not jumping, but the captain noticed. “You’ve seen him too?”

“Perhaps,” Rathe said slowly.

“Robere said this fellow, dressed all in black and thin as a blade, did a fair job of staying out of sight. Says he kept feeling his chest, as if pained. After the outlanders bought their horses and left, this dark man also vanished. One moment there, the next gone.”

Rathe could have lied, but Ostre had done right by him and the others. “I know him as the Shadowman. He chased me and Loro across the Gyntors, and all the way to Ravenhold.”

“Ravenhold!” Ostre blurted. “There’s a dire place, and much avoided.”

“That it is,” Loro said, working on a second piece of venison. “But we were indebted to one of those accursed monks of the Way of Knowing, and Rathe’s nothing if not prickly about keeping his word.”

“Doesn’t seem a bad trait for a man,” Ostre said.

Loro grinned. “Of course not.”

“Tell me of this Shadowman,” Ostre said to Rathe.

“He’s cunning, but I don’t see him being any more troublesome than the outlanders. Like them, he’d have to swim the river to get us.”

Ostre’s jaw clenched. “There might be another way to harm the Lamprey.”

“How?”

Ostre thought a moment. “If I was to attack a ship on the River Sedge-say, by dropping fire on her-I’d do it from atop Ruan Breach.

“What’s that?”

“’Tis the arse end of a rocky gorge cut through by the Sedge.”

“Nesaea never mentioned any gorges,” Rathe said.

Ostre shrugged. “She never saw it. Ruan Breach is fast water-too fast to sail upstream. When heading up the river, ships follow the Green Bend, a slow and muddy oxbow. ‘Twas dug by the Iron Kings of old.”

“Why not take the bend now, and avoid the gorge?”

“We already passed the mouth. Besides that, Green Bend is flat water-in summer it’s more a mire than a river, and turns green with the slime and moss of its namesake. A month gone, Green Bend would have already begun freezing up. By now, the ice is too thick for the Lamprey to smash through.”

Rathe considered something else. “There must be a place where you can put me and Loro ashore.” Loro shot him a horrified look, but Rathe pressed on. “If you drop anchor, we could sneak downstream, have a peek at this Ruan Breach, see if there’s any trouble awaiting us.”

“That’d work,” Ostre said, “but there’s no place close enough to lay anchor and wait-not with winter bearing down on us. Before you get there and back, we’d have lost more days than we can spare.”

Loro threw up his hands in frustration. “So we can freeze solid or burn to death. Might as well let me off now, for neither choice suits me.”

A grin split Ostre’s black beard. “My crew-with the help of Lady Nesaea-crushed the Crimson Gull, the fiercest corsair ship on two seas. A few outlanders and this shadowy bastard don’t frighten me.”

“You might change your mind when the Lamprey starts burning,” Loro said.

“As to that, there are ways to keep a ship safe from fire. I’ll have the crew put out barrels of salted water, and buckets to sling it.”

“Salted water?” Rathe asked.

“Aye. Saltwater has to get much colder than freshwater to freeze.”

“We’ll need more than water,” Loro said.

Ostre grinned. “I’ve a few more tricks tucked in my hold … things to make any river brigand foolish enough to attack the Lamprey wish he’d followed a different calling.”

Chapter 12

Sunlight glinted off the partially frozen waters of the River Sedge, but offered no warmth to those who rode the forest path on the bank of the river. While Edrik shivered uncontrollably under his cloak, the shaggy horse he sat astride was indifferent to the chill. Such would not have been the case with the sleek, fine-boned breed of horses used in Targas. Likely, the cold of the Iron Marches would kill them outright.

This cold would kill most everything under the Shield of the Fathers. With that thought came a vision of the city of Targas. Not its crystal towers and domes glowing with golden light, but darkened, shattered, an empty shell of its former glory. That grim image helped him bear the cold, the nights sleeping rough, and the coarse manners of the deycath who inhabited the Iron Marches.

Imagining the ugly downfall of his magnificent home also kept his mind on capturing Rathe, the man who the Oracle had foretold would spare Targas. He had thought to capture Nesaea and use Rathe’s love for her against him, but that plan had failed. When the woman was not with Rathe, she was with her friend Fira. More often than not Loro, a brutish monster of a man who seemed ever eager to haul out his sword and start chopping, was also usually about.

That left Edrik with only one way to take Rathe. He was still struggling with the details of his strategy. A single miscalculation would not only kill his friends and the crew of the Lamprey, but Rathe himself, thus dooming Targas.

Danlin rode abreast of Edrik, his chattering teeth rattling out a maddening tune. He had been silent since climbing out of his frosted blankets before dawn, but Edrik could tell his friend was working himself up to a tirade. Behind them plodded all but one member of their company. Like Edrik and Danlin, they sat clumsily in their saddles, bundled beneath too-thin cloaks, and utterly miserable.

Caldio, the absent man, was scouting the river behind them, and keeping an eye on the Lamprey’s progress-there had been a moment at first light when Edrik was sure his company had been seen, so they rode as fast as they dared until out of sight. Caldio was the oldest priest of the vizien caste, and because of his slothfulness, he would never wear the blue-and-gold vestments of an essan. What he lacked in personal discipline, he more than made up for with his riding ability and eyesight. Where the others were awkward, Caldio rode as if born to it. Of his eyes, the man saw as well as a hawk by day and an owl by night. If Targas were to fall, Fathers forbid, Edrik supposed Caldio’s inborn abilities would change his fortune for the better.

Danlin’s expected outburst came out all at once, his deep voice coming in shuddery, steaming gasps. “A curse on all those fools who thought our garments were enough to ward against this damned cold. We should have bought more clothes in Iceford.” He spat the name of the village like a curse. “If naught else, just the name Iceford should have warned those gray-headed dolts what we faced.”

“Those ‘dolts’ are our masters, and we serve at their pleasure,” Edrik reminded Danlin. And myself. His own secret musings had been increasingly bitter of late. Save that they had found Rathe, nothing had gone the way the Oracle had suggested. Which begged, why hadn’t the Oracle given them a strategy to take Rathe, warnings about what to expect while tramping about the Iron Marches, and anything else needed to save Targas?

“All castes of the Munam a’Dett serve the Memory and Law of our Fathers,” Danlin countered. “And as the essans are supposed to be the arbiters of the Memory and Law, is it too much to think they should have known just how blasted cold the Iron Marches are, especially since these godsforsaken lands have surrounded Targas since the first stones were laid for the Ilesma Temple!”

“Lower your voice,” Edrik hissed, casting a nervous look over his shoulder. No one else seemed to have heard, and well they had not. Such contentious talk was the same that had led to questions about the Munam a’Dett Order, and had given rise to profane accusations against Quidan Salris’s mishandling of his and the Order’s authority. To question the will of the Munam a’Dett was not only seditious, it was high blasphemy. Edrik refused to tolerate either sin from those under his command, or from himself.

Danlin smoothed his stony features, but looked far from chastened. “By Blood and by Water.”

“By Blood and by Water,” Edrik repeated, adding, “and by the Fathers.”

“Aye, them to,” Danlin agreed apathetically, and went back to chattering his teeth.

The company kept on at a steady pace along the shadowy path for another hour, during which dark clouds began sweeping down from the north. The air felt a touch warmer, and Edrik wondered if this new round of weather would bring rain or snow, or some ungodly mix of both.

He was still fretting over this when Caldio rejoined them. One look at his harried features was enough for Edrik to call a halt.

“What news?” he asked, as the others clumsily maneuvered the horses around the man.

Gulping breath and exhaling steamy plumes, Caldio pulled off his hood. Hectic blotches of color rode high on his thin cheeks, and his pallid gray eyes widened when he said, “The ship has put out her oars!”

“They’ve used oars before,” Danlin said.

“Yes, but now a drum drives the stroke. The Lamprey has doubled her speed!”

“Doubled?” Edrik said, shocked.

Danlin’s angular features seemed to melt in dismay. “What reason would they have to run so quickly?” He turned a suspicious glare on Caldio. “Did they see you?”

“No,” Caldio said.

“They must have, you old fool. I knew we shouldn’t have brought you along!”

Edrik held up his hand for silence. “It doesn’t matter why the Lamprey has increased her speed. Nothing has changed, save that we must reach Ruan Breach ahead of the ship.”

“That’s a long ride,” Danlin said. “A very long ride for the likes of us. Chances are, one or more of us will end up taking a tumble, and then where will we be?”

Edrik bristled. “Would you abandon all hope for fear of getting hurt?”

“A fall off a horse could kill a man,” Danlin said, earning a few uneasy nods.

Edrik snorted. “If we fail to take Rathe, Targas and the Shield of the Fathers will fall. Should that happen, most of us will die in these godsforsaken lands. So we can plod along and let our only hope escape, or we ride as if our lives depend upon it-which, I remind you again, our lives, and the lives of all our loved ones, do depend on what we do now.”

“Even if we get to Ruan Breach ahead of the Lamprey,” Danlin said, “what’re we supposed to do then?”

Edrik felt his face tighten with a confident smile he had no right to wear, but was helpless to wipe away. “First to Ruan Breach. After, I’ll tell you my intentions.”

Sheltering within the Zanar-Sariit, Algar watched Edrik and his companions ride away. Ruan Breach. Until now, he had been unsure where these men were heading. Now that he knew, he had the impression that something larger than he had previously believed was at play, for the place he was to meet Jathen was only a few miles downstream from Ruan Breach. As to what Edrik planned to do there, Algar was in the dark as much as the man’s followers were.

After the riders vanished around a bend, Algar carefully spoke the words that would return him to the earthly world. The Spirit Stone went cold in the center of his chest, then colder, seeming to glaze his entire body in ice. His eyes squinted down to slits and he doubled over, grinding his teeth against the torture. He endured the suffering, but instead of letting up, it went on longer than usual.

Around him, the nomadic spirits suddenly ceased their wandering. One by one, they turned toward him. As ever, their smoky features were indistinct, but there was something in their bearing…. A prickle of dread crept down Algar’s spine, shriveling his stones. They see me! Gods, they see me!

All at once, the pain and cold slackened, and he felt his limbs gaining substance and weight. The spirits faded from sight. A different sort of cold assailed him as he straightened, his boots sinking into frosted drifts of pine straw. He took a trembling breath and slowly let it out. Steam plumed before his eyes, telling him he had escaped Zanar-Sariit.

He looked around, wondering if the spirits really had seen him. The necromancer who had seated the Spirit Stone into his chest had warned that while he trod the secret ground between the realms of the living and the dead, he couldn’t touch either of those worlds, nor could the beings dwelling in those realms touch or see him.

I imagined it then … but perhaps I should adopt some caution? Prudence, after all, guided most of his actions.

Prudence! his mother cackled in the back of his mind. He cringed, but she wasn’t finished. Is tha’ the name you’ve now given to yer cowardice? Well, m’sweet, murderin’ bastard of a boy, is it?

“Make mock if you’ll,” Algar said, face twisted into a sneer, “but prudence guided me to lay in wait and end your reign over me.”

I say fear made you hunker in the shadows with your dagger. ‘Twas fear and cowardice that made you plant the steel in m’back instead of m’heart!

Algar remembered the day in question, hearing her speaking with a man at the door….

“Come again after dark, an’ m’sweet boy will be ready to gobble yer cock,” she had purred.

The man had laughed, a shrill, tittering sound. “That’ll make me just like one of those highborn fools! Would you be m’lady … after?”

“Better than that, I’ll be your queen.” After their uproarious laughter subsided, she quaffed a cup of wine, drizzling some across the tatty yellow silks straining to contain her flaccid breasts. The man tried to lap up what spilled, but Algar’s mother swatted him. “Want a taste o’ these, I’ll need a bit more silver.”

No silver was forthcoming, and the man departed. Algar waited until his mother sauntered past his hiding place, then crept out of the shadows behind her, the steel he had so carefully sharpened coming alive in his hand. The keen blade sliced and plunged, first through her silks, then through her doughy flesh. And when she lay on the dirty floor of their hovel, her eyes rolling in pain and confusion, he watched her spreading blood overrun a scatter of coins just beyond her outstretched fingers. It was the price paid for him to pleasure a man. The price was not in silver or gold, but mere coppers. He took those coins for himself, and then soaked her in lamp oil. She was begging weakly for mercy when he set her alight….

Got nothin’ to say for yerself, boy? the ghost of his mother drawled now, her harridan’s voice ramming against the inside of his skull like a cold iron bar.

Algar smiled wanly up at the wet snowflakes beginning to sift down. “I wish I’d never been born, you bitter old cunt.”

Her laughter echoed through his mind. Well, you was born, and it weren’t no great pleasure to push you bloody and screaming into this world, m’sweet bastard boy.

“I have another wish,” Algar said, bringing the memory of killing her to the forefront of his mind, concentrating on it so strongly that she could see and smell and hear even the finest details. “More than anything, mother, I wish I had gutted that last buggering bastard and burned him next to you.”

Howling obscenities, the harpy that had birthed him faded into the deepest wrinkles of his mind. It struck him that one day he would be spirit, much as she was. Could one spirit torture another? Perhaps one day I’ll find out, he thought, not displeased by the prospect. For now, he had more important matters to attend to than the ghost of his mother, and that was looking after the only other person he hated as much as her. Rathe Lahkurin.

Parting the collar of his tunic, he used the proper words to summon the lesser magic of the Spirit Stone. There was no pain in the swirling mass of cloaking shadows, nor were there any wandering spirits.

He set out at a ground-eating trot. When cloaked in shadow, he could move as effortlessly as a night breeze, never tiring. As poorly as Edrik and his fellows rode, it didn’t take him long to catch up. Algar slowed a hundred strides behind the riders, for strong light revealed his secret.

Over the remainder of the day, the snowfall increased, coming down in thick flakes that quickly filled tree boughs and covered the frosty ground. Algar paused once to contact Brother Jathen with the seeing glass, but as he was about to trace the proper rune, he decided the monk needed a lesson in patience, and put the milky orb away.

Chapter 13

Queen Erryn’s army marched along a precipitous trail that led through plunging chasms of rock and ice. At times, the wind blew so hard that the men had to hold to one another to keep from being swept off the narrow track and into a shrieking white oblivion. At other times, they bored through snowdrifts so high and deep they might have been mountains themselves. They climbed ever higher, working doggedly to tamp a path for their queen and the supply train.

Day had passed to night and back to day, before Erryn and her army came to a ravine that ran flat and true, like a road. Rocky walls towered overhead, giving the army a reprieve from the howling voice of the storm. Mile by mile, the ravine narrowed to no more than twenty strides at its widest. Until Erryn saw the glyph-carved guideposts, each of carved graystone wrapped in bands of black iron and standing some twenty feet tall, she had come to believe that General Aedran was leading them to a frozen doom.

As they drew closer to the ancient guideposts, Erryn made out a tumbledown wall of rough stone farther on partially blocking the way. A pair of stubby towers loomed above the wall like ghosts, their square crowns shattered by some forgotten battle.

“The oldest stories say those who first crept into the Gyntors from the Iron Marches did so to escape the wrath of plundering dragons,” Aedran said, as they rode between the guideposts.

“Dragons?”

“Aye.” Aedran pointed to one of the ancient markers. Ages of harsh weather had worn its glyphs smooth, but the images of winged serpents rising above flames were clear enough. A battered iron dragon emblazoned the top of the marker, its jaws stretched in a silent scream and wings spread for flight. The rest of the carved impressions were strange to Erryn’s eye, perhaps a written language, or perhaps arcane symbols that no longer held any meaning.

“If only to bring us fire,” she said with a violent shiver, “I could hope there are dragons hereabout.”

“I’ve never seen a dragon,” Aedran admitted, his tone suggesting that he didn’t believe in such creatures. “As to fire, I hold little hope that we will find anything to burn, save the wood we carry for cooking, and our lamps and candles.”

Erryn hid her disappointment. “At least we can get out of the wind and snow,” she said, struggling to remember what warmth felt like.

“The storm might prove the least of our troubles,” Aedran warned, his voice almost lost under the sharp exhalations of a Prythian work-chant. Hah! they cried as one, the sound rumbling off the walls as the tampers slammed their iron-headed tools against the snow. Sensing a destination, excitement had invigorated the usual monotony of their shouts.

Erryn twisted in the saddle. “You keep warning of troubles, but I’ve yet to see any-other than the weather. I’m starting to think there’s nothing to fear.” The more she thought about it, the more sense it made. What could possibly live in such a miserable place as this?

Aedran fixed his gaze upon her. His mask of Prythian bravado had vanished, leaving his features engraved with dread. “These mountains are cursed, every inch of them. The paths I kept us on until now were the safest … but now safety lies far behind us.”

“If coming here is so dangerous, wherever here is,” Erryn said, waving her hand over their bleak surrounds, “then why did you agree to my order?”

He studied her for a long moment, his eyes a vibrant blue over the top of his scarf. “On occasion, the idea takes me that there must be more to a man’s life than gold and glory, more than fighting for the sake of both.”

Erryn stared, still not sure what he was getting at. Truth told, he sounded like a philosopher belly deep in a barrel of brandy.

Aedran suddenly frowned. “Oh, shit on it all! What it comes to is that you were right, and I was wrong. Without shelter, we’ll freeze solid. When the men went missing and those horses froze to death, I got it into my head that I’d rather freeze myself, than face whatever might lay off the path. For a time, I lost sight of Ahnok’s demands, and I forgot who I am as a man of Pryth. For a time, I was afraid.”

“What’s your god of war have to do with it?” Erryn didn’t worship any particular god, though on occasion she had shared a scrap of food with a hungry waif in order to gain the favor of Ilix, the patron god of thieves.

Aedran shrugged. “Given a choice between a meaningless death, such as freezing solid, or dying while battling an enemy, a trueborn Prythian must always choose to fight, as Ahnok demands of the warriors who follow him.”

Erryn found herself nodding at the sentiment, but while trading doctrines kept her mind off the cold, she had greater concerns. “Do you know what awaits us … what dangers?”

“Hard to say. Could be we face nothing worse than the storm. Could be we’ll all meet terrible ends that no man has ever imagined.”

“You could say the same about most anything,” Erryn said. “Surely you can do better.”

“I told you the Gyntors are cursed-something even you should know, seeing as you’ve lived your life in their shadow.”

Erryn’s shrug opened a gap in her cloak and let in an icy draft. Shivering, she pulled it tight again. “I’ve heard stories and told a few, along with everyone else, but I’ve never seen anything to prove they were true.”

“Be glad you haven’t,” Aedran said. “By dark sorceries or endless seasons of cold, it makes no matter what changed those who keep their lairs in these mountains. I’ve crossed some of those who live deep in these crags, and they’re no longer men. Long ago, they shed the cloak of humanity in favor of donning the skins and the ways of beasts. They hunt the night like wolves, seeking prey, even if that happens to be their fellow man.”

Erryn felt his fear eating into her; she saw behind her eyes packs of crazed men draped in tattered hides, running over the snow on the hunt; saw them dragging down some weary traveler, ripping and clawing-

He’s just trying to frighten me, she thought, shoving the images away. Erryn sat straighter in the saddle. “An army of Prythians can defend themselves against anything that lives here.”

“Not everything that walks these lands lives as we live,” Aedran said, facing ahead to look over the bent backs of the soldiers clearing the way.

“I have no fear of the restless spirits,” Erryn said.

“We shall see.”

A broad vale hazed by streamers of snow opened beyond the ravine. A mile farther on a mountain rose up, its peak lost in the clouds. Lower down, long blades of ice and slumping brows of snow draped the face of a fortress wall several shades darker than the granite outcrops and promontories surrounding it. Something about its sweeping curves and sharp ridges made Erryn uneasy.

“Have you been here before?” Erryn called above the wind, which had grown stronger, now that they had escaped the ravine.

“No,” Aedran said. “But I’ve heard stories of this place. It is named Stormhold.”

“And what do these stories say?”

Aedran pointed out the twin ridges sweeping down off the mountain to embrace the vale, their rough backs marbled with ice and drifted snow. “I’ve heard that the arms of Kiniss guard it well, and that she always welcomes the lost.”

“Kiniss … a goddess?”

Aedran eased his mount closer to Erryn’s, until their knees were brushing. “Aye. She’s one of Dargoth’s Thousand Daughters. Dargoth, the God of the Mountains, is insatiable. To avoid the temptation of laying with his daughters, he struck all his daughters’ wombs barren, and then sealed them with fire and molten rock.”

Prythian gods, Erryn decided, were as demented as Prythians. “If Kiniss welcomes the lost, she’s a friend of mine.”

Aedran’s laugh carried above the wind. “The Thousand Daughters are also insane-seems they didn’t appreciate their father’s treatment. Kiniss may welcome the lost and weary into her embrace, but at best we have even chances of her letting us go.”

“You Prythians need friendlier gods,” Erryn said.

Aedran laughed harder. “Ofttimes we rage against the gods as much as each other-all the gods save Ahnok, that is, for what fool would fight the God of War?”

What fool indeed? Erryn thought, thinking if anyone would challenge gods, it would be a Prythian.

A cloud of snow billowed around them, its touch flailing exposed skin with a thousand needle teeth. When the air cleared, Erryn saw that they had ridden amid a group of ancient catapults, their huge wooden arms gray with age and rot. Some of those arms stood tall, aimed at Stormhold. Others lay broken. More siege engines poked up out of the snow, too old to make out what they had been. It was plain that a great battle had taken place here, but the victors hadn’t bothered to clean up afterwards.

What if there were no victors? Erryn wondered. Then, Are we riding over the ancient bones of dead soldiers? If so, who were they?

She glanced sideways at Aedran. “So when your, ah, man-beasts aren’t busy eating folk,” she said, “do they pass the time by attacking strongholds?”

Aedran shot her a hard look. He had pulled off his scarf, and already frost coated his short beard. “Make mock if it eases your mind, but if you ever see eyes in the night creeping close, or hear the gnashing of teeth in your ear, you’ll find all your laughter’s as useful as a bucket of piss.”

Erryn grinned behind her scarf. “If that happens, you’d better be near with your blade.”

“I cannot promise sharp steel will serve any purpose.”

Erryn decided she had heard enough, and fell silent.

It took an hour for her army to carve a path to the base of Stormhold. Where she might have expected stout walls of rock quarried from the mountain itself, Stormhold’s wall was iron. Above it soared four dragon towers. Their toothy jaws gaped, as if roaring into the faces of long dead enemies. Rows of horns studded their sleek skulls and snouts, but a final, larger pair swept back from behind their eyes. The face of the wall and the soaring parapets were covered in sharp-edged scales the size of shields. Interspersed throughout were arrow loops, most sealed with thick shutters. The tampers halted before a windswept ramp leading to a massive gate also forged of pitted black iron, and embossed with thick serpents.

“How can men fashion iron so?”

Aedran gazed up at the dragon towers. “Some say Stormhold was built when gods walked in flesh, long before the Fourth Age of Sorcery, an age when those who wielded magic rose above all men and claimed for themselves crowns and thrones, and later enthralled their subjects and free dragons.”

“Stormhold does seem to be a place fit for gods,” Erryn agreed, having never heard of a time when gods walked the world, or the Fourth Age of Sorcery, let alone the other three. To her there was the present and the mythical olden times, the birthing bed of all stories.

“Tales claim many things,” Aedran said with a dismissive shrug. “I assure you, neither magic nor gods built the walls of Stormhold, but men alone.” She gave him a dubious look, and he added, “When men share a will, they can create things of beauty and wonder, things most folk would think impossible.”

Erryn glanced again at the wall. “I’d like to meet men who can make such things.”

“One day,” Aedran said, face solemn, “when you’ve conquered all the realms your heart desires, I’ll show you the wonders of Pryth.”

Do I really want to conquer entire realms? He spoke as if he knew her heart, but she felt otherwise. Defeating King Nabar and gaining the northern reaches of Cerrikoth is enough, she told herself. Aloud she said, “I thought Pryth was only filled with warriors.”

“Aye, it is, but those warriors are also craftsmen-workers of wood and stone and metal. It just happens that the making of war guides the souls of my people. One day, that won’t be so.”

Erryn considered Aedran’s fur and leather armor, and the intricacy of the scales covering his chest. She thought about how eagerly the Prythians had thrown themselves into building up Valdar’s defenses, and how easily they had fashioned what they needed for the journey into the Iron Marches. “When there are no more wars to fight, what’ll you make then, if not new wars?”

A troubled frown knotted his brow. “Our ancestors learned half a thousand years gone that peace is a double-edged sword. Those stories tell of the peace that came after learning the forging of iron. During those days, we trusted neighboring realms, traded openly and fairly with them. Together we built great cities, sailed distant seas, explored strange lands that have been forgotten since the Age of Despair.”

Age of Despair? Erryn mused, wondering why she had never heard of all these past ages. Could it be that Aedran was a learned scholar? She almost laughed aloud at the idea, but a sudden disquiet stifled her mirth. Who is this man I’ve placed at the head of my army?

Still looking over the wall of Stormhold, Aedran didn’t notice her meditative silence. A score of Prythians had begun using the butts of spears to chip away the layered ice welding the great iron gate shut. The rest of the warriors lined either side of the ramp, watchful for danger.

“Those days of peace and fortune before the Age of Despair have no formal name,” Aedran continued. “But I’d call those days the Time of Fools. Riches flowed easily with the discovery of forging iron-everyone wanted and needed it, you see. There was so much wealth that common peddlers would rival today’s kings.

“In time, folk grew fat and lazy. Leisure became their first and truest love. Men forgot what it was to earn their keep.” His mouth turned down at the corners. “While my ancestors lolled about, their allies plotted, seeding themselves deep into every facet of my people’s lives. Then the day came when those friends turned their knives and swords against my forefathers-a treachery some whisper that was planned from the beginning.”

Aedran’s blue eyes, bitter as a midwinter dawn, locked with Erryn’s. “The peace my ancestors bought with iron and goodwill ended with gutters running with blood. Along our highroads, babes torn from their mothers’ breasts were hung upon lances like wailing banners. Our men, bloated and fearful after generations of ease, fled instead of dusting off long unused swords. They feared the implements of war, you see, more than war itself. Many were slaughtered wherever they hid. Many more were caught and made into eunuchs, and spent the rest of their days serving their new masters.”

“What of the women?” Erryn asked, captivated.

Aedran’s jaw worked. “It’s no lie that women suffer the most in war.”

Erryn needed no further explanation. “You Prythians must have fought back?”

He spat in disgust. “There was no Pryth during those black days, and so no Prythians.”

“Then how did Pryth come to be?”

“My ancestors were taken far from their homelands and spread across many realms. It is said among my people that at least one drop of Prythian blood flows through the veins of everyone alive today. One of the realms where my people ended their forced journey lay deep in the Gray Horns, what later became Pryth.”

“Why would anyone want to scatter a folk so far?”

“A fine way to ensure there is no rebellion amongst a captive nation is to cast them far and wide, and destroy every trace of what made them a distinct people-their gods, language, customs. What is torn away is replaced by the ideas and principles of their new masters.”

Erryn shook her head doubtfully. “You cannot steal a man’s memories.”

“You don’t have to,” Aedran said. “You only have to ensure those memories are never passed to his children. In a single generation, all is forgotten.”

The very idea of such a practice appalled her, yet at the same time, she understood its ruthless effectiveness. “If everything was taken away, how did your people ever become Prythians?”

“A small few remembered their origins. Of course, they were the old ones, and considered troublemakers by most. Yet they made sure their children knew the truth. Besides the memories of who they had been, those children learned how their kindred were defeated. Over time, they used the same tactics to earn the trust of their new masters. With trust came an inkling of freedom. The leashes they wore, you see, became longer and longer, until the bravest of them began to gather in secret. And, in secret, they spoke aloud the tales of their elders, told the tales of their greatest sovereigns of old. Unlike their slothful forebearers, the implements of war didn’t frighten them.”

“How did they earn their freedom-their true freedom?” Erryn asked, envisioning heroic battles.

Aedran spread his gloved hands. “When the uprisings began, new blood paid for old. And then came the true slaughter-relentless, monstrous, slaughter. Freedom was bought at a great price, but this time it was not my people’s blood that ran in the gutters, nor was it our staked babes that wriggled and wailed upon the highroads, nor was it our women who suffered the fury of the enemy. We gave back tenfold what our forefathers received. We became reavers, stalking horrors in the deepest watches of the night, and those who remembered their heritage took for themselves the fierce and desolate land now known as Pryth.”

“So,” Erryn said slowly, “your people became the same monsters who chained them?”

“Monsters,” Aedran said in a musing tone. “Yes, I suppose they did, though my people were better at it. Chains, be they of iron or a king’s harsh edicts, often crush a people to dust. But, sometimes, those chains can blacken a man’s heart toward vengeance.”

“Are your people still so full of hate?”

Aedran laughed bitterly. “It was never about hate, but retribution. Yet, I’d be a liar if I denied that war is in our blood, now and forever-and that’s the double-edge sword I spoke of.”

Erryn frowned. “You said peace was a double-edge sword.”

“Since the day we Prythians won our freedom, we’ve made ceaseless war to ensure our enemies remain peaceful toward us. We sell our swords far and wide, and we win other men’s wars in the most brutal ways possible, thus ensuring they keep their eyes and hearts off of Pryth.”

“What’s that have to do with peace?”

“Name the nations that have ever invaded Pryth.”

“I’ve never heard of any such nations.”

“If that isn’t peace, what is?” His gaze became thoughtful. “The day will come when we make less war, the day some few of my people call the Awakening. Instead of swords and shields, we will make beautiful things again and, for a time, blood will cease to flow.”

“I had no idea you Prythians sought anything more than gold and glory.”

“We do,” he said, almost too quietly to hear.

She didn’t like the expression on his face. It suggested again that Aedran was not the simple fighting man she had hired, but something more.

“Alas, some of my people have abandoned the dream of the Awakening for the fleeting joys of swinging sword to earn gold and glory. But there are enough of us who continue to seek our ancient birthright and destiny-the real reason my forefathers took back their freedom.”

“Aedran!” One Eye Thal shouted, before Erryn could ask about birthrights and destiny. The old Prythian warrior trotted near, head bent against the storm. Behind him, the men who had been breaking ice had begun heaving against one side of the great iron gate. Ancient hinges squealed and creaked, and the bottom edge made a hollow grinding noise as it scraped over icy flagstones.

“Looks like we will sleep warm tonight,” Aedran said, sliding from the saddle.

One Eye Thal halted and wiped away a crust of yellowish pus that had frozen to his weathered cheek below his eye socket. “Aye, and not a moment too soon. Last time I had a piss, my cock near turned into an icicle.”

Aedran cleared his throat. One Eye Thal’s good eye rolled toward Erryn. When he spoke again, his voice sounded different from its usual brutal gruffness. “Forgive me,” he said to Erryn. “I’m so often amongst the men that I forget myself.”

Wanting to put One Eye Thal at ease, Erryn said, “I’ve myself pissed ice chips for more days than I care to count.”

One Eye Thal blinked his single dark eye, and Aedran his pair of blue ones, and then both men threw back their heads and laughed.

“Gods curse me!” One Eye said, after composing himself. “She was born on the wrong side of the Gray Horns!”

Still smiling, Aedran eyed her in a way that heated the center of her. “I’ve often thought the same.”

“Best if we call her a Prythian and have done with it,” One Eye Thal advised.

“She’s a bit short,” Aedran said, his smile widening at Erryn’s scowl.

One Eye Thal shrugged. “You forget Queen Tara. That lass stood no higher than my chest.”

“And pretty as the first flower of spring.”

“Aye, she was at that,” One Eye said wistfully.

“Queen Tara?” Erryn asked.

One Eye Thal said, “Queen Tara was a strong girl with a love of fine steel. She died in battle … must be o’er a hundred years ago.”

Erryn looked between the two men. “Then how do you know how tall she was, let alone if she was fair?”

Aedran shared a look with One Eye Thal. “I told our fine young queen here that we’re not all about forging swords and shields, but she didn’t believe me.”

“Did you tell her about Mountain Home, the Pillars of the Moon-surely you told her of the Rings of Dawn?” One Eye Thal demanded.

“Rings of Dawn?” Erryn asked, intrigued.

“Aye,” One Eye Thal said. “If we hadn’t built them to guide the sun, the west would never have a springtime.”

Erryn smiled. “You should never lie to a queen.”

“Who says I’m lying?” One Eye Thal said fiercely, then burst out laughing.

Erryn laughed as well, but had a feeling One Eye Thal believed every word he spoke. As much as she would have enjoyed hearing more of Pryth, she had more pressing matters than her curiosity. “We need to get into the fortress.”

“She has the way of it,” Captain Romal said, coming up from the rear. He was slender for a Prythian, with fair hair and a long golden beard braided into a fork. He tugged at the knuckle of bone dangling by a loop of gold from what was left of one ear. The story Erryn had heard said that the rest of his ear had fed an enemy. “We’ve a dozen men with frostbite.”

Erryn didn’t wait to hear anymore. “I want everyone indoors within the hour.”

It took less than half that.

Chapter 14

At first, it was only a touch warmer within the dark and dusty reaches of Stormhold than without, but near a thousand men and half as many horses soon provided the overflowing great hall with warmth. The rumbling murmur of conversation and whickering horses worked as a lullaby on Erryn, forcing her to concentrate on keeping her eyes from sliding shut.

“Best if we set watch and send out scouts,” Aedran advised. “If there are any stores of food to be found-barrels of flour will keep a long time, even if they’re crawling with weevils-we will find them soon enough.”

Erryn nodded absently, holding her fingers above the flame of an oil lamp. One Eye Thal had found her an old chair to sit on and a smallish table covered with cracked ivory inlays to hold her lamp. My throne and high table, she thought, missing the equally crude accommodations of the Cracked Flagon back in Valdar.

Aedran turned and shouted for silence. The men quieted, and their combined breath turned into a fog that glowed like dark and ancient gold in the torchlight. Unlit doorways yawned like black mouths and marched around the graystone hall, each thrice the height of a man, their lintels engraved with images of dragons. Set deep in four walls, a dozen or more cold hearths waited for wood and fire to warm their iron grates. If the previous rulers of Stormhold had left behind anything telling who they had been, save a few odd pieces of furniture, thieves had cleared it all out in intervening years.

“Find anything of wood and start some fires,” Aedran called, the vaulted ceilings of the hall magnifying his voice. “Our good queen has demanded a feast-even if it is of horsemeat-and we shall have it.”

Roars of approval met the command and the promise of a hot meal, and the men dispersed.

The previous rulers of Stormhold might have taken away all the banners and devices that named who they had been, but they left plenty of furniture behind. Blackwood chairs, tables, and wardrobes burned hot and bright enough to push back centuries’ worth of gloom and cold, and those flames were more than hot enough to roast frozen meat hacked from the carcasses of the horses that had frozen to death.

Captain Romal found the kitchens. Besides a wealth of spices, he located all the makings for bread. The yeast had gone over, but as he said when he returned lugging two moth-eaten sacks of flour, “Bread is bread, whether it rises, or remains flat.”

One Eye Thal and his patrol plunged deep into the bowels of the mountain fortress, following corridors guarded by rusted armor and weapons draped with cobwebs. His search led to vast cellars filled with oaken casks and barrels. The wine and brandy they once contained had long since turned to pungent brown dust, but there had also been racks filled with earthenware jars brimming with strong but drinkable spirits.

A few draughts of blackberry brandy put General Aedran in a fine mood, and he insisted on building a proper throne for Erryn at one end of the great hall. It began with a stout table, atop which some of the men placed a high-backed, cushioned chair. When Erryn sat down at the rowdy urging of her army, the cushion split, belching a cloud of dust. Sneezing and laughing by turns-she had matched Aedran draught for draught of brandy, and was half-drunk already-she waved for the men to proceed.

The horses and sledges were moved to an adjoining hall and put under rotating guard so no one would miss the festivities. After that, the men produced an assortment of hand-carved pipes, some of wood, others of bone, and struck up a series of jaunty tunes. Those not playing, danced and sang. Those not dancing or singing, stomped and clapped. Despite the bleariness of her eyes and her swimmy head, Erryn noted that these songs held more joy than those the Prythians had played while at Valdar.

“It’s the promise of hot food and coming glory that lightens their hearts,” Aedran responded when she asked, kneeling beside her on the table. He smiled and tapped her nose with a finger. She brushed him off, but when her hand touched his, it lingered, soaking in the heat of his skin. He grinned at her, his teeth white behind his blood-red beard.

“We had plenty of food and glory at Valdar,” she said, a little breathless.

“Aye,” Aedran said, turning to watch the dancing. Nearly too soft to hear, he added, “But now we march toward destiny.”

He’s drunker than I am. Erryn found nothing particularly funny about the thought, but she laughed aloud. He joined in, his arm briefly wrapping around her shoulders and squeezing her close. When he leaped from the table and began dancing, she felt colder for the loss of his presence.

As Aedran spun around the great hall, Erryn sipped brandy from a dented pewter cup. His booted feet kicked higher and faster than any of the other men, his arms weaved intricate patterns as he twirled, and his beaming smile grew wider with each new turn.

When it seemed Aedran could do nothing more impressive, he suddenly leaped high, curled into a spinning ball, and hit the floor in a roll, only to bounce back to his feet in another graceful leap.

Round and round he went, the men cheering him on, until sweat shone on his brow, and his breath came in gasps. At last, he stopped, gave an unsteady bow, and climbed back onto the table with Erryn.

Across the great hall, now a hundred men imitated their leader. Some displayed great skill; others were sorely lacking. After some time, a bellow of command halted the dancing, and the men moved aside for Captain Murgan, who strutted shirtless before Erryn. Scars crisscrossed his lean frame. The worst was a raised pink oval where a nipple should have peeked through his chest hair. He spun to face her and bowed so low that his balding head nearly touched his outstretched knee.

Captain Romal came next, made a similar bow, then trotted a hundred strides to the opposite end of the great hall, the forks of his golden beard swinging. At some silent signal, Romal darted toward Murgan in great bounding leaps, and landed a boot in his companion’s cupped hands. Murgan heaved upward and Romal soared, legs straight, arms spread, chin lifted toward the black of the great hall’s high ceiling. He held the pose as he fell in a plummeting arc until the last second, then he curled in on himself and landed in a rolling somersault. Next it was Murgan’s turn to fly.

Not to be outdone, Captain Kormak splashed a generous gulp of wine down his throat, and made his bows to Erryn. Then, with his thick black braid whipping about the top of his head, he began spinning like a burly top. Round and round he went, the men clapping, until he lost his footing and tumbled drunkenly through a wall of soldiers. Curses and raucous laughter followed, but no fists were thrown, nor was steel bared.

After that, the carousing began in earnest.

“I’d no idea you Prythians could dance,” Erryn said, having to raise her voice over cheers, shouts, and trilling pipes. To her eyes, it seemed as if the army had doubled in size, but half of them were blurry ghosts. She set aside her cup of brandy.

“If a thing is worth doing, we’ve great passion to do it well,” Aedran said, his tone and smile suggesting more than his words. Much more. Erryn’s cheeks grew hot, her tongue dried, and it was something of a relief when Aedran looked away.

Food came piecemeal. First, there was piping hot flatbread and chilled wine, followed by more wine, followed by roasted slivers of horsemeat and more bread. To this, the Prythians added berry-and-lard cakes taken from the supplies. Salty and sweet, the cakes were fine, as was the horsemeat and bread. While she and Aedran ate and laughed, the dances changed to contests of strength.

When a pair of Prythians stripped down to their smallclothes and began circling each other with daggers, Erryn ordered Aedran to put an end to it.

“They’ll not hurt each other,” he said around a bite of food. “Not much, at least.”

Erryn was surprised to see that he was right. The longer she watched, the more she saw patterns in the dramatic thrusts and parries, throws and blows. By the time the contestants’ corded muscles were glistening with sweat, it became obvious this, too, was a sort of dance.

“They’re acting something out,” she murmured.

Aedran nodded excitedly. He was now sitting cross-legged on the table beside her, one elbow propped on the armrest of her chair, his fingers brushing her leg as he spoke. “The Conflict of Kings tells the story of the king of night and the king of day, and their ceaseless battle.”

She leaned forward. “Who is who?”

“At different times, each represents night and day, for one cannot live without the other. Also, the changing roles ensure that no one gets stuck with the mantle of darkness.”

Several more dance-battles followed, some light-hearted, the comical tumbles and falls egged on by jaunty tunes; some full of sadness, with brother standing victorious over brother, while the rest of the Prythians chanted a lament to somber pipes.

As the final round of wine and brandy was doled out, the remaining scraps of meat and bread eaten, the last dance of the night promised to be wholly different from the rest. Erryn saw the men’s faces change when they doused the candles and lamps, and banked the hearth fires, casting the great hall in a darkly sullen and shifting light.

“What’re we watching now?” she asked.

Aedran touched the back her hand, sending a thrill up her arm. “Soul of the Dragon tells the story of my people,” he said softly.

“The same you told me before we came into Stormhold?”

“Aye.”

As the bulk of her army knelt around the edges of the great hall, Erryn settled into her chair. One by one, the men began beating their fists against their thighs and raising their voices in a joyful chant. Those not drumming and chanting, perhaps a hundred in all, mimicked the actions of farmers and craftsmen. They smiled and joked as they labored, never noticing a group of stern-faced men drawing near with swords and spears and hammers poised.

The drumming slowly changed into a clamorous rhythm, and the chanting became howls and cries when the warriors attacked. The blows were false, but Erryn cringed to see the one-sided battle played out.

After the workers were subdued and dragged away, the drumming slowed to the beat of a dying heart and the chant became low, grief-stricken. The workers returned, but now there was no joy in their labor. They crawled about on hands and knees, heads bowed, backs contorted as if from a great weight, their hands scraping listlessly at the floor of the great hall. The stern-faced warriors returned as well, but now they laughed and jested as they watched over the enslaved. Erryn searched the faces of those around the great hall, and was stunned to see tears wetting many cheeks.

The drumming and chants changed again, and all at once the workers’ backs straightened and they rose up as one to rip the weapons from their captors. For a long time afterward, they made war.

When at last it seemed the final battle had been fought, the former slaves began circling the great hall, knees bent, weapons thrusting and slashing. They added their voices to their chanting brothers. Fists hammered against thighs, louder than before.

Erryn recalled Aedran’s tale, but what she saw was unfamiliar. “What do they do now?”

“They seek after our birthright, the Soul of the Dragon. Such is the destiny and purpose of all true Prythians.”

The words were on her tongue to ask what that meant, but the drumming rhythm increased until the warriors were running about the great hall. Then, without warning, they broke apart and joined their brethren. No cheers and rowdy calls filled the hall as before, only reverent quiet.

Erryn looked to Aedran and saw the sheen of tears in his eyes. Impulsively, she used the ball of her thumb to brush one glimmering line of dampness from his cheek. “If your destiny brings such sadness, why follow it?”

He caught her hand. “The sadness comes from having to follow this road at all. As I told you before, if our ancestors hadn’t failed us and themselves, we’d not have to search for our lost destiny now.”

She wanted to ask more, but One Eye Thal presented himself. The sheen in his remaining eye had nothing to do with sorrow or regret, but anger. Some of that emotion fled when he looked at Erryn. “The men and I thank you for the feast, and for not letting us freeze off our stones out in that murderous whore of a storm.”

Erryn repressed a grin at his uncouth thanks, not that it troubled her. She had been born to a woodcutter and a surly barmaid. Whether she claimed the title of queen or not, she was uncouth, through and through.

“You’re most welcome, captain. And you have my thanks, as well.”

His brow wrinkled in question.

“You’ve all kept me safe against those who’d crush my claim to a throne that’s never existed, and you’ve followed me even when it makes no sense to do so.” Before he could protest, she rushed on. “There’s not enough gold in the world for such fine warriors to risk your lives for me, yet you do so.”

“Aye,” One Eye Thal said, “Course, by now, it’s not gold we follow, but you.”

Erryn blushed at that, more out of shame than embarrassment. “I’m not so foolish to believe that what this army has gained for me has anything to do with my decisions. As it stands, the best ideas come from General Aedran and you captains. Most times I feel like a girl playing at something I’m not-especially a queen.” She cut off abruptly, knowing that for the absolute truth, and thinking she ought not to have said it aloud. She hid her face behind her cup and gulped at the last of her blackberry brandy.

To her amazement, One Eye Thal and Aedran burst into laughter. “The problem with your ordinary ruler,” One Eye Thal said airily, “is that they rarely think they need advice, even though most wouldn’t know where to shit if you sat them on a privy pot and aimed their arseholes for ‘em.”

Erryn choked on her brandy, spraying the spirits across One Eye Thal’s grizzled face. Then all three were laughing, while One Eye Thal pulled up his tunic to wipe away the brandy.

When the laughter dried up, Aedran said to Erryn, “There are some rulers who are born with the gift to lead … and I think you’re one of those.”

Now her blush was from pleased embarrassment. “Does that mean I can expect you to address me as queen, rather than girl?”

“O-ho!” One Eye Thal hooted. “You’ve stepped knee-deep in it now, lad!”

“I suppose I have at that,” Aedran said.

Erryn sat straight, looking down her nose at him. He didn’t flinch back, but returned her look with one of his own, bold and strong. “Well, general, what’s your answer? Queen or girl?”

“You’re no girl,” he said, but added before she could gloat, “but neither are you fully a queen.”

“That’s your answer?”

He shrugged. “It’s the best I have. But trust that I’ll continue to follow and serve you until you come into your own-for that to happen, I’ll also continue to advise you, as will the rest of your captains.”

One Eye Thal cleared his throat. “I’ll leave you to this argument,” he said, bowing once more and turning back toward Erryn’s somber army.

“Triple the guard,” Aedran called.

Without turning, One Eye Thal signaled that he understood.

You’re no girl … but neither are you fully a queen. Caught between consternation at his mild rebuff, and concern at his order to increase the guard, Erryn felt her anger growing. When Aedran turned toward her, she intended to have it out with him. Her lips parted, but instead of words, there came a frustrated sigh, and she caught his face in her hands and pulled his lips to hers.

Aedran’s eyes widened, but he returned her passion with his own, plunging his fingers into her hair. One moment Erryn was aware of the great hall, the cold graystone walls, the men settling down to rest, and One Eye Thal ordering a triple watch. In a blink it all receded, leaving just her and Aedran.

Her hands brushed over his bearded jaw, his neck, across the breadth of his shoulders. He trembled like a caged animal. One of his hands found her breast. Erryn leaned into him, her fingers burrowing beneath his cloak, tugging at the straps of his armor. You’re not alone! a voice warned, but she refused to heed it.

His free hand glided over her waist, caressed her hip, moved with cautious urgency between her legs. She moaned, brought his mouth to her neck, whispering an answer to his unspoken question. “Yes,” she said, once and again.

When Aedran suddenly broke away, Erryn was not sure what was happening. She couldn’t fathom why the taste of him was still on her lips, or how his strength still tingled in her palms, when he now sat so far away. She sat wobbly and breathless on her makeshift throne.

“What is it?” she asked, disliking the desperation threading her voice.

“We cannot,” he gasped.

She cast about, saw no one looking their way-the closest soldier was a dozen strides distant, and now that it was mostly dark in the great hall, he was only a dim blur. Still, if it was privacy Aedran wanted….

She clutched at his hand. “I know where there is an empty chamber. It’ll be cold-” she flashed him a unsteady smile “-but we can bring blankets to warm us.”

He caught her hand before it could wander to his chest. She felt the same quivering excitement in his fingers that she felt all through her.

Before he could say anything else, she said in a low, enticing voice, “Would you deny your queen the desires of her heart?”

Some of that trembling went out of him. “It’s not our hearts that desire,” he said, looking around with a guilty, uneasy expression. Before she could argue, he added, “But even if this were more than the yearning of our flesh, we cannot be together as … as a man and woman. Not now.”

Erryn wanted to scream for him to take her, beg him to taste her naked skin. She wanted to do the same things to him.… Instead, she dropped his hand and sat back. Disappointment and a queer sense of loss warred against sudden anger. Anger proved the victor.

“Why not?” she demanded.

“Because this night we bared the soul of Pryth to you, things no outlander has ever seen. You may not have been born in Pryth, but you now carry my people within you. That burden and gift is what makes a true Prythian.”

“If carrying the soul of Pryth means I cannot have you, then I don’t want it. Take it back, I beg you.”

“No,” he said, the word falling between them like a heavy stone, stopping her from reaching for him again more surely than if he had struck her a blow. “Not now,” he said, gentler, but still final.

Then when?

Instead of asking, she took a deep breath, smoothed her face, and stood up. “Help me down,” she said, her voice cold, commanding.

He looked at her with surprise and a residue of something-hurt, maybe, or was it disappointment? She did not give a damn. He had toyed with her, what with all his innocent touches and less than innocent looks. Whatever he had hoped to gain, she couldn’t guess, for what most men wanted, she was willing to give, yet he had spurned her.

Aedran slid off the table. “I should explain.”

“Keep your explanations,” Erryn said, following him down. As soon as her feet hit the floor, she began striding away. His grip fell on her shoulder. She tried to shrug him off. When that failed, she made to pry his fingers away. It was a wasted effort.

He spun her around, pushed his face close to hers. “You will hear me out.”

“So be it,” she snapped.

Aedran’s glare softened. “Prythians always choose queens. It has been that way from the time of our ancestors. And our queens are more than women with crowns to the people of Pryth.”

“What more can we be?”

His gaze wandered over her face. “Our queens speak with the voices of the gods, they guide us wisely, command us boldly and justly.”

“What’s that have to do with anything?” She had heard tales of kings and queens who named themselves gods, but she vowed never to be such a one.

“As I told you before, this night we bared ourselves to you in a way that we never have to any outlander. By doing so, we have chosen you to be our true queen.”

“You said yourself that I am no queen,” she said bitterly. “In truth, though I named myself one and the folk of Valdar supported me, I have no mind for making war, or keeping peace, or ruling people. I have no crown, no throne, no banner. You speak often of past ages and histories, but those are only stories to me-new stories, at that. I’m an ignorant orphan who spent most of her life thieving and lying to survive. If you need a place to sleep where the rats are fewest, or desire an apple that’s not as wormy as the rest in the barrel, I can find those things. A true queen would know how to be rid of the rats. A true queen would ensure all the apples in her realm are sweet and good. I am no queen.”

“You misunderstand the abilities of queens,” Aedran said with a gentle smile. “That aside, whatever you were before matters nothing now. You’ll learn all you need to know. In the meantime, you are our chosen queen-the Queen of Pryth. You stand above us, as have all our queens before you. A Prythian queen must represent the will, mind, and soul of our gods. Such a woman would be soiled by the touch of a mere warrior.”

A single flame of hope flickered in her breast. “Then I renounce my title.”

“What has been done in the sight of your army cannot be undone … save by death.”

Death? Is he mad? “I want to go back to Valdar,” she said, struggling for breath.

His brow creased with regret. “It’s too late for that. You have a duty now to your army and the folk of Pryth.”

“If I’m so esteemed, how can you deny me?” she demanded.

“A Prythian queen would never stand against the destiny of her people.”

She stepped closer to him. “What if I do? What if I refuse what you’ve placed upon my shoulders?”

His face hardened. “Then I’d be expected to kill you for a betrayer. You’re a part of us now, and it’s expected that you’ll behave so, lest some begin to think your heart harbors the same treachery that destroyed our ancestors.”

“I hired you blood-hungry fools to serve me, not the other way around.”

“We will serve you … as long as you serve us by embracing your new purpose.” Aedran stepped closer. “Accept and rejoice in that you’ll be queen of more than you ever dreamed.”

“Only if I behave as I’m expected to, which is to say if I behave in ways that serve Pryth?”

“Aye.”

“I never wanted anything but to help my people, those who’d suffered under the thumb of Lord Sanouk….” She trailed off, her eyes widening. “It was you.”

He blinked. “Me?”

“Yes,” Erryn grated. “You put the seed into my head to murder King Nabar’s emissary, and then to cross the Gyntors into the Iron Marches. You knew this would happen all along, didn’t you? All this about me becoming your queen and the voice of your gods. I don’t even know your gods! Ilex is my god-a god of thieves-not Ahnok, nor the God of the Mountains, with his crazed Thousand Daughters. You’ve been manipulating me from the beginning, turning me to do your will.”

He didn’t bother to deny the accusation. “At first, I only wanted to earn the gold and glory you offered, and to win you a proper crown from King Nabar. But all isn’t lost. Now that you’re the Queen of Pryth, we are bound to destroy Nabar, as was your deepest wish all along. In time, we will do that.”

Erryn shook her head. “Only as long as I serve the will of the army I bought!”

“Do not look at it that way.”

“There is no other way to look at it. I was freer as an orphan than I’ll ever be as your queen. Can you not see that you have chained me the way your ancestors were chained? Can you not see that your queens are but pretties placed on a high seat and told what to say and what to think, never truly leading at all?”

Aedran scrubbed a hand through his hair. “That’s nonsense!” He began stammering some explanation, but she cut him off.

“I want to sleep,” Erryn said woodenly, turning away.

This time, he let her go.

Chapter 15

Using a shovel with a flat wooden blade, Rathe tromped across the Lamprey’s deck and pushed a load of snow over the side. Although the air felt warmer, the ice on the River Sedge was thickening. The sound of it crunching against the cog’s bow and under the six pairs of stroking oars made a hellish din.

Loro perched on a nearby barrel, sharpening his sword. Falling snow had crowned the hood of his bearskin cloak. “I thought sure we paid for passage aboard this leaky tub,” he said offhandedly.

Rathe scooped another line of snow over the side. “We did.” He paused to arm sweat from his brow. Where he had just shoveled, fat flakes were already whitening the deck again. If the storm kept up, it would be a long day and a longer night.

Loro looked up from testing the edge of his sword with a thumb. “Then why are you working so damned hard at something the crew is supposed to do?”

“What else am I to do?”

“Relax,” Loro said, shoving his sword into the scabbard. “Let these wretches do their chores.”

Rathe set to work again. “Sitting still makes me nervous.”

With a shake of his head, Loro shucked his dagger and began running the sharpening stone over the blade. “That’s a sickness, brother. Must be. Why, I could lay about half the day, and not feel a bit of unease.”

Rathe gave him a lopsided grinned. “When I’m your age, I’ll likely feel the same.”

“I’m not so old as that, you spindly shit. I just look it because my hair started falling out when I was still on the teat.” Loro scratched his chin, eyes narrowed in thought. “No, I expect your need to labor is on account of being fidgety. For myself,” he went on, ignoring Rathe’s scowl, “I see no need to exert myself without reason. Waste of energy.”

“Some call that sloth,” Rathe laughed, arming more sweat from his brow.

Loro grinned wryly. “Fidgety folk invented the word sloth to make themselves feel better about being so fidgety. Look at you, working up a sweat on such a cold day. None of the crewmen are working so hard.”

Rathe glanced at the sailors in question, and wondered what Loro saw that he didn’t. A few held their hands over a smoldering brazier near the mainmast, but the rest were taking turns clearing the deck of snow, or knocking ice from the rails, yardarms, and shrouds. Gnat used a long brass eyeglass to search the banks of the river. After the first glimpse of Edrik’s company shadowing the Lamprey, they hadn’t been seen since.

Rathe set to clearing the deck again. “I grew up hoeing poor soil, planting crops, reaping crops, chopping wood for the cook stove. The work was endless,” he said, remembering the aches that formed in his hands and shoulders, the baking heat of the sun in high summer cooking his head, the way dirt migrated into every crevice on his body, leaving him chapped and raw in places he would rather not consider.

“Seems like you’d have learned your lesson,” Loro said.

“I learned to hate cabbage and parsnips,” Rathe admitted. “Too much work to grow something that doesn’t do a thing to fill your belly. I feel the same about most things that come out of the ground.”

“From the stories I’ve heard about the Ghosts of Ahnok, you must’ve also had an abiding hatred for crofters.”

Rathe cringed at the rush of memories. Wizened Captain Nariq, seeking levies for King Tazzim’s legions, had traded Rathe’s hoe for the hilt of a sword when he was no more than ten years old, setting him on the path of a soldier. Nothing he had ever done was harder, and he had earned much glory, but he had also spilled much blood. Toward the end, most of it had fallen from innocent crofters and village folk. “I was a soldier. I received my orders, and I followed them.” To my regret, he didn’t add.

“We of the City Watch had orders, too,” Loro drawled. “Course, I rarely followed them. I remember once-”

Murmurs went through the crew, cutting Loro short. Rathe glanced over his shoulder to see Fira crossing the deck with Nesaea by her side. The fire-haired woman had washed her face and hair, and other than a slight green tint to her cheeks, she looked much better.

“Seems Liamas’s potion worked,” Rathe observed.

Loro slid his bulk off the barrel and sauntered toward her with a wide grin. Fira brushed by him without a word and made her way to Liamas, who was also grinning. His grin grew wider when she stretched up and planted a lingering kiss on his lips.

For a moment, the only sound was crunching ice and creaking oars. Then the crew exploded with a round of hoots and catcalls. Fira blushed furiously, Nesaea’s mouth fell open, and Liamas puffed up. Rathe glanced at Loro. His great bald head had developed a scrawling map of throbbing veins.

“Let it be,” Rathe began, but Loro was already stalking forward, his dark eyes fixed on the Prythian giant. He swept Fira behind him. She slid on the icy deck and plopped down on her arse.

“Fool!” she cried, wincing as she tried to stand with Nesaea’s help.

Liamas’s grinning mouth became a flat, bloodless line. Loro glared back. All at once, the crew was in motion, making a broad ring around the two men, somehow managing to cut out Rathe and Nesaea, but leaving Loro, Fira, and Liamas in the center.

“I wonder if you should do something?” Nesaea asked, standing on her tiptoes to get a better look.

Rathe shook his head, resigned. Sometimes a rock was too big to stop from rolling downhill. “From the start, these two have been at each other like strange dogs. Now, with Fira kissing Liamas, well….”

Nesaea grinned mischievously. “She was only thanking him.”

“That’s not how Liamas or Loro sees it, nor the crew.”

Nesaea glanced his way, eyebrows raised. “Surely you are not saying this is her fault?”

Rathe was not about to let himself be dragged into what he considered childish foolery. “A kiss on the cheek might’ve gone over better. Of course, we are talking about Loro-a smile and a word might’ve been too much for him.”

“Fira is almost as bad.” Nesaea said. “I expect she wanted to goad him, which might turn out worse than she believed.”

As the crew began chanting for a fight, Loro and the hulking quartermaster continued to stare at one another, deadly silent.

“Hopefully they won’t kill one another,” Rathe said. “I don’t fancy Captain Ostre tossing us overboard.”

Nesaea’s eyes went wide. “You don’t think it will come to that, do you-killing, I mean?”

Rathe allowed himself a rueful chuckle. “There’ll be a fair amount of blood and bruises, but no more than that.” I hope.

Nesaea’s worried look fell on Loro, and Rathe knew she understood what he did. Loro was a man of few passions, but they were fierce. Losing didn’t necessarily mean he would quit.

“Enough!” Ostre’s roar froze everyone. Glowering, he shoved his way through the circle of men. “What’s all this?”

“This reeking heap of pigshit wants a fight,” Liamas said, stripping off his coat and tunic to reveal a towering frame corded with muscle and sheathed in scarred, golden skin. Loro scowled so fiercely that the crew’s thundering approval of their champion fell silent. Even Captain Oster waited in silence.

Loro flung off his bearskin cloak, then pointed at Liamas. “Have a good look, friends, for I’m about to bathe this poxy whoreson in his own blood.”

Liamas’s grin came back. Having fought beside Prythians from the first day he joined the legions, Rathe knew the warriors of Pryth fought for the sheer joy of it, even if that meant fighting amongst themselves.

Loro showed no concern. He wrenched off his steel-scaled jerkin and the padded tunic beneath, and hurled them into the ring of onlookers. Where Liamas was golden, Loro was nut-brown and covered in a pelt of bristling black hair. While he might not have the teats of a grandmother, as observed by the tailor Master Abyk, he was unquestionably fatter than Liamas. Yet, under all that drooping suet, he carried a bull’s size and strength.

“So be it,” Captain Ostre said. “But before we begin, I’d hear the grievance.”

Loro spoke up first. “This bastard’s been itching to get my woman out of her clothes since she came aboard. Now he’s gone and given her a witch’s brew to get her all wet-”

Fira’s full-armed slap cracked against Loro’s face. He backed up a step, his jaw bunching under the red handprint forming on his stubbled cheek. He shouted something at her, but the rowdy crew overrode him.

“Enough!” Ostre bellowed again. When all was quiet, he went on. “I cannot be rid of my quartermaster-” he wheeled toward Loro “-and I cannot in good conscious toss your wretched arse over the rail, so I see no choice but to let you two settle this with fists.”

“Aye,” Loro and Liamas declared at once.

Fira’s brow knotted in worry, but whatever she might have said was lost when the crew gently but firmly hauled her outside the ring.

“Liamas will crush him,” she said, joining Rathe and Nesaea.

Rathe didn’t want to believe it, but Nesaea had detailed Liamas’s exploits against the crew of the Crimson Gull. While he had no doubt about Loro’s fighting abilities, the Prythian stood a head and a half taller than Loro, and had most likely been fighting since he could walk.

Ostre laid out the rules. “There’ll be no biting or tearing at the other man’s tenders, and no trying to break his neck. When the contest is over, I expect the winner and the loser to put all this nonsense aside. We’ve a ship to sail, and the gods of winter are bent on making sure we stay in the Iron Marches.”

“Agreed,” Liamas said.

“Agreed,” Loro said.

Ostre, looking somewhat excited, joined Rathe and the others. “There’s no need for you ladies to watch,” he said to Nesaea and Fira.

“He’s my lover,” Fira said grudgingly. “I must make sure he doesn’t get killed.”

“There’ll be none of that,” Ostre assured her.

Rathe noted the eager sheen in Nesaea’s violet eyes when she said, “I cannot think of a better way to pass the time.” My goddess of snow and silver, he thought, remembering how she had worn a similar expression the few times he had seen her fight.

“Very well,” Ostre said, and led them up a short flight of stairs to the poop deck. After brushing snow off the rail, he leaned forward. “Are the contestants ready?

Liamas answered by rolling his thick neck.

“Let’s get on with it!” Loro bellowed, slamming a fist against his chest.

“They’re like a pair of cocksure roosters,” Fira said, her voice somewhere between marveling and fearful.

“They’re men with bruised pride,” Rathe said.

“Pride is nothing but a cause for trouble,” Fira said, as if she had not known that provoking Loro might lead to this.

For himself, Rathe knew that if a man had been sniffing around Nesaea, his weapon of choice would not have been fists, but steel … and steel had a nasty way of stilling hearts.

“Begin!” Oster called.

Loro and Liamas began circling each other in the falling snow, their feet leaving prints on the slushy deck. Liamas resembled a great cat, hungry and determined. Loro was akin to a bear that had enjoyed a good long season of feasting.

“Are they going to do something?” Nesaea asked, after the opponents had spent several minutes taunting each other.

“Liamas is just taking a measure of your fat friend,” Ostre said confidently. He leaned over to Rathe. “Care to wager a spot of gold?”

Rathe didn’t have much choice but to choose the side of his companion, but he did so willingly. Irritating as Loro could be, the man had stood at his side when others fled. “Free passage if Loro wins. If he loses, then double your price.”

Ostre nodded enthusiastically.

Loro has a better than fair chance, Rathe was telling himself, when Liamas’s fist suddenly hooked across his body, blindingly fast, and cracked against Loro’s chin with a sound akin to mallet thudding into a wheel of cheese. The watchers roared as Loro staggered away, his arms windmilling. When Loro regained his balance and set his feet, their exuberance faded to murmurs of awe. Growling, Loro shook his head. The quartermaster’s victorious grin collapsed.

“Damn me,” Ostre muttered. “Never seen a man take such a blow from Liamas…. But have no fear, my quartermaster has faced strong men before.”

“He’s never faced Loro,” Rathe said, voice low. He had seen Loro chew the face off a Hilyoth before, one of the Shadenmok’s devil-hounds.

Loro laughed as he stalked close. “If you wanted to kiss and tickle, then why not say so?”

The crew erupted in cheers.

When the Prythian’s fist struck again, Loro absorbed the punch and laughed all the harder. Rathe found himself growing excited enough to forget the perpetual cold and snow. He did, however, notice Nesaea pressing against him, her eyes wild and beautiful. Fira’s lips formed a delicate pink circle, but she didn’t speak a word.

Loro ducked when Liamas swung a third time, and the Prythian’s fist smacked against the top of Loro’s skull. Dancing backward, shaking his wounded hand, the quartermaster cursed in pain. Loro plowed forward, head lowered, and smashed into the Prythian. With a strangled oof, the quartermaster floundered into the ring of crewmen, who shoved him back.

While Liamas struggled to draw a wheezy gasp, Loro raised his fists to the sky and made a slow turn. “Better get another champion! This one’s soft as an old whore’s teats!”

Liamas’s face went ugly, and he charged.

“Behind you!” Fira shouted.

Loro spun. When Liamas’s fist came swooping in, Loro lowered his head again. This time the cracking sound was different, more of a sodden crunch. Liamas jumped away, hand held against his chest. Three of the fingers looked like a mangled claws.

“Broke his fool hand on the man’s skull!” Ostre gasped in dismay.

“Double the wager?” Rathe asked.

Ostre’s black beard shook in agitation. “Aye,” he rumbled.

Loro swung around the big Prythian, shouting insults against everyone from the man’s mother to his unborn children, before bulling his way inside the quartermaster’s guarded stance. Instead of battering Loro’s head again, Liamas hammered an elbow against Loro’s spine. The fat man’s feet went out from under him and he crashed to his knees. Liamas landed a thudding kick to the side of Loro’s face, knocking him sprawling. Nesaea clutched at Rathe’s arm, and Fira moaned behind a raised hand.

“See there?” Ostre said, nodding smugly.

Rathe watched Loro push himself up on shaking arms.

“Now who needs a champion, you fat bastard?” Liamas demanded, earning shouts of approval from his supporters.

Loro clambered to his feet and wiped away a trickle of blood from his temple. He looked up slowly, a stony smirk pulling at his lips. “I’m done playing with you, little sister.”

With that, the two men roared toward each other, collided with a thud, their fists flying. When they broke apart, Loro was breathing hard and blood was flowing from his ruptured lips. For his part, Liamas looked better off. Most of the blood on him belonged to Loro.

Cradling his broken hand, Liamas waded in and kicked Loro in his barrel of a gut, doubling him over. The quartermaster straightened him with another thumping boot to the face. The fat man reeled, struggling to stay upright, and fell against the cheering crew. Before they could throw him back into the circle, Liamas closed in.

Using his good fist, he struck Loro a blow to the cheek, backhanded him, and then sank a fist into the man’s hanging belly in rapid succession. The crew flung Loro away, and he crashed face down on the deck. Liamas treated the crew to a triumphant shout, which most of them returned.

“Your man fought well,” Ostre said, holding out his hand.

“Fool,” Fira said, tears in her eyes as she turned to the stairs leading down off the poop deck. Nesaea glanced at Rathe, then joined Fira.

Rathe wasn’t paying much attention to the women, the Prythian giant, the crew, or Captain Ostre’s waiting hand. His eye was fixed on Loro, who had gotten to his hands and knees. Rills of blood ran over his face, making lurid patterns in the trampled slush on the deck. A growing number of crewmen began to take notice, and a hush slowly fell over them.

Liamas followed their stares. “Give over, you bloated bag of suet, or I’ll unman you in front of Fira, and take her for my own.”

“She’ll never be yours,” Loro said in a hoarse, woeful voice.

“We’ll see,” Liamas said.

“No,” Loro answered, struggling to his feet, “we will not.”

With a resigned sigh, Liamas moved in again, landing devastating blows against Loro’s face and ribs. The fat man grimaced, but did little to ward against the attack. His singular goal seemed to be driving closer to his assailant. The thin streams of blood on his face grew to rivers pouring from nasty splits over his cheekbones and above his eyebrows. The flood ran down his chest and the expanse of his gut, soaking the waist of his trousers. When it became obvious he was not going to lie down, Liamas gave up protecting his injured hand and let it fly. His efforts came too late.

Loro reached through the flurry and caught the giant Prythian by the throat. While Liamas pummeled him with renewed vigor, Loro used his other hand to catch hold of his opponent’s groin. The crew began squalling about foul play, but Loro paid them no more mind than he did Liamas’s frantic efforts to break free.

With a straining grunt, Loro bent his knees and hefted the Prythian over his head, then made a stumbling dash for Lamprey’s rail. Crewmen hurled him back, and Loro dropped the giant to the deck. Before Liamas rolled away, Loro began putting his boots to the man. The Prythian crossed his arms over his head, and Loro redoubled his efforts. He kept at it until the crew began to protest. Rathe belatedly understood Loro meant to kill the Prythian.

Vaulting over the poop deck’s rail, Rathe shoved through the ring of sailors, and spun Loro around. Still ensnared by a killing fury, he swung a bloodied fist at Rathe, who dodged back, then slapped the man hard across the face. A measure of awareness came into Loro’s eyes. Below the rage-filled stare, Rathe saw a man with a deeply wounded heart, and he realized none of this had to do with stung pride, but only Loro’s love for Fira.

“It’s finished,” Rathe said, leading him away from a groaning Liamas.

Chest billowing, blood and snot bubbling from his nostrils, Loro nodded weakly. “Aye, brother, it is over. Like you said before, it’s time to be rid of these wenches, and all the troubles that come with them.” He pulled free from Rathe and stumbled away, disappearing below deck.

“What did he mean?” Nesaea asked.

Rathe turned to find both her and Fira staring at him with hurt and anger smoldering in their eyes. “It was something I said to get him off all that talk of becoming a thief along the Sea of Muika.”

“Of course,” Nesaea said, flashing him a tepid smile. “I should’ve known.”

As they followed Loro, Rathe worried they did not believe him. And why should they? he thought. After all, he had already left them once before, back at Valdar.

Chapter 16

“How’s Fira?” Rathe asked, using his new blade to parry Nesaea’s sword thrust. Steel rang as their feet danced lightly over the icy deck. The snowfall had stopped the night before, but the gray skies promised more.

“Angry,” Nesaea said in a distracted voice.

Rathe lunged, his sword flashing at her unprotected breast. With startling swiftness, she whirled and raked his blade aside. He abruptly changed direction, forcing her to do the same.

“I guess that’s better than Loro,” Rathe said. “He took quite a beating.”

“Serves him right.”

“He was protecting Fira’s honor.” And his love for her, Rathe thought, but didn’t say.

Nesaea’s eyes narrowed. “Is that what you call trying to kick a man to death?”

Rathe circled out of distance. “As I recall, you seemed as eager as anyone else to watch the fight. Besides, everyone was sure Liamas would crush Loro-even Fira. Seems to me that Loro had no choice but to make sure he was the clear victor.”

Nesaea jabbed the tip of her sword at Rathe’s middle. A half-hearted effort, at best. Smirking, he beat her blade aside. An instant later, her dagger whispered out of its sheath and slashed at his face. He leaped back, surprised he still had a nose, his own dagger coming to hand before his feet lit upon the deck. Nesaea crossed her blades to catch Rathe’s overhand strike, and swept it down and away, upsetting his dagger thrust. She changed direction, now forcing him to match her.

“What makes you think Fira needs her honor protected,” Nesaea said, “when she’s been doing fine for many years without him?”

“Most everyone needs protection, one time or another. Most often those who need it the most are those who’re too cocky to see that they need help.”

“Cocky?”

“What would you call kissing your lover’s rival?” Rathe could think of a few other choice words, but chose to keep them to himself, if only because he knew Fira well enough by now to guess she had only been prodding Loro for the sake of prodding him. A dangerous and foolish game better suited to children.

“She was only thanking a friend for helping with her seasickness,” Nesaea retorted, making a wicked slash at his legs.

Rathe leaped back, but this time she came at him hard, sword and dagger slicing through the cold air. Steel rang as he spun and gave her retreating, leather-clad rump a firm kick. Nesaea wheeled, a hectic splash of color staining her cheeks. Rathe found himself wondering if they were still talking about Loro and Fira.

“Between friends,” he said, “a word of thanks tends to suffice.”

Nesaea shrugged that off. “As it happens, Fira was very appreciative.”

Rathe loosed a derisive laugh. “Then it’s a good thing Liamas didn’t cure her of boils, or she might’ve bedded him right there in front of everyone.”

“Try not to be as big a fool as Loro,” Nesaea snarled, coming at him. Rathe fought her off, but their match was beginning to feel a bit closer to a true fight.

“In that case,” he said when out of reach, the stirrings of irritation flaring in his chest, “I’ll remember your opinion when a comely woman helps me overcome some difficulty or other, and I need to thank her in a friendly and appreciative manner.”

Nesaea’s cheeks grew redder, and her eyes squinted to dangerous slits. “Try it, Scorpion, and you’ll find yourself missing your stinger.”

“I prefer to keep my stinger,” Rathe said dryly, swatting aside her dagger before it could fulfill her promise. Her sword followed, but he had shifted off balance, and for a moment he feared she was about to cleave his arse. At the last instant, she twisted her wrist and spanked him smartly with the flat of her blade.

The watching crewmen’s roar of approval drew Captain Ostre’s attention. “Get back to work!” The booming command sent them scurrying, and put an end to Rathe and Nesaea’s match.

Rathe was about to congratulate her efforts, but Nesaea whirled and stalked away, her bare steel flashing dully. He looked after her, bemused.

“Best let her temper cool, lad,” Captain Ostre said, coming to a halt beside Rathe. For his part, Ostre had the good grace not to say much about the brawl between Loro and Liamas, though he was put out at having his quartermaster bedridden.

Rathe gave him a questioning look.

“Might not be obvious to most of these rogues,” Ostre said, absently scratching at his beard, “but I know a spat when I see one.”

“Spat?” The word strange on Rathe’s tongue. Before Nesaea, there had been plenty of woman who wanted to share a night of passion with the Champion of Cerrikoth, but nothing more.

“Spat,” Ostre repeated, “lover’s quarrel, call it what you will.”

“We were sparring,” Rathe said, sliding his blades into their scabbards. “As for Nesaea, she’s angry because she lost.”

Ostre fixed him with a doubtful eye. “Seems she had you there at the end.”

Rathe avoided rubbing his tender backside.

“Most often the best thing to do with women,” Ostre went on, “is to play the mummer.”

Rathe disagreed. “Seems the better choice is to drag grievances out in the open.”

“That’s because you’re young and foolish. Best to let women win … or at least let them think they won.”

“Best for who?”

“For you both, lad,” Ostre said with a heavy sigh, as if he didn’t trust his own advice.

“I’ll keep that in mind.”

Before Rathe could move away, Ostre caught his arm. “As it happens, I didn’t come to offer advice.”

“Then what?”

Ostre looked toward to the southern riverbank, not more than a hundred strides away. By now, the Lamprey had sailed well into the long and snaking gorge that ended at Ruan Breach. Rocky walls bounded the river and soared high, overtopped by listing firs and pines draped in fluffy cloaks of snow. “Some of my crew saw one of those riders again.”

“Edrik’s company, same as before?”

“It would seem so,” Ostre said slowly. “A scout, most like, keeping an eye on us.”

Rathe considered the Lamprey’s pace downstream. “They’re pushing their horses hard. How much farther before we come to the breach?”

“Not near far enough to tire the horses my brother sold them,” Oster said. “But after we get through, the river opens up. From there to the White Sea, we’ll be untouchable. In the meantime, we’re ready as we can be.” The crew had lined the rails with a ratty assortment of shields, and had put out barrels of salted water with buckets stacked nearby, to use against any attack of fire.

“But first we need to get through Ruan Breach,” Rathe said. The gorge was getting narrower by the hour, and the river swifter.

“Aye,” Ostre said again. “And that’s why I came to you. Nesaea has it that you’re a demon with a bow. A few good archers can keep our foes busy while my crew sails the Lamprey-once we’re in the gap, with the river surging, things can go wrong in a blink.”

“I’m a fair enough shot,” Rathe demurred. He had been the finest archer in the Ghosts of Ahnok. “As is Loro.”

“The more the better-long as your man can put the past behind him.”

“I’ll talk to him,” Rathe promised, but guessed there was no need. Loro was quick to anger, but quicker to smile. He had proven his point, if at Liamas’s expense. It was anyone’s guess if Fira would ever forgive her lover for making such a brutal and bloody scene.

Nesaea was forced to halt when the skinny cook bustled out of the galley carrying a steaming pot. When he glanced at her, her anger flared. “Don’t you have anything better to do than ogle every woman you happen across?”

The man’s eyes went wide. “Sorry, m’lady.”

“I’m not a lady, fool.”

“As you say,” he muttered, the contents of his pot sloshing as he squeezed by.

Shaking off her irritation, Nesaea continued to Loro and Fira’s cabin. She was about to open the door, but raised voices within gave her pause. Loro, it seemed, had come to apologize. Nesaea was sure he wouldn’t get any sympathy from Fira. He would be lucky to make it out with his skin intact.

She folded her arms and leaned against the wall, one foot tapping restlessly against the deck. That drumming tattoo ended abruptly when she realized the raised voices she heard were not spoken in anger. Are they laughing?

She could scarcely believe it. After Loro pummeled Liamas, and all but announced to everyone that he was done with Fira, how could they now be laughing together?

But they were. And then Fira’s voice lowered, becoming a seductive cooing, and Loro’s laughter took on a different note.

Nesaea cursed under her breath, shoving away from the wall. She battered the door with her fist, refusing to let her friend make as big a fool of herself as Loro had already proven to be.

Their voices cut off at once, followed by a moment of silence, then tittering laughter-and tittering it was, like a pair of young lovers.

Fira swung the door open. Her hair and clothes were disheveled, and her breath was coming too fast. “Nesaea? I thought you were sparring with Rathe?”

“I was, until he began acting the idiot. Now I find you doing the same.”

Fira abruptly shut door in her face. Loro said something within, and Fira answered. A moment later, the door swung wide again, framing Loro’s battered features. He searched Nesaea’s eyes, then turned back to Fira. “You’re right, they had a spat. I’ll leave you to it.”

Nesaea stood aside for him to pass, her mouth hanging open. After Loro vanished up the steps to the main deck, Fira dragged Nesaea into the cabin and shut the door.

“Well?”

“Well what?” Nesaea said acidly, plopping down on the edge of the bed. Fira had aired the cabin out and lit a few candles. Now instead of sickness, it smelled of mold, tar, and burning tallow.

“What did you two fight about?” Fira asked, sitting down and taking Nesaea’s hand, as if she needed comfort.

Wondering how Fira could know they had fought, Nesaea pried herself loose of Fira’s grasp. “You, as it happens.”

Fira laughed. “That was a foolish waste.”

Nesaea gaped at her. “Last night you were ready to make a eunuch of Loro, and now I find you flirting with him, and you call me foolish?”

Fira put on a sly grin and shrugged off Nesaea’s consternation. “Until you interrupted, we were doing a fair bit more than flirting. As to cutting off Loro’s manhood, you know me better than most, and I shouldn’t have to explain my, ah, rages. As for as Loro and I, we fight and then we love.”

“What of Liamas?”

“What of him? I told you on the trip here looking for your father that he’s too pretty by far.” Fira shuddered. “Rather he was. Anyway, I could never love a man who thinks he’s more comely than me.”

“Loro almost killed him!” Nesaea protested, knowing full well that was not what was bothering her, but at the same time having no idea why she was angry.

“Did he?”

“You know he did. If Rathe hadn’t stopped him-”

“Then someone else would have,” Fira assured her. “If not, then Loro would’ve stopped … at least, I think so. Though, I must say, my kiss was a bit more costly for Liamas than I expected.” She grinned mischievously. “I hope he liked it. Either way, it has all turned out for the best.”

“Has it?” Nesaea asked, appalled, not sure she knew her friend half so well as she thought.

Fira gave her a guilty look. “I suppose not, if you and Rathe are fighting over my nonsense. But I have to wonder, were you really fighting over us at all?”

“Who else, if not you?”

Fira pulled her hair over one shoulder and fixed Nesaea with a level gaze. “You make a fine show of playing the highborn, and that act has earned you and the Maidens a fair bit of coin, but you’re not, and will never be, a true noblewoman.”

“I know that,” Nesaea said, though she felt a twinge of remorse at hearing it.

“Do you? Or, deep down, have you begun to believe you really are Lady Nesaea, and that Rathe is some handsome lord, come to take away your troubles?”

Nesaea’s mouth worked. “Most of my life I’ve done well enough on my own. I don’t need a lord’s help, or Rathe’s, for that matter.”

“Perhaps not,” Fira replied, “but is it such a poor thing to have someone to share your burdens with, now and again?”

Nesaea stood up and began pacing. The cabin felt stuffier than before, the air cloying. “What are you getting at?”

“You say you need no one, and as long as I’ve known you, that’s been true. But after Rathe pulled you out of Lord Sanouk’s catacombs, only to then leave you with Queen Erryn-”

“That jumped-up chit’s no queen,” Nesaea growled, remembering all too well the dismay and hurt she’d felt when Rathe abandoned her to guide Erryn, the same pretty slip of a girl who had all but begged Rathe to share her bed and become her king.

“She has the will and the wealth of any dozen kings,” Fira said. “And because of you, she has the beginnings of a fortress and an army of Prythian mercenaries to protect it and her. If those things don’t make her a queen, then there are a fair number of queens and kings who don’t deserve the title. But that’s not my point.”

“What is?”

“After we left Valdar, you headed in the same direction as Rathe and Loro.”

Nesaea scowled. “We’d already spent a season entertaining throughout Cerrikoth, and with winter coming, east into Qairennor was the only way to go. That Rathe and Loro went the same was happenstance.”

“Maybe,” Fira allowed. “But if you’d not heard of your father in Cliffbrook, we Maidens would have wintered along the shores of the Sea of Muika.”

“What difference does that make?” Nesaea demanded.

Fira looked at her as if she were daft. “Because that’s where Loro has always talked of going, and for certain you would’ve found Loro at Rathe’s side.”

“Are you saying I was chasing Rathe?”

Fira gave her a bland look.

“That’s absurd. I’ve never pursued a man, and I never will.”

“Is it so wrong to follow the one you love?”

Nesaea felt a pang. “I’ve never said I loved him, and he’s surely never said as much to me.”

“The words might not have been spoken, but that changes nothing.”

With some effort, Nesaea kept her mouth shut. There had been times after the madness of Ravenhold when it seemed Rathe would speak the feelings of his heart, but he never had.

Nesaea gusted a sigh. “I do not wish to speak of this.”

Fira shrugged. “You’ll have to come around to it sometime, unless you plan on sending Rathe away, and going after your sister alone.”

“I might at that,” Nesaea said, hating that a part of her meant it. She’d had help along the way, but most of her life had been ruled by her own actions.

And is that the real reason you are angry? a small voice asked. Nesaea conceded that it was. The idea of relinquishing her freedom to a man who had cast her aside once before, even if he had done so thinking that was the best way to keep her safe, didn’t sit well with her.

Even for love? came that same small voice.

Nesaea considered the question, but could find no answer.

Chapter 17

Erryn started awake, eyes taking in the pale gray light spread across the uneven floor tiles. Morning already, she thought, but felt unrested. She had seen the same snowy glow of dawn every morning since taking shelter at Stormhold. The fortress was vast, with countless chambers and halls carved into the mountain. Had she chosen to, she could have explored for days, maybe weeks.

But what good is exploring a prison? The idea wasn’t new, but no less troubling for its frequency. She almost laughed at her former irritation of Aedran calling her girl instead of queen. What I’d give to be a mere girl again, one who Aedran tapped on the nose, and favored with wanton looks.

Now, because her hired subjects had shown her their convoluted history through a series of dances, she was the Queen of Pryth. She didn’t understand that custom in the least, and the longer she thought about it, the more foolish it seemed. Worse still, instead of revering her supposed authority, they treated her as a jewel or a talisman to be fawned over on occasion, then tucked inside a locked box and hidden away.

I have to escape, she thought, this new idea making her heart race. Just as quickly, her hopes fell. Before she had gone to bed, One Eye Thal had reported that another storm was blowing in. Despite the news, Aedran ordered the men to make ready to set out come dawn, just in case. Another safeguard was to keep up the hunt for more hidden food stores within Stormhold.

Seeing no reason to crawl out of her makeshift bed on the floor, Erryn closed her eyes. She lay there a long time, struggling to find sleep, before her eyes popped open again. The pale light she had seen earlier was gone, and she guessed a guard must have passed by before, using a candle to light his way. Weary as she was, sleep seemed farther away than ever. She rolled to her back and pulled her blankets up to her chin.

Queen of Pryth, she thought in disgust. Voice of the gods. I want to take back everything I ever hoped for, sneak off into the night, and behave as if I never named myself queen of anything….

Her thoughts trailed away when she noticed the faint light had returned, and was falling from the ceiling … a ceiling that was moving. She blinked, rubbed her eyes. The glow remained-not from a single source, but from many hundreds, maybe thousands, all tiny and wriggling.

Erryn sat up, the blankets pooling at her waist. She held up her hand, turned it with growing wonder. A silver radiance bathed her fingers. She flung aside her blankets and stood up-

The light winked out, leaving her in absolute darkness.

Not absolute, she thought, turning toward a faint golden glow … the light of a candle pushing through the doorway, made weak by the length of the corridor beyond, at the end of which stood her guards. She tilted her head, listening for any indication that the men had seen anything alarming. Other than the blood pounding in her ears, she heard nothing.

Erryn was moving before she decided she should, rushing for the doorway. She had to tell someone what she had seen. A shape loomed before her, huge and furred. She recoiled, eyes bulging. Something strong grabbed her shoulders, pulled her close when she lashed out, burying her in the scent of wolfskin and leather and oiled steel, and that of a man. Aedran.

Almost as soon as she recognized the smell and feel of him, her fear became rage. “Unhand me, oaf!”

He held her, speaking in a soft rush. “Easy. It was just a dream. Just a dream.”

“It was no dream, idiot. There’s something in here with us.”

He stiffened, and she heard the gentle ring of steel escaping its scabbard. “What?”

“Be still,” she said, “and you’ll see.”

He stood stock still, his breath deep and even. She stood at his side, irritated that some foolish part of her tried to move her closer to him. Somehow, she resisted.

Minutes crept by, but the room remained dark.

She sensed him shifting about, and squeezed his hand to signal him to stay still. When did I catch hold of his hand? She would have dropped it, but his fingers were twined through hers, and the jackass would probably make her work to get free, which in turn would leave them standing here even longer in the dark … near her bedding, where she had wanted to be with him not so long ago. She hated that a part of her still wanted to feel him pressed against her, his lips on hers-

Her amorous thoughts ended when the light on the ceiling came to life again.

“What is that?” Aedran breathed, craning his head. In that cold glow his beard looked more silver than red, his skin lined and gray. That’s how he’ll look as an old man, she thought.

And still handsome, a pesky voice intoned, irritating her.

“Do you know what they are?” she asked.

“No.” He studied the crawling lights awhile longer, eyes wide with wonder. “They don’t seem dangerous.”

“I wonder how often folk have said the same, only to end up dead,” she answered scornfully.

He either didn’t hear her, or was acting as if he hadn’t.

Erryn squinted, letting her lashes weaken the light enough to make out the creatures. They looked like furry caterpillars, she decided, though smaller than any she had ever found around Valdar or Hilan. And, of course, these glowed, something she had never seen before, let alone heard of.

One of them fell off the ceiling and hit the floor with a faint plopping noise. Its light died at once. Erryn kept her gaze on the spot, waiting. After a few moments, it began to glow again, apparently unhurt by the tumble. It inched over the floor, a fuzzy, luminous ball.

“I don’t want them falling on me,” she said, shuddering at the thought. Caterpillars were a short step up from worms, to her mind, and worms were an even shorter step up from maggots.

Aedran opened his mouth to answer, but a revolted shout cut him short.

“That was close,” he said.

“One of the guards,” Erryn answered, sure of it.

They darted from the chamber into the corridor, and there halted, the earlier cry forgotten in their amazement. The walls, ceiling, and floor of the passage were crawling with the small caterpillars, filling the air with a misty light.

Aedran waved his hand near one wall. The insects recoiled, but didn’t fade. “These don’t seem to mind our presence.”

“They must’ve been here all along,” Erryn said. “Maybe they’re getting used to having us about.”

“That’s what I’m afraid of.”

Another shout got them moving again.

Erryn trotted after Aedran, wincing every time the leather soles of her boots burst a caterpillar with a crunching pop.

By the time they rounded the corner and came into a much broader corridor than the first, the guards’ shouts had become dismayed laughter. They found the two men, Zander and Coran, standing one before the other. Like all Prythians, they were tall and broad, and made bulkier by their fur cloaks and thick leather-and-scale armor.

“They tickle,” Zander said with a grimace. He was holding a torch aloft with one hand, and using the other to keep his curly black hair off his neck so Coran could flick off the caterpillars inching over his skin.

“You’re bleeding,” Erryn said, seeing crimson pinpricks dotting Zander’s pale skin.

“Aye,” Zander said, turning a bit. When his eye found her, they filled with a measure of deferential awe that she had grown to hate. She had liked her men better in Valdar, where they had scarcely paid her any mind. Zander added, “Those spines are tickly, but sharp. One false move, and you’re pricked.”

“Be still,” Coran growled, sending the last caterpillar soaring. Satisfied that he was done, he stepped back and ruffled his golden hair, which was shorn close to his scalp like Aedran’s. He was bleeding also, giving his head a patchwork look.

Aedran glanced at the ceiling. “There are more than ever.”

“They come out of the cracks,” Zander said, following the general’s gaze. “Started about an hour ago-at least, that’s when we noticed them. At first, they winked on and off whenever we moved around, like they were scared of us. After that, they became friendlier, and started dropping down to see what we were about.” He spoke as if they were pets; a little troublesome, perhaps, but harmless. Erryn shared no such appreciation for the wriggling creatures.

“You didn’t think it important enough to raise the alarm?” Aedran demanded, sidestepping one of the worms as it fell. It hit the floor and bounced on its spines, its light flickering briefly, then growing steady again. It joined a trio hunching over the flagstones toward Aedran’s closest boot.

Zander gingerly rubbed the back of his neck. He winced when he brought his blood-smeared hand before his face. “Didn’t see much need,” he admitted. “They’re just caterpillars-come spring, they’ll likely turn into moths. If we raised the alarm every time we saw a spider or beetle, what would Queen Erryn think of her warriors?”

One of the creatures plopped onto Erryn’s shoulder, and she went very still. Up close, its eyes were black and faceted, like a cut gemstone-a black, soulless stone, with points of pale, shimmery light caught in each angular surface. She also saw its mouth, a pair of oversized pincers guarded by a nest of spines that looked like glass needles. It began inching its way toward her face, those pincers gnashing together. Just at the edge of hearing, she could make out a scraping noise, like grinding teeth. She let out a disgusted oath.

Aedran caught her before she touched the worm, and Zander swept it off her shoulder. Cursing, he raised his hand. There were several spines lodged in the edge of his small finger. They still glowed, but the light was fading fast, sinking like some ghostly ink into his skin.

“Burns,” he hissed, plucking out the glassy barbs.

Aedran let go of Erryn and took Zander’s torch. He swept it over the worms creeping over the floor. Their spines crisped and curled in the heat. The general leaned over, pressed the torch closer. The creatures tried to retreat, but didn’t get far before curling up on themselves, their light dying as they went still.

“They die easy enough,” he said, straightening.

“We don’t have enough torches to cook them all,” Coran advised.

Aedran scanned the ceiling. “Not if we’re spread out. But if we can clear out the great hall, we can keep watch for more.”

“They’re just caterpillars,” Zander repeated, as a flurry of cries echoed along the dim, cold ways of Stormhold.

“Just so,” Aedran agreed. “But I’m not about to let them use us as pincushions.”

More shouts followed the first, and Erryn imagined the wriggling caterpillars swarming her army, burying them alive. “I suggest we hurry.”

Her general and the two guards offered no argument.

By the time Erryn, Aedran, Coran, and Zander reached the hall, half of her army had already gathered there to escape the caterpillars. But the small creatures were here too, by the thousands, and their faint light washed over the soldiers, making them seem more like ghosts than men.

At Aedran’s order, a hundred torches were soon alight, and the Prythians began roasting the squirmy host.

“Seems like they’re coming after us,” One Eye Thal snarled, stomping a few spiny creatures underfoot. They crunched like nuts under a mallet. He had rushed to join Erryn and Aedran as soon as he saw them, along with her other three captains.

“I think mayhap our heat draws them,” Kormak said, trying to glance everywhere at once and making his thick black braid whip like an angry serpent. He looked very close to bolting.

Erryn wanted to flee as well, and leave Stormhold to its true masters. The caterpillars disgusted her beyond words. Crushing and burning them by the score did nothing to ease her revulsion. If their efforts to eradicate the creatures had shown any progress, she might’ve felt differently, but right now, they were fighting a losing battle.

Somewhere off to her right, Aedran began shouting orders, but his was just one of many voices. The great hall overflowed with the dull thunder of men cursing loudly when pincers of spines pierced them.

Erryn shuddered at the sight of her army flailing about in the dusty torchlight, flapping their arms, or vigorously brushing their hands through bloody hair. Where the men stood on the brink of overwhelming dread, the packhorses had crossed the threshold. Snorts and whinnies filled the hall, and their stomping hooves rang loudly against the flagstones, beating out a hectic rhythm.

Still the worms came, a slow, unending horde.

They’re everywhere! Erryn imagined she could feel them crawling over her, sticky and sharp … yet whenever she searched herself, she was free of the caterpillars. Maybe they’re under my clothes, sneaking over my arms and chest, inching up my legs, seeking-

Another wave of disgusted fright threatened to send Erryn running out of the fortress, but the memory of the howling storm held her fast. How long will the fear of freezing to death outweigh the fear of being chewed to death? Neither choice suited her. She wanted to live.

“We must clear out a smaller area,” Erryn shouted at One Eye Thal.

“Aye,” the grizzled captain said, grunting as he used a gloved hand to sweep half a dozen caterpillars off one arm, then doing the same to the other. More writhed in his hair, like spiky fish in a net. He turned his good eye on her, wide and questioning. “Where do we make our stand?”

Erryn’s mind raced, but produced nothing of worth. The other captains had left her side, caught up in the unruly tide of men slapping and swatting at themselves. Curses and cries had risen to a thundering commotion. Close by, a horse reared up, bowling men over.

“Fire kills them,” Erryn said, holding up her oil lamp, the heat of which sent a caterpillar squirming off her arm. So far, she had avoided getting poked or bitten, and she meant to keep it that way.

“What good does that do-Agh!” One Eye Thal cut off with an appalled grunt when a worm tumbled out of his hair and landed on his nose. He shook his head like a bee-stung bear, and sent the insect flying. “Gods! The bastards are everywhere!” He touched his nose, but there was no blood.

Erryn grasped his arm, thick and hard as an old oak branch, and jerked him around. “We burn them.” That had been Aedran’s plan from the start, but he had chosen the wrong battleground. “The great hall is too large, too high, and has too many nooks and crannies. We must retreat.”

“There’s nowhere to go!”

Erryn cast about. “Gather a dozen men,” she ordered, “and all the lamps they can carry.”

“For what?” Aedran asked, breathless after pushing through a wall of thrashing Prythians.

She raised herself up, shedding her terror and revulsion. “Do as I command!” She was sure arguments would follow. Instead, One Eye Thal grinned at her, and a strange glimmer came into Aedran’s gaze. Pride? she wondered, hardly able to believe it. Or is it satisfaction?

The general turned away to call soldiers to his side. The response was almost as overwhelming as the swarm of caterpillars. It seemed as if the men had been waiting for someone to give a command, no matter what that command was. It took but a few seconds for Aedran to gather a score of Prythians around himself and their queen. It took less time for those same men to collect a hundred oil lamps, some alight, but most cold.

“We have what you wanted,” Aedran said.

“Follow me!” Erryn set off toward the corridor they had used to reach the great hall. She was stopped cold by a surging wall of soldiers, all beating at themselves and one another, smashing worms, cursing the glassy spikes hung in their skin, bellowing when any of those creatures sank pincers into unprotected skin.

Aedran stepped ahead of her, with One Eye Thal and the other three captains serving as a defensive ring between her and her frenzied army. Together they pushed through-Aedran was not alone in knocking a few heads of anyone given completely over to terror-and ended up in the long corridor, now aglow with tens of thousands of marching caterpillars. They squirmed over every surface, seeking the heat of men.

Or, maybe, they’re drawn to the scent of fresh blood? Erryn thought, horrified by the prospect.

Aedran faced her. “What do we do?”

He wants me to lead, she realized, knowing intuitively that was true, but not understanding why.

Instead of answering, she took a cold lamp from his hand, unstopped the oil reservoir, and hurled it down the corridor. A long tail of oil droplets followed after the unlit lamp, sparkling like silver raindrops in the ghostlight cast by the worms. The lamp hit the floor with a clang and wobbled out of sight.

One Eye Thal looked at her as if she had gone mad. “That was a perfectly good lamp!”

Erryn snatched a torch from Kormak’s hands and flung it after the lamp. When the torch hit the floor, its flames guttered and spit, then set alight the trail of oil with a muffled whoosh!

Erryn retreated, her feet crunching through a dense carpet of caterpillars. Flames raced down the corridor, blackening a host of worms. They began to swell like tiny sausages. Soon after, they burst, their jellied insides threatening to put out the fire.

“More lamps,” Erryn ordered.

Before she had finished speaking, the corridor was filled with soaring lamps. The sharp smell of drizzling oil mingled with the reek of roasting caterpillars. In seconds, intense heat and rising flames filled the corridor, driving back the light of the worms. A hot, soot-filled wind drove Erryn and her party backward.

After the flames and the heat faded, she saw that blobs of ash had replaced most of the caterpillars, but those still alive were crawling for the safety of cracks in the stone walls. A rowdy cheer went up from her captains, as if they had singlehandedly pushed back an invading army.

“We’re not finished,” Erryn said. “We’ll have to burn them all before we can shelter here.”

Now that they had seen what to do, her companions set off down the corridor, dousing the floor with lamp oil, splashing it high up on the walls. Once they reached the far end, they set it all alight again. It burned hotter and brighter than before, the flames scaling the walls to reach the ceiling, searing everything left alive.

When the last flames guttered out, and only the flickering light of a few lamps stood against the usual darkness of Stormhold, Erryn surveyed what they had done. The long corridor would make for a tight fit with all the men and horses, but she was confident there was enough room.

Erryn felt the weight of the men’s gazes on her. Aedran and the captains ringed her about, as if waiting for something more. Erryn locked eyes with the general and frowned. As they had before when she guessed he had wanted her to take command, his blue eyes shone and an expectant smile played over his lips.

“What would you have us do, my queen?” he asked.

He truly wants me to lead, Erryn thought, but more than that, he wants the men to see me leading, a queen at the head of her army. In that moment, she could almost forgive him for spurning her. Almost.

“We’ll need to keep a watch, in case these foul creatures return,” she said. “But now that we know how they swarm, we ought to be able to knock them back before they can grow in number-hopefully without having to set everything afire. Bring the rest of the men here, but before they come into the corridor, make sure they have none of those damnable caterpillars crawling on them-”

“That means we’ll have to strip,” Aedran cut in.

“Modesty will do us more harm than good,” she said, and received reluctant nods all around. Listening to the rising commotion in the great hall, she added, “I suggest you make all haste, or my army will flee Stormhold.”

When Aedran and the others hesitated, Erryn took a deep breath, drew off her cloak, and shook it out. Next off was her coat, then her first of three tunics. Her general and captains followed suit.

Her talk about modesty came back to haunt her when she stood as naked as her men. As far as she could tell, they were not looking at her as they would a goddess-queen, but as men who see a desirable woman.

Not to be outdone, she boldly returned their scrutiny. When she looked on Aedran, she felt the same eagerness and regret in her heart that she saw in his eyes. Both emotions she pushed down, strangling the life out of them.

After ensuring no caterpillars had taken refuge in her clothing, Erryn got dressed again, as did her men. While no one had set fire to the worms in the great hall, the tiny creatures had begun to disperse. Neither Erryn nor Aedran thought it wise to count on the creatures not returning.

A few shouts got the army moving toward the corridor. A few more shouts had the men in front stripping out of their caterpillar-infested clothing and armor, shaking it all out, and then moving into their narrow sanctuary.

Erryn oversaw everything. Some of the Prythians looked askance at her, but she only bid them entry with a curt gesture after Aedran or one of her captains had ensured they weren’t bringing any of the worms with them. Most of the men bore welts and swollen bite marks.

Erryn recoiled when Zander tottered into the torchlight, his curly black hair matted with sweat and blood. He had removed his cloak and trousers, but still wore his scaled jerkin. His eyes, red and puffy, rolled feverishly.

“Are you daft, lad?” One Eye Thal asked. “The queen’s order was to take everything off.”

Zander wobbled where he stood, and began pissing on the floor. “Gobble my arse, you ugly, one-eyed whoreson,” Zander mumbled, as if his tongue had grown too thick for his mouth.

One Eye Thal’s fists clenched, but Aedran stopped him from disciplining the man. The general leaned closer to Zander. Erryn suddenly wanted to scream at him to keep his distance, but the words stuck in her throat.

“He’s sick,” Aedran said.

“Is it venom?” Erryn asked.

“Mayhap,” Aedran said, brow furrowed. He spoke quietly to Erryn and the other captains, but all of them denied seeing anyone else showing the signs of fever or delirium.

“Make sure he’s free of worms,” Aedran said then, “but put him away from the others. If there’s sickness here, we don’t need it running through the rest of us.”

“Be hard to keep it at bay, packed in as we are,” One Eye Thal said.

“There’s nothing for it,” Aedran said, then called over a pair of soldiers to lead a muttering Zander away.

Erryn watched the soldier scratching at a rash of pustules ranging from his fingers to the back of his hand. Earlier, that same hand had been full of caterpillar spines. If venom afflicted him, she hoped it was nothing deadly. If it is, she thought, troubled that such a cold calculation would enter her mind, then I may lose half my army … or more.

Chapter 18

Time to dance for your master, puppet-boy! came his mother’s drunken cackle.

Algar tried to ignore her, but she was right. Brother Jathen needed to hear what was afoot. Yet, Algar still hesitated to use the seeing glass to contact the monk, because, truth told, he was not sure what was afoot.

Cloaked in shadows born of the Spirit Stone, he had been watching Edrik and his fellows since they arrived atop the place they named Ruan Breach. Far below, the River Sedge churned through the gorge’s throat. Once past those dark waters, the river spread wide and was frozen over. There were several slender boats lining the southern riverbank, which Edrik’s men had taken from the snow-laden brush. Those boats seemed too delicate for navigating the River Sedge, but apparently Edrik and his fellows had used them before. Two men had remained with the boats. One was still there, staring across the river, and the other had headed downstream.

Algar wanted to move closer to Edrik and Danlin, who were gazing down into the stony breach, but stopped himself. Dark clouds had been building throughout the day, but the gloomy light was still strong enough to break the Spirit Stone’s spell and make him visible. He could step into the Zanar-Sariit, but each time he did, it seemed as if the spirits of the dead were drawn to him more strongly than before. With that in mind, he chose to huddle out of sight within a dense stand of firs.

As soon as they had arrived, Edrik ordered most of his fellows to begin cutting down slender trees with short swords barely suited to the task. Afterward, they cut the logs into posts the length of a man’s leg, and then sharpened one end. When they had gathered a sizable stack, he ordered them to make several shorter posts, these without a sharpened end.

Now the men were using the short posts as hammers to drive the sharpened posts into a crack running along the top edge of the gorge.

Algar tried to envision some kind of weaponry, but no matter how he looked at it, that didn’t make any sense. His next thought was that they were building a shelter, but that made even less sense. Setting up camp would not help them capture Rathe.

Your master might know, puppet-boy.

Deep in concentration, his mother’s nattering voice didn’t trouble Algar as much as it normally would, and he even found himself agreeing with her. Brother Jathen, after all, followed the Path of War.

Stealing deeper into the trees, Algar pulled the seeing glass from the sack at his belt, and used the tip of his finger to trace a rune over its milky white surface.

The faint chime sounded continually, stabbing into his dream. Grumbling, Brother Jathen dragged a coarse woolen blanket over his head, blocking the noise and blotting out the thin light within the tent….

And then he was with Fira again, her fiery hair spread in a fan around her head. She smiled, her green eyes languid in the candle light as he caressed her breasts, rolled her nipples between his thumb and forefinger.

“Take me,” she said, a breathless command.

“Those are a whore’s words,” he chided, though not minding at all.

“Then make me your whore.”

His fingers abandoned her breasts and walked a path down her flat belly. As they ventured lower, she arched her back, lifting her slender hips. His fingers explored the damp heat between her legs.

“Now,” she moaned.

He grinned. “All in good time-”

The chiming came again, and the vision of Fira broke completely apart, only to reform into the sneering face of Algar.

Snarling, Jathen jerked the blanket off his head and flung it aside. “Goddamned fool refuses to obey me until now?” he asked the empty tent, a mean affair for one of his station. He sat up on the edge of his cot, fingering the healed but still tender scar on his brow. The uneven flesh was cold to the touch. He glanced to the side and saw that the coals in the iron brazier, set beside a wooden stand holding his armor, had gone to ash.

A young monk of his order hesitantly poked his head through the tent flap. Instead of customary robes, the youth wore a boiled leather breastplate emblazoned with a fiery sun that represented the illuminating light of the Way of Knowing. “General, did you call?”

General. Jathen savored the title. No brothers of the Way of Knowing had used military rank in long years, not even his order. It had been five centuries since any monk of Skalos had actually lifted a sword or spear with the intention of drawing blood. All that was about to change, thanks to the supporter who had joined him the day before, and who had graciously offered him the eventual rule of the Iron Marches in exchange for Rathe Lahkurin.

The sergeant shifted nervously. “Sir?”

Jathen looked up. “No, you babbling fool, I didn’t call for you.”

“Very well, sir,” the sergeant said uneasily, ducking back out of the tent.

“Wait!” Jathen snarled, halting the youth. “Bring coals for the brazier. I’m freezing my stones off.”

“Of course, general. At once, sir.” He ducked out of sight before the last word had passed his lips.

The chime sounded again.

With an oath, Jathen reached for a felt-lined box he kept the seeing glass in while traveling. After opening the lid, he drew a rune over the face of the pale orb. The milky surface swirled, revealing Algar’s pinched features. He looked as impatient and angry as usual.

“You’re late in joining me,” Jathen said, foregoing false pleasantries. More than begin late, the man was an insolent oaf. Yet, he still had his uses. For how long, though? “I trust there’s a reason for your delay?”

“The bounty hunters are still after Rathe,” Algar said.

“Bounty hunters?” Jathen thought a moment, but Fira’s face and lush body were still parading through his mind. With some reluctance, he pushed her aside in order to concentrate. Bounty hunters? When he remembered what the insolent fool had told him before, his anger flared anew. “Ah, yes, the outlanders who you said looked like Prythians, but were not?”

“Yes.”

“Why are you still troubling yourself with them?”

Algar ground his teeth together. “I told you before, monk, they’re after Rathe. Now I have reason to fear they mean to take him before the Lamprey can sail through Ruan Breach.”

Jathen frowned. “Why would you think that?”

Algar spoke for a time, and Jathen listened. He suddenly sat bolt upright. Can they be so foolish? Considering what Algar had just told him, he supposed they could.

“You must stop them,” Jathen blurted, interrupting Algar’s report.

“Why, monk?”

“Do as I say!”

Not waiting for a response, Jathen ran his finger over the seeing glass, making Algar’s face vanish. After tucking the orb into its box, he began pulling on his armor. When the sergeant returned with a bucket of coals, Jathen was just finishing with the last buckle. He sent the youth off with a new set of orders.

Within minutes the large encampment, which lay a league west of Ruan Breach, had become a bedlam of activity.

Chapter 19

As day faltered toward dusk, the River Sedge carried the Lamprey along at the pace of a galloping horse over rolling waves and through sucking eddies. A wallowing tub like this shouldn’t go so fast, Rathe thought, standing amidships and listening to the ship’s timbers creak and groan. More disconcerting was the sight of the helmsman using a member of the crew to help him keep the rudder steady.

Captain Ostre had mentioned that the river would get rougher as it narrowed to no more than a hundred strides, but had also assured Rathe all would be well. “I’ve passed through Ruan Breach more times than I remember. Even in high summer, when the Sedge is at its lowest flow, it’s plenty deep enough for the Lamprey’s draft.”

Rathe hoped that was true, for if the ship ran aground now, the current would quickly dash it to bits. He and everyone aboard the ship might survive that, but the cold black waters of the Sedge spoke of death with a cold and watery tongue.

“Crew says a storm is coming,” Loro said, joining Rathe’s side. Dark clouds had been building throughout the day, and were now spitting occasional showers of snow. The wind had picked up, making the rigging sing.

“Captain Ostre has said the same since we left Iceford,” Rathe allowed, “but we’ve yet to suffer anything worthy of being named a storm.”

Loro shrugged. “We’re not from these lands, so how can we know?”

“What else does the crew say?”

“That these early storms oft bury the land to the height of a man sitting astride a horse.” The cuts on Loro’s face had scabbed over, but the rest was a mottled confusion of swollen and bruised flesh. Still, he looked better than Liamas, who had joined the crew an hour earlier. Battered though the Prythian was, it didn’t keep him from barking orders and making threats. So far, he and Loro had avoided talking, but they had gone so far as to share amicable nods.

Rathe looked for Edrik’s company along the southern cliff, but by now the day had grown too old and dark to make out anything besides overhanging trees. “I’m more concerned about the outlanders, and whatever they have planned for us.”

“Bah!” Loro said, flapping a dismissive hand. “The worst those fools can do is lob a few fire arrows our way. With night almost on us, they’ll have a hard time hitting anything.”

“True enough,” Rathe said, but he was not given to discounting the wiles of his enemies. Continuing his study, he asked, “How is it between you and Fira?”

Loro paused in testing the draw of his bow and dropped a lecherous wink. “I’ll tell you for sure on the morrow.”

“What of Liamas?” Rathe asked, wanting to change the subject before Loro could ask about him and Nesaea. For himself, Rathe was not sure what had occurred between them, but knew he didn’t like it.

Loro glanced toward the Prythian giant. “Truth of it is, I cannot blame the quartermaster for making a try at Fira-a blind man can see she’s a fine-looking woman. Now that I’ve cracked the bastard’s head, I expect he’ll prove to be a decent sort.”

Rathe stifled a chuckle. He had seen the same many times before, two men bitter enough to kill each other over one thing or another, only to become friendly after swapping blows. Women, though, seemed a more grudging breed. He thought Captain Ostre was right about letting Nesaea think she won more often than not in order to keep peace between them. The problem was, Rathe had never been one to surrender out of hand.

“Rider!” the watchman called from the crow’s nest.

All eyes turned. At first Rathe saw nothing out of place. Then, framed between two boulders perched high above, he saw a man sitting astride a horse.

“Seems he’s only enjoying the view,” Loro said.

Before Rathe could respond, the rider bent over. A moment later he sat up bearing a flaming torch. In the deepening gloom, it appeared he was holding a tiny sun aloft. Not just holding it, but waving it.

“What’s that fool doing?” Loro asked.

Rathe’s jaw tightened. “Sending a signal.”

Leaving Loro’s side, he ran to the poop deck and joined Captain Ostre, who was using a long eyeglass to look farther downriver.

“What do you see?” Rathe asked.

“Two more signal fires. There can be no doubt they’ve been watching us all along.”

“How far to Ruan Breach?”

“We’re nearly there, lad. In less than a quarter turn of the glass, we’ll be through.”

“The darkness will help,” Rathe said.

Ostre lowered the eyeglass. “I’m more a merchant than a fighter, so explain how battling in the dark helps?”

Rathe pointed at the first rider, now falling behind the Lamprey, then moved to a bright splinter of light rising off the second rider’s torch-the third, he still couldn’t see. “They can drop fire on us, as we feared all along, but we’ll see it coming.

“There’s a comfort,” Ostre said, sounding anything but comforted.

“Surprise is the key to a proper ambush,” Rathe explained. “They’ve lost that now. That they gave it up so easily tells me they’re not skilled fighters.”

Ostre tugged his beard, nodding. “I see what you mean … but I’m of a mind to teach these fools a lesson.”

“Such as?”

Instead of answering, Captain Ostre called to Liamas, “Bring up the ballistae-and be quick about it, or we’ll miss our chance.”

Rathe loosed a burst of wicked laughter. “You surprise me, captain.”

Ostre shrugged. “After battling the Crimson Gull, I decided the Lamprey would always fight, instead of run. Liamas, being a Prythian, has a head for the ways of war. Loading half a dozen ballistae into the hold was his idea-”

“Do you hear that?” Rathe interrupted, his head cocked toward a sound akin to drums. He had heard something like that before, but where escaped him.

“Sounds like battering rams hammering a gate,” Nesaea said, climbing the stairs to the poop deck. She had donned a northern warrior’s garb of dark leathers and furs. Her gloved hands caressed the hilts of the dagger and the sword hanging from either hip. Her eyes cut toward Rathe, as if challenging him to dispute her observation. He had no intention of doing so.

The Lamprey surged downriver, picking up speed the closer they came to the throat of Ruan Breach. High above, the second torchbearer flashed by, much faster than the previous one. As the ship climbed up and over a frothy swell, snow began to fall in earnest. Not much farther on, the ship was flying through a swirling white squall. The erratic drumming echoed through the gorge, falling on them from all sides, hastening the crewmen to set up the ballistae around the deck on three-footed pedestals.

“What do you make of that?” Ostre called, pointing past the jagged lips of Ruan Breach not a quarter mile distant. Father downstream, almost lost in the snowfall, a figure was running along the riverbank, frantically waving a torch.

“Something’s wrong,” Rathe said.

“For them, or us?” Nesaea asked.

Before Rathe could answer, a loud, popping crackle sounded through the gorge. The drumming abruptly ceased, replaced by a deep rumbling that vibrated his teeth and bones. The rest of the crew stood looking about in confusion. Rathe scanned the walls of the gorge, but saw only dark rock webbed in ice.

“We’re nearly through!” Ostre shouted. He jabbed a thick finger toward a pair of crewmen at the bow who were fitting a ballista with a spear-sized bolt. “You there, make ready!”

As one man used a crank to draw back the heavy bowstring, his companion carefully turned the weapon on its pedestal to take aim at the running man.

“Wait to fire till we’re through the gap!” Liamas bellowed, running in their direction over a deck that had begun to pitch and roll on the back of the surging river.

The drumming began again, the tempo increasing by the moment. There came another deep rumble, then a loud, thunderous boom that resonated through Ruan Breach.

“What was that?” Loro bellowed near the mainmast, his feet spread for balance.

“Gods!” Rathe gasped, remembering where he had heard such erratic hammering before-at the quarries south of Onareth, where workers drove wedges into faces of marble in order to break the rock.

Nesaea pressed close to him. “What is it?”

Rathe’s skin crawled, and his frozen tongue refused to speak. It cannot be!

The next booming rumble was louder than all the rest, followed by the crackling roar of great stones grinding against one another. Heads turned and eyes flared wide, as the southern wall of Ruan Breach sagged almost imperceptibly, then began breaking apart along a thousand spreading fissures. Rocks and ice rained down into the river, quickly followed by tumbling slabs that churned the black waters into a gauntlet of leaping froth. Clouds of dust spurted from widening cracks in the wall, then the entire southern face of the breach shattered and slid into the river. The rushing current slammed into the obstacle, rolled back on itself, and heaved upstream like a mighty sea wave.

Rathe caught Nesaea with one hand and held the rail with the other. Loro turned toward Rathe, his mouth yawning around a shout lost under the crashing roar of surging water and falling rock. Crewmen scrambled like rats before a flood, but there was nowhere to go.

The Lamprey crashed against the colossal wave with a groaning shudder, throwing the sailors off their feet, and breaking the ties holding stacked crates and barrels. A huge comber boiled over the prow, the foaming waters swallowing men and cargo. Rathe saw Loro disappear a second before the wave exploded over the poop deck’s rail and knocked him off his feet. Nesaea’s grip tightened on him, then was gone. Deadly cold water tumbled him toward the stern and pinned him against the squat deck house.

The booming crunch of exploding timbers below deck kicked Rathe’s heart into a gallop. He was no sailor, but he understood that the keel had run aground. Now turning broadside to the river’s current, the Lamprey began heeling over, breaking apart on the rocks that, moments ago, had channeled the River Sedge through Ruan Breach. As the ship tipped over, water spilled off the deck, and the Lamprey shuddered like a beast in its death throes.

Rathe hauled himself up, saw Nesaea doing the same nearby, and raced to help. The two helmsmen had vanished, as had Captain Ostre. Another rumble drew Rathe’s startled gaze to a towering column of rock smashing through the starboard quarter of the Lamprey’s bow. Frigid water exploded through the shattered deck. Instead of screams and shouts, Rathe heard only the rushing river and breaking wood. The few crewmen remaining on deck fought to get free of tangled rope and debris, their movements stiff, ungainly. The others had either been knocked overboard, or had leaped into the false safety of the river. Rathe looked for Loro, but couldn’t distinguish one struggling man from another.

“We have to swim,” he said through chattering teeth, helping Nesaea up.

She shook her head, her face a pale smear in the snowy gloom. “The river will kill us.”

“We’ll die if we stay.”

Before she could respond, Loro cried out, “Rathe!” Casting wildly about, he found the portly man standing over the ruin of the hatch. He held a coughing Fira by the sodden hood of her cloak.

“Here!” Rathe shouted back.

Dragging Fira along, Loro turned and began slogging toward Rathe. They had almost reached the poop deck, when a yardarm broke loose and swung out of the collapsing rigging like a pendulum. It slammed into Loro, knocking him over the side. Kneeling on the disintegrating deck, Fira looked around in confusion.

“Loro!” Rathe ran to the rail and looked over. Roiling water and tangled debris met his eye, but not Loro.

“Can he swim?” Fira screamed, trying to reach Rathe and Nesaea.

Instead of answering, Rathe remembered Ostre saying to Loro, “All those steel scales on your jerkin won’t help for swimming, and the Sedge is a fearsome cold bitch any time of year-especially now.”

Spluttering and splashing, the fat man popped up a few feet away, clawing at a pile of sharp rock and shattered timbers. As soon as he caught hold, he went under.

“Do something!” Fira wailed.

Torn, Rathe faced the two women.

Nesaea was already bustling Fira to what was left of the rail near the bow. Nesaea flashed him a grim smile. “We’ll meet you on the riverbank.”

She ended whatever argument he might have made when she flung herself and Fira over the side. The River Sedge churned and boiled around the spot they had disappeared. They popped up a second later, rapidly drawn downstream by the raging waters. Rathe watched in horror as they bobbed through the broken rocks now partially damming the river, and then passed out of sight.

Cursing, Rathe leaped overboard feet first. The river wrapped him in its frigid grip, squeezing the breath from his chest. The current tugged and pulled, spinning him, and then his head slammed against a rock. For a moment he drifted, stunned, points of light flaring before his slitted eyes. He drew an involuntary breath, allowing the river to pour into his chest.

Rathe’s eyes flared open on bubbling darkness, cold fire filling him. With a strangling exhalation, he purged the water from his lungs. With no air to take its place, he kicked hard, fighting to reach the surface. His limbs had already gone numb with cold, and he struggled against broken wood and stealthy skeins of rope trying to bind him to a watery grave-

Coughing and flailing, he broke the surface. The only warmth he felt was on the side of his head, a wide torrent of heat. Blood. Wreckage from the Lamprey drifted around him, more and more by the moment, as the river smashed the ship to pieces. Silent corpses slid across the remains of her deck and dropped into the churning river, the eddies dragging them down.

“Loro!” he called, the effort bringing on a bout of coughing. Finding the spot he had last seen the fat man, Rathe plunged below the surface and swam through the black, his arms almost useless as they slashed back and forth, seeking his friend.

He came up wheezing, his limbs stiff as boards. If he didn’t get out soon, he never would. The thought, sluggish though it was, chilled him more than the river.

Rathe took a great gulp of air that burned going down, and prepared to dive. Before he could, something tugged feebly at his leg. He reached down, and his fingers passed through wet fur-Loro’s bearskin coat!

He caught hold of an arm and pulled. Loro didn’t budge. After a couple more sharp tugs, Rathe felt his burden shift and begin to rise. For a moment, the cold forgotten, Rathe kicked and heaved, until Loro broke the surface.

“Gods and demons!” Loro roared, spraying water into Rathe’s face. “Foot got hung after my last breath. Thought I was drowned!”

“We have to reach shore,” Rathe shouted.

“Shore? We’re in a frozen hell, brother. We’re going to die here!”

Rathe had no strength left for speaking, and barely enough for swimming. He reached for a shape bobbing nearby, but recoiled at the spongy softness of a dead sailor. He pushed the body away and watched it drift into a channel of whitewater rushing through the rocks.

“That way,” he gasped, and followed the dead man. Loro, looking about the darkness with bulging, half-mad eyes, struggled after Rathe.

The current battered them over rocks and splintered wood, but Rathe hardly felt a thing. Floating behind him, Loro spewed an unrelenting string of curses that became a fearful shout when they tumbled over the edge of the crude dam. They dropped a dozen feet before splashing into the thundering waters below Ruan Breach.

When they popped up, snow lashed the darkness, blocking sight of the riverbank. Rathe thought he heard someone coughing over the roar of falling water. He urged Loro to follow him, and began swimming across the current. A pounding in his head muddled all thoughts, and his arms and legs were reluctant to work. He glanced over his shoulder and saw Loro thrashing weakly.

“Not going to make it, brother!”

“Stay with me,” Rathe panted. “We’re almost there.”

“Rathe?” Loro called desperately, only his nose and lips above the water.

“Swim!” Rathe ordered, catching one of Loro’s arms and dragging him close. He was not about to let Loro die.

By the time Rathe’s waterlogged boots touched the rocky riverbed, he and Loro had drifted far downstream. Stumbling and heaving against one another, he and Loro clambered to higher ground and collapsed on the snow-covered stones of the riverbank. The wind was less here, no more than a breeze, but was still bitter as it sank through Rathe’s wet clothes, stealing the last dregs of his strength, stealing his breath, stealing his will. He lay shivering on his side, sucking in the frozen stink of moss and mud.

Loro rattled deranged laughter. “I’m numb as a whore’s privy parts after a Midwinter feast night.”

Rathe grunted in answer, struggling to his hands and knees, then to his feet. Higher up the riverbank, he could make out a dark forest, the tree limbs bent like penitents under thick white mantles.

A muffled shout turned his attention upstream, and he was stunned to see several figures bearing torches, perhaps a quarter mile distant. They leaped from landed boats and raced toward a smaller group of people huddled near the river’s edge-the Lamprey’s survivors, Rathe was sure. He also knew those bearing torches. Edrik and his fellows.

“It’s those bastards who dropped the cliff on us,” Loro snarled, having gotten to his feet. The fat man fumbled for the hilt of his sword, but his hand had become a stiff and useless claw. Giving up on drawing steel, he took a faltering step in their direction. Rathe halted him with a touch.

“There are too many to risk an open attack.”

“They have Fira and Nesaea,” Loro retorted.

The truth stung Rathe, but dying a fool’s death would not serve to get them free. “We’ll get them back,” he said, not sure how. And we need to make haste, he considered, fingering the blood running down the side of his face. The wound would not kill him, but he couldn’t think clearly.

“I pray you’re right, brother.”

As do I, Rathe didn’t say, leading Loro toward the trees.

Chapter 20

“Leave him be,” Jathen said sharply, holding up a staying hand.

“We’re not here to coddle our enemies, but to kill them all, save the Scorpion,” Captain Carlus said, one of Nabar’s Kingsguard. His eyes formed a black slash below the rim of his helm, but his burnished dagger glittered with the distant torchlight of those converging on the Lamprey’s crew. Like the forty men standing in the snowy darkness around him and Jathen, under Carlus’s gold-edged crimson cloak he wore a tabard emblazoned with a charging ebon bull, its horns wreathed in white roses. Carlus seemed to believe his commander, who was an even greater arsehole than he was, had placed him in charge of this particular mission. “Now stand aside, monk, so I can put an end to this puppy’s whimpers.”

Instead of backing away, Jathen knelt beside the subject of their disagreement. The shave-headed young man, clad in simple garb that Jathen recognized from Algar’s descriptions of the bounty hunters after Rathe, lay curled around the arrow buried in his guts. He does have the look of a Prythian, Jathen mused, remembering Algar’s description. That thought led to wondering where Algar was, and why the shadowy bastard had failed to stop these fools from destroying the Lamprey. Could Algar be dead? It seemed unlikely, but….

Pushing that away, Jathen glanced at the dead torch smoldering in the snow nearby. Before the arrow had pierced the man, he had been fleeing Jathen and the company of Kingsguard, waving the torch in warning.

Did anyone see it? Jathen expected someone must have, but after the fellow’s companions dropped half of Ruan Breach on the passing ship, their attention had shifted to the survivors crawling out of the river.

Jathen drew off his glove and grasped the fletched end of the arrow protruding from the man’s belly. A gentle twist earned him a groan and the youth’s full attention. “What’s your name, boy?”

“Do you mean to kill me?”

Jathen gave a longsuffering sigh. “If I wanted you dead, I’d have let Captain Carlus have his way with that dagger of his. My intervention on your behalf should prove that I only wish to help you.”

“Please,” the youth said, his eyes rolling from the captain’s hulking shape to Jathen’s face, “take it out. It … it hurts.”

“Well of course it does,” Jathen said gently, as he caressed the arrow’s fletching. “But if I’m to help, we should at least know each other. Let me begin. I’m General Jathen Martel,” he said, putting emphasis on his title for the sake of Captain Carlus. “I’m a monk of the Way of Knowing.”

The youth stared through the falling snow at Jathen’s busy fingers, wincing each time they brushed against the arrow’s nock. “Len,” he said in a pained hush, a pearl of blood growing from the corner of his mouth. “I’m Len … a vizien priest of … the Munam a’Dett Order.”

“Munam a’Dett?” Jathen said in a contemplative tone. “You speak the tongue of the ancient Iron Kings. It hasn’t been spoken for five centuries or more.”

Len licked his lips, smearing the pearl of blood. His body had taken on a frightful quiver, and the arrow jittered under Jathen’s fingers. “It means … means-”

“Skin of the Dragon,” Jathen finished for him. “Or, perhaps, Soul of the Dragon.” He shrugged dismissively. “In either case, a strange name for a priesthood, but who am I to judge?”

Captain Carlus snorted disdainfully. “Who indeed?”

With blood now drooling from his mouth, Len gazed vacantly at Jathen’s boots. More blood ran from his belly, staining the snow. Jathen guessed he had only moments to learn what he could. He gave the arrow another tweak, and Len clamped his teeth on a screech. When his eyes opened again, they seemed livelier.

“I cannot imagine why priests of any order would don the mantle of bounty hunters,” Jathen said, “but if you wanted Rathe dead, why not kill him at Iceford?”

“Dead? Rathe? We never wanted him dead, we…. How do you know…?” Len trailed off.

“Dear Len, let there be no secrets between us,” Jathen cajoled. Instead of another twist, he slapped his hand over the youth’s mouth and pushed the arrow deeper into his guts, and deeper still, until it scraped against the bones of his spine. Len struggled to get away, but only managed to squirm about like an earthworm baking in the sun.

“Gods be damned, monk,” Captain Carlus said approvingly, “you’re a cold son of a poxy whore.”

Jathen heard him only distantly. His attention was on Len and his pain. Too much too fast would kill him quicker than he would like, but too little would delay the answers he sought. When Len ceased to squirm, Jathen sat back on his heels.

“By the Fathers!” Len whimpered, hands curled near the shaft of the arrow, but not daring to touch it. “What do you want of me?”

“I want to know your interest in Rathe Lahkurin, the Scorpion of Cerrikoth.”

“I … I’ll tell you all I know,” Len said, the words clipped by his chattering teeth. “But … please … stop hurting me.”

“Ought to crush his head,” Captain Carlus said. “It’d be a mercy.”

“The mercy will be saving his life,” Jathen said, noting that young Len’s eyes had taken on a hopeful sheen. “But first, I’d hear all you can tell me.”

“We never wanted him dead,” Len said again. Other than the strained way he was talking, and the blood streaming over his lips, he seemed rather excited to provide answers. “The Oracle directed our footsteps in finding him. Rathe is to help us save Targas.” He looked past Jathen, searching upstream. If he saw his far-off companions, even now herding the survivors of the Lamprey together along the riverbank, he gave no notice. “We didn’t kill him, did we? By the Fathers … please tell me we didn’t.”

Jathen placed a firm hand on Len’s shoulder. Oracle? Targas? The first he had never heard of, other than the common term used for objects and the occasional folk who foretold future events. Targas … well, that was another word of the ancient Iron Kings, and meant Everlasting City of Light. Legends of Targas were few, but the name itself had occasionally served as the rallying cry for the folk of the Iron Marches, those who had once sought to throw off the yokes of oppressive lords after the fall of the Iron Kings. With the help of time and the greatest minds of Skalos, the name Targas had vanished from memory, along with the slow demise of all the old Houses throughout the Iron Marches. All, save the recently revived House Akarlen of Ravenhold, a deed for which Jathen had Rathe and his plaything Lady Nesaea to thank, the scheming bitch who had ruined Jathen’s face with her black alchemy. But Ravenhold was of no further concern to Jathen, for he had arranged for that fortress and its master, Lady Mylene Akarlen, to fall again.

“I hope you got all you wanted from the boy,” Captain Carlus said, “for he’s naught but a sack of meat.”

Jathen looked back into Len’s glazed eyes. The youth was good and truly dead. Jathen doubted most of his claims, especially all that about being a priest-vizien, if memory served, was the ancient word for keeper or caretaker, which would have made him a keeper or caretaker of dragon skin. A wholly foolish notion, and surely nothing to be proud of, even if it were true.

Jathen stood up at the same time a pair of scouts returned to the company. “What did you find?” He bit his tongue when they ignored him and spoke to Carlus.

“Two others from the ship came ashore not a hundred strides from us. Men, by the size of their footprints. Even with the dark, we could see where they crawled out of the river and up over the rocks. After that, they headed into the forest.”

Jathen looked to Carlus. “I trust those under your command are not as eager as you to kill any prisoners they take?”

“Long as they don’t kill the Scorpion-and that’s saying the river didn’t kill him-they can do whatever they want to anyone they find, by order of the king himself. Could be my men have a mind to warm themselves with those two wenches you mentioned, eh?” That garnered a few chuckles from the gathered soldiers.

Jathen felt anger heating his scar, but he resisted touching it. “I told you and your commander that Fira and Nesaea were mine alone.” If they’re still alive, he considered, struggling to ignore a wave of dread at the memory of Ruan Breach crumbling into the river and crushing the Lamprey. If Nesaea had drowned, so be it. Dead was dead, whether by his hand, or by the hand of fate. But the idea of Fira drowning was almost too much to bear.

“You can have the women,” Carlus allowed. “Though I cannot imagine what a monk would need with them.” This time his men erupted with boisterous laughter.

“Quiet, fools!” Jathen snarled. While they carried no torches, in order to hide in the snowy murk, laughing like a bunch of drunken idiots was sure to alert Len’s companions.

“Settle your mind, monk,” Carlus said, his shadowed features hard. “We’re too far downstream to hear over the river.” He turned. “As for the rest of you, shut your gobs. We’ve a Scorpion to catch, and after getting dumped in the river, he’s like to be ready to sting the stones off every one of you.”

After the laughter died, Carlus asked, “Now what, monk?”

Jathen surveyed the snow-covered forest. “If you please, Captain Carlus,” he said with forced pleasantness, “send word to our host that the time has come to see what our net has caught.” With all his heart, he hoped it had at least snared Fira.

Chapter 21

After they had reached the tree line, Rathe and Loro began trudging toward the gathering of Edrik’s company and the Lamprey’s crew. Snowy brambles growing amid the trees made for slow going, but Rathe didn’t want to lose sight of the torches. The way his vision swam in and out of focus, those wavering lights served as his only guide.

“Are we any closer?” Loro asked, teeth chattering.

Rathe paused to catch his breath. The blood running from the split on his scalp had slowed, but the pain of the wound snaked down his spine and coiled in his guts. His mouth filled with bile, but he fought down the urge to vomit.

“Rathe? Are you ill, brother?”

Rathe wanted to answer, but to even think about it set his insides to sloshing. He shook his head, making it worse.

When Loro leaned over, his eyes widened at the sight of Rathe’s gore-streaked head. “Gods! It looks like your brains are leaking out.”

Rathe took a shaky breath, blinked a few times, swallowed. The sickening, hammering thuds continued, but the urge to spew diminished. “I think all this moving around is warming me up.”

“You’re either lying, or about to die.”

“I’m fine,” Rathe said, looking over Loro’s battered features. With the shadows and clots of half-melted snow mingling on his swollen brow and cheeks, Rathe found it hard to believe his friend had come out the victor against Liamas. “It’s you who looks risen from the grave.”

“Be that as it may, whatever you mean to do, we should do it before we become ice statues.”

Rathe searched through breaks in the foliage and spied the ring of torches circling those who had made it ashore. “Do you see Nesaea or Fira?”

A frown creased Loro’s brow. “The way this snow is coming down, they all look alike. I’m sure they made it out, though, and are waiting for us to come rescue them.”

Rathe shied from the hopefulness in his friend’s voice, but just as quickly latched onto it again when he saw a pair of Edrik’s companions struggling up the riverbank, guiding a huge man between them. “They have Liamas.”

“If they were smart,” Loro said, sounding more confident than ever, “they’d have drowned the Prythian oaf in the river, instead of bringing him into their midst.”

Rathe recalled how inept Edrik had been back at the Minstrel’s Cup. “They aren’t fighters, and the way they dropped the cliff on the Lamprey says they are not so very smart, either.”

“Say what you will, but they did stop the ship.”

“Only at the risk of killing us all. And, as Edrik made it plain that he wanted me to join him, toppling half a mountain on my head is likely the worst way to make that happen.”

Loro nodded in agreement, his gaze still on Liamas. The Prythian giant put up no fight, but Rathe noted a watchfulness in the way his head turned one way, then the other.

“At the first sign of resistance,” Rathe said, “Liamas will attack.” Despite the beating Loro had given him, Rathe also knew the Prythian was more than a match for any handful of the fools who stood with Edrik. For himself, Loro might take on two handfuls of the outlanders.

That just leaves me, Rathe considered, stomach growing sour and squirmy again at the thought of wading into a fight. You’ve seen men battle with worse wounds, he told himself, but had a hard time remembering when.

“We need to get closer,” Rathe said.

“Best be quick about it. They’ll have to move the prisoners soon, unless they mean to stand by and watch them freeze to death.”

Rathe curled his stiff hands into painful fists, released them, balled them again. He imagined Nesaea’s fear and his own when the wall of Ruan Breach first started to crumble. They could have killed us all. Fury sparked alight deep in his chest. He coaxed and nurtured that rage. He would free it soon, but not just yet. For now, he needed its warmth to bury the queasiness in his guts, to quiet the infernal hammering in his skull, to warm his blood.

“Hear that?” Loro asked.

“It’s all I hear,” Rathe said. When Loro looked askance at him, he realized the fat man had not read his thoughts, but was speaking of something else.

Loro cursed under his breath. “Drums-real drums-not like before the cliff fell.”

Rathe saw Edrik’s band turning toward the sound, raising their torches to cast the light farther. Then Rathe noticed something else in the torchlight that set his heart to racing.

“I see them,” he said, the drums forgotten as he pointed out Nesaea and Fira, both standing cold and bedraggled beside Captain Ostre and Liamas.

Loro’s face split into a grin. “When this is over, remind me to make a hundred offerings to any god in any temple we come across.”

The drumming grew louder, rolling up the River Sedge. Edrik’s band and the survivors of the Lamprey began stirring. A few pointed toward the forest, while the others stared downstream.

“Someone’s in the woods with us,” Loro said, looking back over Rathe’s shoulder. By the time Rathe turned, a torch flared alight, then another and another and another, until it seemed the forest had been set afire.

Rathe pulled Loro down into a crouch.

A moment later, soldiers began rushing past Rathe and Loro’s hiding spot. They came out of the forest in two groups. One group spread out along the riverbank, while the other encircled Edrik’s companions and their captives. Shouted orders to surrender climbed above the approaching drumbeat, and Edrik’s company complied without a fight.

“Those are Cerrikothian Kingsguard,” Loro said, studying the newcomers. “What’re they doing here?”

“I’d guess that King Nabar learned I was in the Iron Marches-probably from Brother Jathen, as the monks of Skalos are the only true power in these lands.”

“I ever see that prancing fop again,” Loro growled, twisting the hilt of his sword until he was able to drag his frosty blade free of the scabbard, “I’ll have off his stones.”

Rathe chuckled darkly. “This is the life of the rogue you so cherish, friend. Beset on all sides, and an enemy to every man.”

“Does everything have to be so grim with you?” Loro snapped. “Is it so wrong for a man to have dreams?”

“No,” Rathe said, struggling to concentrate on this new development, “but a man should keep his dreams separate from the truth.”

“As you’re so keen to wallow in truth, here’s some more for you. If we are captured, then you and I are going to end up back in Onareth to face the headsman.”

“What of Nesaea and Fira?” Rathe asked, knowing what Loro would say, because he was thinking the same thing.

“King Nabar doesn’t want them. Like as not, he doesn’t know who they are, or that they were ever with us. For myself, we went to Skalos together, and good Brother Jathen doubtless mentioned me to Nabar. Our former king will assume I had a hand in killing his brother, Lord Sanouk.” Loro shot an accusing look at Rathe. “I suppose that means I’m sharing in your curse of bad luck.”

The drums had drawn closer, and a brightening radiance was spreading around a downstream bend in the river.

Loro shook his head in dismay. “Did that fool king send an entire legion to collect you?”

“It seems he must have.” Imagining the forest around them soon filling up with soldiers, Rathe bit back a curse.

Loro made to stand, then hunkered back, his features knotted with indecision. “We cannot stay here, but to run will get us caught even quicker. What do you suggest?”

Instead of answering, Rathe stared at the emerging sight downriver. Scores of lanterns lit a war galley crashing its way through the ice covering the slower, wider span of the River Sedge. The prow of a second ship soon showed itself, and then four more, all coming in a staggered line, all propelled by thrashing oars.

“The forest is our only hope,” Rathe said.

“So you really mean to leave Nesaea and Fira?”

“We have to stay out of sight until we can puzzle out a way to get them free,” Rathe said, despite knowing there was no way that did not end with him and Loro dead.

Chapter 22

Soldiers rushed hither and yon over the decks of the six war galleys. Lanterns by the score, hanging from yardarms and rails, lit the night. Nesaea held fast to Fira, who quivered and shook. Nesaea shivered just as hard, but the root of her shaking came from knowing she was trapped. After Lord Sanouk had poisoned her and locked her away in the catacombs under Fortress Hilan, there were times when even warm blankets seemed suffocating. Observing the steel-wielding Cerrikothian Kingsguard around her, she wished blankets were her only concern.

There were no less than forty of Nabar’s Kingsguard around her and the others. Edrik was easy enough to pick out. He was not the tallest, nor was he the strongest looking, but his fellows all deferred to him. For all the good it will do them. But the outlanders had ceased being a threat.

She knew the Kingsguard had come for Rathe, and as he was not among the captives, chances were they would soon put everyone to the question. The soldiers said nothing, but their spear tips and swords glittered in the torchlight, waiting to begin their bloody labor. More than their steel, Nesaea knew all too well that they had other, viler means to use against her and Fira, the only two women amongst the captives.

Edrik’s people, all young, shave-headed men dressed in similar garb, clustered together. They stood by impassively, as if waiting for something to happen in their favor. Fools, Nesaea thought, knowing that pain was the only thing likely to happen anytime soon.

Closer by, Captain Ostre huddled beside Liamas and what was left of the Lamprey’s crew. None of them seemed inclined to risk a fight to escape, which didn’t fit with the men she had fought with against the Crimson Gull. Like Nesaea and Fira, the water covering them was going to pale feathers of frost in their clothes, hair, and beards. Ostre flashed her a reassuring smile.

What does that mean? Nesaea wondered. Does it mean anything?

Normally, she never failed to come up with a plan, but not now. She squeezed her eyes shut, took a deep breath, forced away the threads of panic threatening to encase her heart. This is nothing like Sanouk’s catacombs. There is no magic here, just flesh and steel. Think!

Instead of a plan, a face came to mind, a strong face, the face of a warrior, the face of her lover. Rathe. Where is he? Did he make it out of the river?

Earlier, Nesaea thought she had seen two figures farther down the shore. With all the chaos after the Lamprey had come under attack, then swimming for shore and getting captured-not once, but twice-Nesaea was unsure if she could trust her eyes.

“We have only ourselves,” Nesaea said against Fira’s ear.

Fira leaned away, eyes round in a face as white as the falling snow. Her usually full lips had shriveled down to pale blue worms. “What’s that mean?” she whispered back.

Releasing Fira, Nesaea caught the hilt of a dagger concealed under her cloak-the Kingsguard had been quick to disarm everyone under their watch, but they had not been thorough. “We’ll have to cut our way out of this trap, and make for the forest.”

“Are you mad?”

“What choice do we have? They came for Rathe. When they realize he’s not here, the questioning will begin. I shouldn’t have to tell you what that means for either of us. If I must choose between getting cut down or being held down while some brute has his way with me, I’d rather die with a blade in my hand.”

Fira nodded imperceptibly.

As Nesaea began twisting her dagger to break it free of the iced sheath, Edrik glanced her way and slowly shook his head.

Nesaea went still. Had that been a warning, or was he only trying to save his own skin? Before she found an answer, Edrik made a slight gesture to his fellows and, one by one, they slipped tiny golden flasks from under their robes and took a sip. Watching each of them grimace by turns, she wondered what they were up to?

“Ho the camp!” came a familiar voice from the soldiers tromping along the riverbank.

“Oh, gods,” Fira breathed.

Nesaea said nothing. The first she had heard that voice, the haughty speaker had been recounting the history of Skalos.

“Jathen,” Fira whispered harshly.

Nesaea nodded, a wave of trepidation filling her breast. Before Rathe had returned the monk’s so-called baubles, she had treated the Keeper’s Box and the Wight Stone with two substances that, when put together, created a destructive mixture. Doubtless, Jathen would not have taken kindly to losing such rare and powerful artifacts. She had never expected to see him again, but here he was, striding into view.

“His face,” Fira muttered.

“Oh gods,” Nesaea breathed, as the man halted to look over the captives. As his agate blue eyes swiveled, she saw a terrible scar across his brow, as if searing fire had washed over him. Alchemy was a thorny talent to master at best, and while Nesaea was a fair hand at it, something had gone very wrong. I ruined his face … a face most women would’ve found attractive.

Jathen’s eyes widened at the sight of Fira, then narrowed when they turned to Nesaea. “Milady,” he said, striding nearer. He was dressed as a lord ready for battle, with an ermine-lined green cloak draped over his broad shoulders, and a burnished steel breastplate embossed with a golden sun. “I cannot tell you how pleased I am to find you here.” Though he spoke in a pleasant tone, there was a disturbing mixture of hatred and joy in his eyes that made Nesaea cringe.

“Brother Jathen,” she said, renewing her efforts to get her dagger free of the icy scabbard. “I’m surprised to see you.”

Jathen smiled warmly, as if greeting an old friend. “Duty calls, and we humble servants must obey, yes?”

“I suppose,” Nesaea agreed.

Jathen turned back to Fira. “Words cannot convey my delight in discovering you unharmed by the dreadful accident which befell your ship.”

“You call what happened to us an accident?” Fira snapped.

Jathen came within an arm’s length of them. Up close, the monk’s face showed even greater ravaging. Some scars suited men. Those he wore would do nothing to turn a woman’s eye, except away in pity. “A poor choice of words. Forgive me. Attempted assassination, it seems, was done here. Well, I’ve come to deliver the king’s justice.”

“I didn’t know the Iron Marches had a king,” Nesaea said, not liking the way he was looking at her.

“More’s the pity they don’t. Ah, well, I suppose it’s up to the justice of Skalos.”

Before Nesaea guessed what was coming, Jathen’s face twisted into a bitter sneer, and he caught a handful of her frozen hair. He yanked her head sharply to the side and leaned in close. His eyes were cold and bleak.

Fira lashed out, but one of the Kingsguard who had come with Jathen stepped in and dragged her away. Jathen barely paid them any notice.

He leaned closer toward Nesaea, turned his face one way, then the other. When he spoke, his breath was a warm puff of steam across her face. “Have a good look.”

“Did you suffer an accident?” Nesaea asked breathlessly, still twisting at the hilt of her dagger. She thought it had budged a fraction.

Jathen wrenched at her hair, forcing her head farther to the side and dragging her off balance. “Accident? You cannot be serious?” With each word, he twisted harder, until Nesaea’s neck gave an alarming crack. The only way to relieve the pain was to drop to her knees. The relief was short-lived. He shook her like a dog worrying a rat. She abandoned her dagger to claw at his stones. Before she could reach him, he struck her across the mouth. A dull ringing filled her skull, and blood washed over her tongue.

“Leave her be!” Fira screamed, sounding far away.

The Lamprey’s crew began shouting against the abuse, but the ring of Kingsguard tightened. When Liamas tried to push through, a spear butt slammed into his belly, knocking him back.

“You name mutilating me an accident?” Jathen’s fury raised his voice into a shriek.

“I’m sorry,” Nesaea said, searching in vain for a way to break free.

“Oh, milady, you have no understanding of the word!” Jathen raved.

Fira twisted in her captor’s grasp and raked her nails across his eyes. He cursed as she spun out of his hands. Before she could take the first step, his fist collided with the back of her neck. Fira staggered and fell, hitting the frozen rocks with a muffled sob.

“Fira!” Nesaea screamed, at the same time Jathen bellowed, “Enough, you fool! She’s mine!”

Stunned silence held for a moment, then Ostre and his crew attacked. Fists flew, spears swung, men fell. In seconds, the rebellion was over. Liamas and Ostre both lay on the ground, bleeding and dazed. At least one crewman was dead, the loops of his innards hung in rigid fingers. The Kingsguard forced the rest of the rebellious captives to their knees.

“Don’t mind them,” Jathen said against Nesaea’s ear. “You have problems of your own.”

“Kill me and have done with it,” Nesaea said, jaw clenching.

“Why ever would I foreshorten our time together, when I have so many questions that need answering?”

At the nasty tone of his voice, Nesaea’s hand stole once more to the hilt of her dagger. It was like trying to drag a boulder from the earth.

Jathen’s fingers twined tighter in her hair. “Whenever I look at my face, you see, I wonder what recompense such a grievous wound demands. Now I look at you, and wonder, what would such a pretty young woman cherish most about herself. What, I ask, is that one thing you could lose that would make you understand my pain?”

Nesaea stared into his eyes and saw something worse than death looking back.

Jathen pressed closer and gave a brutal squeeze to one of her breasts, while at the same time speaking in reasoned tone. “Perhaps, I think, cutting off your teats would be proper payment for what you did to me. But then, I think, perhaps not, for you could hide such wounds from the world, unlike me-lest I wear a mask.” His gaze mapped her features. “I tell myself I could take your eyes, maybe your lips. Or, perhaps, one of each? I expect there are those who would find such ravaged beauty appealing, even delightful. At worst, you could combine such imperfections with your other talents to great advantage in some lord’s great hall or king’s court.”

Nesaea tried again to pry his fingers free of her hair. He smiled, gave her cheek a jarring slap, then pressed his lips against her ear. “I’ve thought of many ways to punish you … but only one truly suffices.”

Jathen leaned away and motioned to one of the Kingsguard. The soldier approached, looking at Nesaea with something between regret and lecherous hunger. “Shame to ruin her, monk.”

“And it is an even greater shame that you insist on providing opinions when none are required! Now, give me your torch.”

Nesaea went cold, and her efforts to get loose intensified, when the torch passed hands. As the heat of that fire drew near, she smelled her wet hair struggling to burn, and she began to scream.

Chapter 23

The agonized scream rose so sharply and so loudly that, for a moment, Rathe believed the forest itself was suffering some rending agony.

A moment later, the cry cut off.

“Hold,” he ordered, ducking behind a screen of brambles. The abrupt movement revived the pounding in his head, but for once, it was easy to ignore.

Loro hunkered at his back, a hulking shape in the night. “Could’ve been a frost leopard,” he said in a hopeful tone.

“Such a beast would have to be very hungry to stalk men with fire.” Rathe wiped a trickle of blood from his brow.

“Then it was a woman,” Loro said, his voice cracking with rage. “Far as we know, there are only two nearby.”

“It was Nesaea,” Rathe said hollowly.

Loro’s silence told that he thought the same.

Rathe struggled to think beyond the hammering inside his skull, and his skin crawled at the memory of that piercing cry. The guilt he felt was worse. Since fleeing into the forest-he hated to think of it that way, but fleeing was exactly what they had done-all they had managed to do was stay out of sight, work their blades loose from their scabbards, and warm their limbs a bit by darting between the shadows.

“We have to go back,” Rathe said.

“We’ll die,” Loro said. “You understand that?”

“Yes,” Rathe said, but secretly reasoned that King Nabar had not sent a small fleet loaded with Kingsguard to capture Rathe’s companions, but him alone.

“All men die, but I never thought this would be my end,” Loro said. “I’d hoped to pass in my sleep, with a full belly, and a wench or three curled beside me.” His scowl had deepened as he spoke, but now his face went slack and he loosed a grudging sigh. “Well, there’s no help for it. Let’s get on with this mad business.”

Not long after they turned back, Rathe saw scores of torches through the trees. At least there hasn’t been any more screams. That brought him no comfort.

“Are you sure two men against a legion is the best course?” Loro asked. “Maybe we should have a look around, find a place to sneak into their camp, and wait for the guards to get sleepy.”

Rathe shook his head. “With the snow falling, they’ll soon load the prisoners onto the ships and put them to the question.”

Loro cursed under his breath.

Rathe parted a drooping curtain of snowy branches. The dam of rocks that had crushed the Lamprey was now a waterfall, the edges already beginning to freeze. The galleys rode anchor where the River Sedge widened below Ruan Breach. So many lamps burned on their decks that Rathe could have mistaken the fleet for a floating city. Most of the crewmen stood at the rails to look toward the riverbank, which was now lined with beached longboats, and easily two hundred Kingsguard. Edrik and his fellows stood apart from the other captives, passive but watchful. The Lamprey’s crew knelt on the riverbank, most of them bloody. Rathe picked out Liamas, Captain Ostre, and a redheaded woman-Fira, no doubt. She was bent protectively over someone on the ground. As he didn’t see her anywhere else, Rathe guessed Fira was watching over Nesaea.

“Seems you were right about Nesaea, brother,” Loro said, voice thick. “But I’d judge she’s alive.”

Rathe was unable to speak.

“Someone needs to die for this,” Loro said, shifting his feet. “Sooner the better.”

Rathe nodded, but didn’t move. Someone would pay, but as he would have only a single chance to collect his due, he wanted to make sure he chose wisely.

That was when he saw a man arguing with a trio of Kingsguard. The fellow wore a familiar green cloak. Melting snow had darkened his blond curls and plastered them to his skull. Rathe knew him well. “Brother Jathen. I suppose he wanted to see me collected.”

As they watched, the three men of the Kingsguard caught Brother Jathen and half led, half dragged him to one of the longboats. None to gently, they tossed him in. The crewmen at the oars shoved off and began rowing toward the ships.

“Seems he angered someone,” Rathe said, but he was looking again at Fira, who now cradled Nesaea’s head in her lap. She would not take such care if Nesaea was-Rathe’s mind skittered away from the word dead.

Loro’s attention had turned to another longboat approaching the riverbank. He whistled softly. “Looks like the king and his new queen have also come.”

Rathe looked that way, startled. Even with the falling snow, he knew the man’s face. The last he had seen Nabar, he had been sitting beside his father at a tournament in Onareth. Then, Nabar had been a timid and rather weak prince. He still looked so, but now he was the King of Cerrikoth. His queen was a mystery concealed beneath a light blue veil that matched her thick cloak.

“I know what to do,” Loro said.

Rathe arched a questioning brow.

“I hand you over to the king, collect the reward, and save my arse and everyone else’s in the bargain-all except yours, of course. But then, you’ll need to worry more about where your head ends up, than your arse.”

“Not a bad idea.” More or less, that had been Rathe’s line of thought.

Loro snorted. “That’s naught but a steaming pile of horseshit, brother. I didn’t gather up the Maidens of the Lyre and attack Fortress Hilan to get you free, nor did I cross the Gyntors and venture into the madness of Ravenhold, only to hand you over so easily.”

Rathe had once known another man who had stood by his side with the same conviction. Thushar had died in chains, his head lopped off because of Rathe’s indiscretions.

“I thank you, but you’ve earned a better end than what I face.”

“Save all that valiant twaddle for gullible children,” Loro growled. “My woman is yonder with yours, and even if I didn’t want to, that forces me to stand with you to get her loose.”

Rathe could have argued further, but saw that Loro had made his decision. He prayed to Ahnok for strength and courage, even as he cursed the demonic spirit that so relished bringing him, and everyone around him, no end of misery. “Luck to you, friend.”

“Same to you, brother.”

Weapons poised, they stood up and pushed through the brambles.

Chapter 24

“Why hasn’t it worked yet?” Danlin asked Edrik in a low voice, his gaze searching the faces of the crimson-cloaked soldiers around them. To Edrik’s eyes, Danlin looked every inch as fierce as they did, but after seeing the ease with which they put down the crew of the Lamprey, he knew they were men born to war, where he and Danlin were inexperienced priests trapped in a monstrous and foreign world filled with merciless deycath.

“Be patient,” Edrik said, his confident tone belying the obviousness that nothing had happened since they drank the Blood of Life. Like Danlin, he wondered at the delay-a delay that had allowed the vile mistreatment of Nesaea, now sprawled senseless. After watching Rathe and his companions in Iceford, Edrik felt as if he had come to know them a little, at least enough to share in their misery. Watching the pale-haired warrior in the green cloak-General Jathen, another soldier had named him-abuse Nesaea as he had, made Edrik’s belly cramp. What sort of people can do such terrible things?

On the heels of that thought, a small voice asked, What right have you to judge anyone? It was you who dropped a cliff on the Lamprey. You had no care for her safety then.

Thin as it seemed, Edrik’s answer was that he had acted to save Targas, not some diabolical need or desire to see a woman suffer. Besides, he reasoned, if Nesaea had died aboard the Lamprey, it would have been a mercy, compared to what she had suffered at Jathen’s hands.

He had almost vindicated himself, but couldn’t escape the truth that he and everyone he loved needed the woman to suffer, for what else besides that would bring Rathe rushing back?

Edrik searched the faces of his people, who were all looking between Fira tending her silent companion, and the cold forest concealing their salvation.

Where is he? Edrik thought, his own gaze turning to the tree line. His heart quickened when a stirring in the brambles at the edge of the riverbank caused the snow to slough off their branches. All went still again, and his heart sank.

“Perhaps we should try again,” Danlin whispered.

“The Summoning will work,” Edrik said, wanting to believe it, but finding it difficult to escape his doubts.

“But what if it failed?” Danlin asked. His gaze cut toward the soldiers. “If we don’t act soon, they will take to their ships. And as they are still holding us, I fear they mean to force us to join them.”

A reverent murmur turned Edrik’s head. Several soldiers were helping a man and woman out of a longboat. By the humble words of fealty, bows, and salutes, Edrik understood that the newcomers were the soldiers’ king and queen. If he’d had any doubt on that score, the golden crowns spoke plainly of monarchs. The king’s crimson cloak and robes, overstuffed with resplendent sable and decorated with golden needlework, was garb ill-suited for the bank of a river. Edrik turned his attention to the queen.

Dressed in pale blue, from her slippers to the veil obscuring her features and held in place by a circlet of gold, she moved with an otherworldly grace, leaving the soldiers aiding her without much to do. She was the true power here, Edrik knew at once, unsure how that helped matters.

“Before trying again,” Edrik said to Danlin, “we’ll wait a little longer for the Summoning to work.”

“Why not now?”

“You know why.”

“I’m more interested in staying alive,” Danlin hissed, “than worrying over the proper use of the Blood of Life.”

“Betray the edicts of our Order at your peril,” Edrik warned.

Danlin’s lips wrinkled back from his teeth, but he said no more. Thinking to soothe his friend, Edrik said, “If it comes to it, we will drink the potion again, but not for a Summoning.”

The anger on Danlin’s face melted away. “You suggest we perform the Sight-binding here, out in the open for all to see, and dare speak to me of betraying the edicts of the Munam a’Dett?”

“If it comes to it,” Edrik said, “the ire of our masters will be the least of our troubles….” His words faltered at the sudden silence around them.

All eyes had turned toward the forest, and Edrik thought sure the Summoning had finally worked. He was wrong.

“What’s that fool doing?” Danlin asked, as Rathe stepped into the open. Loro came next. Both carried swords and daggers.

“Not a fool,” Edrik said, awed despite himself. Seeing the bloody-faced man come willingly against such insurmountable odds destroyed all the hidden doubts he had carried in his heart about the legitimacy of the Oracle’s foretelling. “He is the hope of Targas.”

“Only if he lives.”

“He will. The Oracle foresaw it.”

One of the soldiers walking beside the king gave a shout, drawing a dozen men to his side. Without further word, they set off toward Rathe and Loro.

Another movement, almost lost within the forest’s deepest shadows back behind Rathe, caught Edrik’s eye. A pocket of darkness swirled, as if struggling to gain substance, then blended back into the shadows that had birthed it. Other than Thaeson’s vague descriptions, he had no idea what to expect from a Summoning. Could this be it?

He glanced skyward, looking for a clearer sign. Snow swirled like flakes of dirty gold in the torchlight, but he saw nothing else. Still, Edrik sensed things beginning to move and shift around him, subtle stirrings that prickled his shaven scalp.

“Make ready, lad,” Edrik heard the captain of the Lamprey whisper to the golden-haired giant beside him-a man with the looks of one born in the eternal light of Targas, if markedly larger.

The big man met the eyes of the battered crew, and gave an imperceptible nod. Edrik watched with mounting horror as each sailor picked up an icy stone and held it against his leg. They mean to fight!

Chapter 25

Rathe halted at the approach of a dozen Kingsguard. The soldiers spread out along the riverbank turned to watch, but otherwise kept their distance. Rathe focused on the commander of the group, thinking he looked familiar.

“Should we start hacking pieces off these whoresons straight away?” Loro asked. “Or do we want to give them a chance to surrender?”

Rathe’s laughter made his head pound, but he kept laughing. Few things stirred his blood as much as the thought of battle. Invigorating as it was, he also despised it. He was no murderer, but he was a killer, and he would leave it to sages to decide the difference between the two.

“At least they don’t have any archers,” Loro said.

Rathe sobered. “Seems we have a bit of luck, after all.”

“Black luck, at best.”

Silence fell between them.

Rathe made a study of the officer in the lead, a squat man with a face as craggy as a timeworn boulder. He knew the fellow after all-and well he should, as the man had foretold Rathe’s downfall. How long ago had that been? Not so long as it seems, Rathe thought, finding it hard to believe that less than two seasons gone he had been raiding with the Ghosts of Ahnok across the plains of Qairennor.

“Halt!” the officer called, ten strides from Rathe and Loro.

Rathe stepped forward. “What brings you so far from Onareth, Commander Rhonaag?”

The man’s smile was humorless and bitter. “Who but you, Scorpion, could drag me to such a godless wasteland?”

Rathe looked to the sky. “I believe there are gods here, but they prefer ice and darkness, to warmth and sunlight.”

“Be that as it may, after learning that you’d killed Lord Sanouk, brother to the king who set you free instead of having off your head, I resigned from the Fists of Rydev and joined the Kingsguard.”

Rathe’s eyebrows rose. “I’m surprised you were so eager to throw your lot in with King Nabar who is-how did you once put it? A fop and a coward who has always fancied Princess Mirith, the witch-queen’s youngest daughter.” Ignoring the soldiers’ uneasy shifting, Rathe searched over Rhonaag’s shoulder. “Unless my eyes deceive, it seems you were right about Nabar wedding Mirith, so I wonder if Onareth has become a ‘den rife with necromancers and mystics,’ as you also predicted.”

“I’ve no love of witches and their ways,” Rhonaag growled, “but the good of Cerrikoth outweighs my hatreds. Such is the reason I hunted your cowardly arse across the northern territories of the realm, sailed two seas, and ended up here. Long have I prayed for Ahnok to let me find you.” A rare and genuine smile touched his lips. “Now I have. When I return to Onareth, I’ll be sure to thank Ahnok by giving your severed cock as a burnt offering.”

“That sounds unpleasant,” Rathe said, the sharp ache behind his eyes having receded, his heart hammering in anticipation of the coming fight.

Rhonaag’s black eyes shone like chips of onyx. Not only did he seem eager to spill Rathe’s blood, he looked as if he wanted to bathe in it. “Still an arrogant shit, aren’t you?”

Rathe shrugged. “Never had a reason to be otherwise.”

“Is there anyone who is not your enemy?” Loro asked out of the side of his mouth.

“Too few,” Rathe admitted quietly, wondering if any former Champion of Cerrikoth had ever fallen as low as he. Considering the hard eyes of the men he faced, eyes that smoldered with the same hatred as their commander’s, he thought not.

“What’re your thoughts on fighting fair and honorably?” Loro asked loudly, as if the Kingsguard were in on the discussion.

“Honor is best served in the absence of blood and steel,” Rathe said. “Right now, I’d recommend a dirty fight.”

Loro chuckled darkly. “Just the way I like it.”

Rathe looked to Rhonaag again. “If you have any love for your men, you’d best order them back to King Nabar. If not, I plan on killing them all.”

“Don’t heed this blustering arsehole!” Rhonaag shouted, but it was too late. All the men present knew of Rathe and his reputation, and none appeared eager to cross swords with him in single combat. As if at a silent command, four of the men broke formation.

“Hold, damn you! Captain Carlus, I command you to hold!”

“We need to protect the king,” he called over his shoulder without slowing.

Rhonaag turned back to Rathe, sword coming to bear. “I’ll bronze your head and make it into my chamber pot,” he snarled.

With Nesaea hurt and naked steel swinging in the frigid air, Rathe decided he was well past taunts. His sword came up in a brief salute, and then he fell into a guarded stance. Loro moved to the side, whirled his sword overhead, and loosed a crazed shout that gave pause to the rest of the men standing with Rhonaag.

The fight never began.

Everyone froze at the rush of a terrible wind tearing through the forest. As the racket grew louder, Rathe realized that it was not wind he heard, but something like wind and water joined to make a deep roar. He darted a glance at the forest.

Where the dark of night had held sway, he now saw an expanding dome scrawled with webs of slow-rippling lightning. It soared a hundred strides above the tallest trees, and spread across the land as far as he could see. It continued to grow, as did the sound of its passage through the forest. Billowing clouds of snow shrieked through the trees and across the riverbank, blinding everyone. An instant later, something warm and jelly-like engulfed Rathe, knocked him sprawling, and then screamed past.

Snow plugged Rathe’s nose, packed his ears, and stuffed his mouth. Spitting slush, he clambered to his feet. The rushing sound had ended as quickly as it began, replaced by shouts and the clamor of fighting. The swarming threads of lightning he had seen covering the dome still rode its outer surface, all around and high overhead. In that faltering light, he saw several men of the Kingsguard locked in battle with the crew of the Lamprey. Rathe searched for Rhonaag, and found the commander and his men racing back toward King Nabar.

Loro turned, his eyes round. “It’s warm!”

Rathe was too dumbfounded to respond. Not only was it as warm as a spring day, the snow had ceased falling. In its absence, thick runners of fog began curling up off the icy stones littering the riverbank.

“Nesaea!” Rathe called, unsure what was happening, but seeing an opportunity to free her and the others. After, they could escape into the thickening fog. Loro needed no coaxing.

Running full out, they had nearly reached the tangled confusion of fighting Kingsguard and sailors, when an overwhelming cry dropped them to their knees. Eyes watering, Rathe slammed his fists over his ears, but the dread cry sank through the flesh and bones of his hands, boring into his skull.

When the cry cut off, Rathe hesitantly dropped his fists. Somewhere in the soupy mists high above, he detected a sound like flapping sails. A thudding breeze churned the fog, and a winged shadow soared overhead. As the shape wheeled over the river and flew back, Loro uttered a garbled shout. The creature swooped closer, rapidly emerging from the mists and taking the shape of a colossal blue serpent. Rathe heard Captain Ostre howl a single word: “Dragon!”

Before the meaning of that warning could take root, a brilliant pulse of light flashed from the beast’s fang-studded maw. A wave of blinding radiance struck Rathe like a soft fist, trading fear for the stark emptiness of oblivion.

Chapter 26

Its scales flashing like cut sapphires, the dragon took another turn over the now silent ships, then glided back and settled its clawed feet on the riverbank. As the creature’s great wings folded against its flanks, the illusion began to fade.

With quiet awe, Edrik and his fellows watched the transformation. When it was finished, Essan Thaeson stood in his blue-and-gold quartered vestments, where the beast had been before. The aged priest’s face sagged with weariness, but his voice was strong.

“Don’t stand there gawping! Gather Rathe and his portly companion. We must return to Targas at once.”

“The fat one is Loro, Essan,” Edrik said. “But why him?”

Thaeson picked his way over the riverbank, slipping on melting snow and ice. “Have you joined those who question Quidan Salris and the Oracle? Perhaps, too, you begin to doubt the justness of the Munam a’Dett?”

Edrik flinched at the accusation. “Of course not, Essan.”

He gestured to Danlin, who took several men to collect Rathe and Loro. While they lifted the two warriors, Edrik studied those lying on the ground. Crewmen, soldiers, a king and queen, all made equal by the powers of the Blood of Life and Munam a’Dett Order.

Thaeson made his study, as well. “A mercy that the Oracle instructed us not to kill these hapless fools.” As he spoke, the Shield of the Fathers began a slow retreat, first passing back over the ships, then coming to the riverbank. Though the crawling radiance still webbed the Shield’s surface, now there was no sound of rushing winds and waters. Thaeson had used that display to debilitate the outsiders-the deycath.

“Perhaps we should kill them,” Edrik said, struggling with the revulsion he felt at the thought of so much wanton murder. He eased his conscience with a glance at Nesaea, her face hidden by a tangled fall of dark hair. After what Jathen had done to her, she would likely welcome death upon waking.

Thaeson shook his head. “The Oracle assured Quidan Salris that these people pose no threat to the Shield of the Fathers, or to Targas.” His tone spoke of absolute faith in the entity that had guided the priesthood in ruling the Everlasting City of Light for five hundred years, but his furrowed brow betrayed underlying concerns.

Perhaps he’s only tired, Edrik told himself.

“Come,” Thaeson said. “Dawn isn’t so far off that we can dally, and I’ll not waste more of the Blood of Life to ensure the wall does not kill us with its touch.”

Edrik used a hand to buoy his aged mentor. The rest fell in line behind them, bearing Rathe Lahkurin, the Scorpion, the hope of Targas.

Sheltered within the protective embrace of the Zanar-Sariit, Algar stalked after Edrik and the others, glad he had refused Brother Jathen’s order to stop them from crushing the Lamprey. There had been a moment when he feared that decision was foolhardy, but now he sensed opportunity. After seeing what these folk named the Shield of the Fathers, and then a dragon transform into the man Thaeson, Algar understood that these folk had far greater powers at their disposal than just the ability to vanish from sight. Blood of Life, he mused, thinking of those golden flasks they drank from.

When they crossed a desolate band of ground-to Algar it resembled a dry moat-Edrik and the others paused to watch the silent advance of the Shield of the Fathers. Remembering what Thaeson had said about its touch being deadly, Algar moved well clear.

The dome, as Algar considered it, was massive and vaulted high overhead, but he saw that it was only an extension of an even larger dome. The smaller of the two halted when it reached the barren strip of dirt, and merged smoothly with the larger. The webs of lightning-only the portion of the dome he stood beneath burned with that undulating radiance-faded to a nearly transparent glimmering.

Thaeson nodded in satisfaction. “We’re safe.”

Before the old man could turn, Edrik caught his arm. “I trust Kyreen and the baby are well?” he asked, just above a whisper.

A scowl crossed Thaeson’s face, but he didn’t answer. Curious, Algar edged closer. Secret knowledge of your foes, potential foes, and even friends, was often more valuable than gold.

“Essan,” Edrik said, “my wife and child are well, aren’t they?”

“It’s best if we discuss this once we reach Targas.”

“I would know now.”

Thaeson sighed. “You need to trust me, Edrik.”

“Has something happened? Please, tell me.”

“Very well, but you must promise to do nothing rash.” Thaeson waited until Edrik nodded. “The last I saw Kyreen, she was still fat with child.”

“Last you saw her? You mean … she’s gone?” Edrik gasped.

Thaeson nodded sadly. “Like so many others of late, Kyreen has chosen to betray our cause by throwing her lot in with those who plot against the Munam a’Dett in a bid to destroy the peace and harmony of Targas.”

“Impossible!” Edrik flared.

Thaeson put a comforting hand on Edrik’s arm. “I visited a few nights past, as I’ve done every night since you departed. When I arrived, an empty house awaited me. I charged those we trust to find her, but they have found no sign of her anywhere. Nor has any of Kyreen’s family seen her.”

“Perhaps she was taken?”

“For all their faults, the traitors have never lowered themselves to seizing anyone.”

Edrik ran a hand over his shaved pate. “I’ll lead the next search myself.”

“Of course, my boy,” Thaeson said encouragingly, but Algar saw the hopelessness in his eyes that Edrik missed.

“We must hurry,” Edrik said, spinning away.

As he went, Algar noted something else the young man failed to see. His men, those who had followed his every command since Algar first spied them in Iceford, now looked upon Edrik with suspicion. What could make them turn so quickly? Algar wondered.

Following the company into a lush forest that looked to have never suffered a winter, Algar found a partial answer to his question in something Thaeson had said. “For all their faults, the traitors have never lowered themselves to seizing anyone.”

When there were traitors about, there was strife and discord. And where strife and discord existed….

Algar smiled to himself, the opportunity he had sensed earlier becoming clearer by the moment.

Chapter 27

“It feels warmer,” Queen Erryn said to Aedran.

They had marched away from Stormhold after the worst of the sickness had passed. Over half of her soldiers had suffered crippling fevers from the stings and bites of the glowing caterpillars. Most were still weak as kittens, but after spending a couple of nights guarding against the return of the spiny worms, and getting hungrier all the while, they had been ready to brave the unending snowstorm that had trapped them at the fortress in the first place. Likely, that storm probably still raged amongst the Gyntors’ highest crags, but down in the forested foothills, the snowfall was lighter.

“It might be a touch warmer at that,” Aedran agreed, surveying the soldiers clearing the way up ahead. The snow was only knee-deep here, allowing for a faster march. He glanced back to her. “I, for one, will be happy to set camp in a forest full of wood to burn.”

Erryn put on a wide grin. “A bonfire would be nice.”

Aedran blinked, seemingly confused by her good humor. Erryn remembered she was supposed to be angry with him, but truth told, she wasn’t angry at all. Disappointed that he had shunned her over some ridiculous custom, perhaps, but not angry. Besides, in some small way, he had made amends by forcing her to actually lead her army in defending against the glowing caterpillars.

“I also want food,” she said. “As much as I can stuff into myself.”

Aedran’s face lit up. “I could eat a horse.”

“And so you shall,” she said. The grueling march out of the high passes of the Gyntors had resulted in several more horses dying.

He laughed at that, and she laughed with him.

This is how it should be between us, she thought, a chaotic heat spreading from her middle to her cheeks. She looked boldly at him, refusing to hide her blush. For a long time, he didn’t look away.

When he spoke again, it was to suggest an early stop for the night. Erryn made a show of thinking it over before agreeing. All the while, a creeping tingle of longing threaded its way through her. Perhaps tonight my tent won’t be so cold … nor my furs so barren.

The army halted an hour later and began setting up camp. As they worked, many of the men grumbled under their breath. Of late, Erryn had noticed that air of discontent more and more.

“They’re just weary,” Aedran said, when she brought it up.

She paused in hammering a wooden tent stake into the snow between four hoary spruce trees. “I’ve seen tired men before, and I’ve seen these men tired before. This is different.”

“Half of them nearly died from those poisonous worms. Most of them were still sick when we left Stormhold. They’re not faring much better now. Besides, the journey has taken longer than it should have, all with too little food and too little warmth to take their minds off their freezing backsides. They’re tired of marching, and ready for-”

“Gold and glory,” Erryn interrupted.

“Aye.”

“Gold I have in plenty, so when can I expect to give my men the glory they want and deserve?”

Aedran looked to the west, but there was nothing much to see besides a forest of gray-black trunks jutting from the snow. Higher, the setting sun peeked through the clouds and painted the sky a deep crimson. “Before any glory comes, we must travel many leagues north, until we reach the headwaters of the River Sedge.”

Erryn stifled a groan. She’d had her fill of marching. “What good does a river do, as it must be frozen over by now?”

“On the banks of the Sedge, there is a surprise waiting for you.”

That caught her off-guard. “What sort of surprise?”

Aedran avoided looking at her. “If I told you, it wouldn’t be much of a-” He uttered a startled squawk when she pelted him with a snowball.

“It’s unwise to keep things from your queen,” she warned, her smile belying the gravity of her tone.

Chuckling, he wiped snow off the side of his head. “I cannot tell you everything, but trust that it will make everything we’ve faced since marching out of Valdar worthwhile.”

She weighed a fresh snowball on her palm. “I suppose that will have to do,” she said slowly, though still wondering about Aedran’s surprise.

“If you promise to put that down,” Aedran said, “I’ll help you finish putting up your tent.”

“Is it the custom for a Prythian general to bargain with his queen?” she said, cocking her arm.

“Only when he’s twice her size and could, at his leisure, roll her about in the snow until he grew tired of it.”

“A good general would not dare.”

“No, probably not, but.…”

“If he did,” she interrupted, her voice lowering, “and his poor queen was left frozen through and through … what would such a general do to warm her?”

As he looked at her, the camp noise seemed to fall away. Aedran cleared his throat. “A good general would do whatever his queen asked of him. Such is his highest duty, and his greatest pleasure.”

Will he ruin my hopes again? Daring to ignore that silent question, she asked, “Are you a good general?”

A garbled shout soared over the camp before he could answer. Erryn turned to find the nearest Prythians had become frozen shadows. One man among them was in motion, spinning in a tight circle and growling curses.

“Is that Zander?” Erryn asked. The last she had seen him, he had been caught in a feverish delirium, pissing on the floor, and scratching at a rash of pustules spreading across his hand, a consequence of the caterpillar spines that had pierced him. Even with the deepening twilight, she could tell something far worse was wrong with him now.

“Restrain him!” Aedran called, leaping up and rushing toward the man. Erryn was quick follow.

At that command, Zander fell into a deep crouch, swinging a snow-tamper around his head so fast the rounded iron square whistled, driving back his fellows. One Eye Thal crept up behind him, caught the tool’s long wooden haft as it began to swing back the other way, and wrenched it away before Zander could react. As he wheeled to face the grizzled captain, another Prythian darted in and wrapped his arms around Zander’s shoulders. Bellowing, Zander snapped his head back, crushing his captor’s nose and shattering his front teeth. The man tried to hold on, but Zander butted him twice more, splitting the man’s lips and squashing his nose to a pulp.

Zander fought free and spun, his fist blurring in a wide hook that cracked against his assailant’s chin. The bigger Prythian rocked back on his heels, blood streaming from his mouth into his matted black beard.

Erryn watched the skirmish with growing alarm. There was something wrong with Zander’s face, but in the half-light, it was hard see clearly.

Hunched and making strange, gargling noises, Zander followed his foe’s stumbling retreat. Without warning, he drove a boot into the man’s groin. When he folded over, Zander pressed in, hammering away with his fists. One blow pulverized the man’s cheek and knocked his round helm askew. The next strike crushed his jaw with the sound of a snapping tree limb. Mouth hanging, jaw unhinged and crooked, the big Prythian fell with a grunt.

Zander sprang over the man and howled like a demon at those who had gathered about. Everyone pressed together, forming a many-layered circle of leather, fur, and steel. Zander fell back into a crouch, panting, his eyes darting behind a curly black cage of unkempt hair. A shuddery grin pulled at his lips.

“He’s gone mad,” Erryn warned.

Aedran raised an arm to block her from getting any closer. “Best to stay out of reach.”

“Enough with your damnable Prythian coddling,” she snapped, trying to get past his arm.

Aedran shoved her behind his back. “For your life, girl, do as I say!”

A retort froze on her tongue when Zander, snarling and clawing, once more hurtled into the circle of men. Someone hit him with the pommel of a sword, and he fell back, stunned. For a moment, everything went still. Erryn saw something leaking into Zander’s beard from his nostrils and the corners of his mouth. She thought it was blood, but what she saw was squirming, rather than running. At the same time, uneasy murmurs rose from her Queensguard. The men keeping Zander at bay began to expand away from him.

“Hold!” Aedran scolded, his tone sharp, uncompromising … and something else. Frightened, Erryn thought sure, her own fear deepening.

“Come away,” Aedran said, catching her arm.

This time, she didn’t resist.

Once more, Zander flung himself through the frosty air and slammed into one of his fellows. Instead of using his fists, he began gnawing at the man’s face.

“Stop him!” Erryn cried, her belly cramping with horror.

Before a handful of Prythians could pull Zander back, he had left ragged bite marks all across his screaming adversary’s face. His captors flung Zander to the ground, but he instantly leaped up again. Whatever her Queensguard saw close-up, prompted them to brandish their swords.

“Take him alive!” Aedran called.

One Eye Thal swept in and cracked the iron tamper against the back of Zander’s skull. The man’s raving cut off and he fell to his knees, head bowed. “Careful, lads,” the captain said. “I’d wager my stones that he’s still got some fight left in him.”

Zander suddenly sat bolt upright, head raised, hair swept back over his shoulders, eyes staring. Festering sores pocked his face. The same held for half the men in her army, but it was obvious that Zander had been digging at the raw wounds, ripping them open. A bloody slit had taken the place of half his nose, and one eye bulged horribly, as if something were trying to push its way out of the socket. No one had seen his ravaged face, Erryn guessed, because like most everyone else, he had probably kept his head buried in the hood of his cloak.

“Get it out of me!” Zander screamed then, ropes of bloody phlegm exploding past his teeth. Zander’s scream became a gagging hiss, his disfigured features going the black-purple of an engorged leech. He began clawing at his throat. His mouth stretched wide and silent; black blood streaked his teeth. He made a hoarse barking noise, spewing a bloody clot over his lips. He convulsed violently, now making no sound at all, and pitched over in snow.

Aedran stood as motionless as all the Prythians.

“Help him,” Erryn pleaded.

No one moved.

“Help him!”

Aedran gave her a hesitant look, and then shoved his way through the men. Erryn came after him, but halted at the sight of Zander. She could not make herself get any closer, let alone help. She wanted to turn away and run.

In the murk, Zander lay curled on his side, a fevered sheen of awareness burning in one eye. The other had burst, leaving the socket teeming with a host of tiny, pale creatures.

Maggots, Erryn thought, dismayed, but knew that wasn’t true. The worms’ faint glow spoke of their kinship to those that claimed Stormhold as a sanctuary.

She drew back, one hand cupped over her mouth to restrain a moan of revulsion and to block the smell of the dying man, a muddy reek of stagnant blood and excrement.

Aedran said nothing as he hauled his sword free of its leather scabbard, the steel singing softly in the gathering night.

“He’s still alive,” Erryn said.

Zander’s breath came in hitching gulps, and his spasming fingers clutched and clawed through the snow. His good eye rolled, his mouth worked. Instead of words, she heard a gagging hiccup, and then a wave of worms boiled over his lips. She retreated a step farther, bile filling her throat and coating her tongue. More worms slithered like tiny white eels from Zander’s ears, from the tattered sores in his cheeks, from his staring eye.

“His back,” One Eye Thal warned, making a hasty retreat.

Distressed mutters filled the frosty air. Aedran tried to draw Erryn away, but she shook him off. She watched helplessly as Zander’s wolfskin cloak began to bulge and hump along the length of his spine.

“Those little caterpillars aren’t doing that,” One Eye Thal shouted, as Zander began to quiver. His good eye wavered, the iris half-covered by the wriggling girth of a worm. He said something in a pleading tone.

“What’s that, lad?” One Eye Thal asked, not coming any closer.

Erryn cocked her head, but could not command her feet to move any closer.

Zander’s quivering became worse. “Out….”

“I can end your suffering, brother,” Aedran said, the blade of his sword running with the first dim light of the rising moon. “Quickly and without pain. You’ve earned that much.”

Zander’s ruined face knotted, his lips rippled. “…. of ….” he gasped.

“He’s saying something,” Erryn said.

Aedran took a measured step closer to the fallen man. He curled the fingers of both hands around the hilt of his sword. “You’re a fine warrior. The glory you have heaped on Pryth and your clan has bought you a place of high honor at the feet of Ahnok. No man could ask or hope for more.”

Zander’s wolfskin cloak continued to shudder and bulge, as if his muscles had taken on a life of their own. His lips pressed tightly together on a worm, pinching it in half. The loose end fell to the snow and thrashed. He inhaled sharply through the devastation of his nose, making a high whistling sound. “.…m-me!” he managed.

Aedran took a steadying breath and raised his sword.

Zander’s face strained. “Get it out of me!” As that cry echoed away into the night, he fell limp.

“Hold!” One Eye Thal burst out, halting Aedran’s sword from falling.

A black claw had sheared cleanly through the silver-gray wolf pelt covering Zander’s back. The man whimpered when an opposing claw joined the first. The rest of the men scrabbled back, faces stricken with revulsion.

Erryn stood fast, held as if by chains of frost. Through the numb terror seizing her heart, she realized the claws were actually pincers … so like those she had seen surrounding the mouth of the caterpillar that had dropped to her shoulder in the cold halls of Stormhold. But these are much larger!

Zander flailed, and it seemed as if he was trying to get to his knees. A high-pitched whistling sound, just at the edge of hearing, escaped his throat. The Prythians dropped their weapons to slap their hands over their ears. Erryn, still rooted to the spot, mimicked them, but the sound knifed effortlessly into her skull.

“Joraxa!” someone cried, barely surmounting the piercing wail.

Without warning, the Prythian ranks shattered, the jostling men rushing into the forest, some so fear-blinded that they slammed headlong into tree trunks. Some got back on their feet and ran on. Others lay still where they had fallen, groggy, moaning.

The shriek rose higher, bringing tears to Erryn’s eyes, making her bladder feel swollen. Her gritted teeth ached to the roots, seemed to vibrate in time with the sound coming from Zander.

Not Zander, she thought. The thing inside him!

The shrill screech cut off, leaving only the noise of men running for safety, floundering through deep snow, cursing in fright; men who until now had always gone eagerly to battle for her, for themselves, for gold and glory; her army of brave Prythians, fleeing, leaving her to her own fate. All had fled, save Aedran and One Eye Thal.

“What is it?” Erryn sobbed, as a flat, bloody skull the size of her open hand began to tear loose from Zander’s body. A cluster of eyes, glittering like wet obsidian, nested in the creature’s sloping crown. Though they seemed to stare blindly, she knew they had marked her. Below those eyes, the creature’s great pincers snapped together over a smaller, gnashing set.

“Joraxa,” One Eye Thal said, staring as if mesmerized, “the spawn of Gamanas, Keeper of the Grave.”

The tip of Aedran’s sword stabbed into the snow with a fateful clank. “I never believed the stories of the great iceworms. I never….” He trailed off, his face that of a man beaten.

“Kill it!” Erryn ordered.

One Eye Thal looked to her, his face serene. His voice was calm, soft, and absolutely resigned. “’Tis us who’ll die, for the venom of a Joraxa makes a man as stiff as stone … at first. Then the worm drags him deep into the frozen earth, below the roots of the hardest frost. And there, his flesh begins to melt, like hot tallow, until naught but bones remain-bones a Joraxa makes into cradles for its unholy brood.”

“Are you mad?” Erryn stumbled back from him, back from Zander, back from the thing gradually curling free from his skin. “You must fight. We all must fight! Kill it!”

“There’s not much point fighting iceworms,” One Eye Thal said in that calm, dead voice.

“You must try!”

One Eye Thal’s lopsided smile was ghastly in the dappled light of the rising moon. “Soon, it will set to hunting us, following the heat of our blood as a hound follows the scent of a stag. If we run now, some of us might escape. All the rest will gather at the feet of Ahnok-”

Erryn’s slap rocked his head back, made his gray hair fly. She had not known she was going to strike him, but seeing some of that submissive light flee his good eye, she slapped him again, hard enough that her palm stung. The third time she drew her arm back, he caught her wrist.

“You’d have us fight our doom?” he demanded, spittle flecking his lips.

Erryn glanced at the creature. It had risen a foot out of Zander. She swallowed her fear. “I command it, you cockless old fool! Now unhand your queen, before I hew off your wilted stones!”

That seemed to sting him more than her slaps, and he looked to Aedran. “This brazen wench is the true Queen of Pryth, just as you said she’d be!” He shoved her into Aedran’s startled arms. “Take her, boy, and keep her safe. Run as fast and far as you can. If any of us survive, I’ll find you!”

Before Erryn knew what was happening, Aedran lifted her, his strong arms holding her to his chest like a nursing babe. Then he was plunging through knee-deep snow. One Eye Thal struck off in the opposite direction, howling a battle cry, but going wide around the iceworm.

The Joraxa was still coming out of Zander, birthing itself from the man’s corpse, rising into the frigid moonlight. Its pincers snapped together … spread wide … snapped together, the rhythmic jarring motion flinging shredded meat and blood.

Aedran wheeled around a cluster of naked birch trees and sank to his hips in an unseen hole. Erryn didn’t regret losing sight of the Joraxa. Cursing and straining, Aedran clambered up and out of the snowy trap, still holding Erryn to his chest. The only aid she could provide was to wrap her arms tight around his neck. Aedran changed course again, and Erryn’s breath caught when the Joraxa came once more into view.

By now, it had uncurled to half the height of a man, and was reaching higher in a waving, serpentine motion. Its segmented body was a collection of overlapping plates the color of old bronze-below the glaze of repulsed terror encasing Erryn’s mind, she knew that was not its true color, for Zander’s blood slathered the creature. Finger-length spines ran like hackles down the creature’s back. Dozens of insectile limbs were unfurling from its belly, each tipped with a stubby triad of clutching talons. It lifted its head and loosed another of those whistling shrieks. Erryn almost screamed when she heard an answering cry, and then another, and another. It’s calling to its kindred! Then, nearly too terrified to imagine the question, How many are there?

Erryn soon lost sight of the iceworm, though she could still hear it and the others, their cries punctuated by softer, barking chirps. Aedran quickened his pace, loping along in jouncing strides, his harsh gasps filling her ears.

Chapter 28

At length, Aedran stumbled and collapsed on top of Erryn. Gasping an apology, he rolled onto his back in the snow. “Can you run?”

“Yes,” she said, her mind filled with gruesome images of the iceworm climbing out of Zander’s corpse. A mercy that I can no longer hear it.

Aedran used a tree limb to stand, knocking loose a drift of snow that fell over them both with a muffled whoosh. The fluffy cold struck Erryn like a slap, and she scrambled to her feet.

The iceworms might have fallen quiet, but there were other noises in the moon-stippled forest. Faint sounds of men crashing through brambles, calling out to one another. Some of those who were closer snarled and cursed, much as Zander had before he fell.

Aedran took her hand. “Let’s get a little farther.”

They went together, him hauling her through snow that reached almost to her waist. Before she had been too frightened to feel the cold, but now its bitter touch began sinking into her limbs, stiffening them.

You cannot stop, she chided herself. And you cannot make him carry you again. This last angered her, for she knew in her heart that she had been letting Aedran and the rest of her army carry her ever since claiming Valdar and naming herself queen. So far in her short rule, she had done very little to mark herself out as a good and strong queen.

As she considered this, her anger rose higher, firming her resolve. Soon, she was matching Aedran stride for stride. With her lesser stature, the effort overstretched her endurance, left her chest heaving and her heart thumping, but she was willing to pay the price. Each time she faltered, she thought of what One Eye Thal had said. “The worm drags him deep into the frozen earth, below the roots of the hardest frost. And there, his flesh begins to melt, like hot tallow, until naught but bones remain-bones a Joraxa makes into cradles for its unholy brood.” Those nightmarish words gave her strength to continue, where all else might have failed.

Erryn and Aedran kept on until the moon had climbed high into a sky filled with broken clouds, slashing the forest in silver and black. Erryn’s legs had gone numb as sticks, and her chest ached from drawing in huge breaths of freezing night air. Despite all her inner scolding, she was about to beg Aedran to stop. He must have sensed her fading, and halted at the edge of a snowy meadow before she could.

“What now?” Erryn gasped.

Instead of answering, Aedran studied the clearing. In the chilly light, Erryn recognized elk tracks and another set that might have been made by a frost leopard, or a bear late to its winter den. Swooping trails left by hares converged on the handful of gray-black briar thickets, each bowed heavily under snow. The faintest tracks were those of birds and mice, meandering in all directions. If any men had moved through here, they had not done so since the last snowfall.

Erryn glanced again at Aedran, poised to flee in any direction he pointed. Looking at his face, she realized there would be no more running. He means to make a stand here.

Aedran turned his head toward a stand of trees. Erryn followed his gaze, but saw nothing alarming.

“That you, lad?” came a soft voice, so close that the speaker might have stood at Erryn’s side. She loosed a startled yelp and spun, nearly losing her footing.

Aedran dropped a comforting hand on her shoulder and drew her closer. “One Eye Thal is a master at making his voice sound as if he’s somewhere other than he is.” Louder, Aedran said, “Aye, you old bastard! Who else would be guarding our queen?”

Relief and gladness filled Erryn’s heart at the sight of the captain creeping out of the gloom between two pines. More men materialized behind him, a long chain of them that quickly spread out to form a wide but sparse perimeter around the meadow. The moonlight was strong enough that Erryn recognized Captains Kormak and Romal, but there was no sign of Murgan. Counting heads, she estimated that One Eye Thal had brought near a hundred men with him.

The captain waded closer through the snow, every motion calculated, as if stalking game. He doesn’t trust his eyes. Erryn could not blame him, not after what had become of Zander.

He halted within arm’s length, head thrust forward, his good eye squinted down to a slit, peering first at Erryn, then Aedran. She returned his scrutiny. Blood flecked his gray beard-Zander’s blood-but nothing about him seemed out of character.

The grizzled warrior straightened. “So, lad, is this the best place you could find?”

Aedran spread his hands in apology. “The finest battlefields aren’t usually discovered while running through the night.”

“And rarer still after getting routed,” One Eye Thal put in with a rueful snort. “S’pose it’ll have to do.”

Aedran studied the diminished army. “So few.”

“Truth told,” One Eye Thal said, “other than those I have with me, I’m not sure I’d want to see anyone else, especially any of those who got bit back in Stormhold. Course, those fellows stayed away.” He waved a hand over the men who had joined him. “These lads are free of bites and otherwise hale … though, a couple shit themselves. I cannot hold that against them, as I damn near soiled my own trousers when that Joraxa crawled out of Zander.”

“What’s getting bitten have to do with anything?” Aedran asked.

One Eye Thal stroked his chin. “My mind’s been turning ever since I got on your trail, and it seems to me-” he cut off, his brow knotted up like a fist. Aedran waited calmly, but Erryn felt as if her skin were crawling off her bones. She knew the old captain was about to say something neither of them wanted to hear.

“Those caterpillars in Stormhold,” One Eye Thal began again, “must’ve laid eggs, or some such, inside Zander … and mayhap a lot more of us.”

“Eggs?” Aedran asked, doubtful.

“Aye, lad. Lucky for us, it seems only one egg can turn into a true Joraxa.”

“How can you be sure?”

“I’m not, but having more than one of those beasts growing inside a man would make for cramped quarters, don’t you think?”

“Maybe,” Aedran allowed, running a hand over his lips. “But if you’re right, then a lot of our brothers are infested.”

“Aye, we could have near on half a thousand iceworms roaming the forest already.”

Aedran looked troubled. “None of the stories I’ve ever heard mention how to kill a Joraxa.”

“Not a one,” One Eye Thal agreed with a hard smile. “All I’ve ever heard is how folk end up melted down into spots of gravy to feed the little ones.”

“Then how do we kill them?” Erryn asked.

“With steel and wits,” One Eye Thal said. “Leastways, I hope that’ll work. If not, we’ll end our days as wormshit.” He laughed wildly, as did Aedran. Not for the first time, Erryn wondered what Prythians thought so humorous about dying.

Aedran sobered. “Best get a few bonfires going. They might help-” He cut off when One Eye Thal went rigid as a post. “What is it?”

“Something’s watching us.”

“Anything watching us this night, is also hunting us,” Aedran said.

Erryn saw that both men had drawn their swords. She followed suit, the short sword Nesaea had given her feeling like a chunk of useless iron in her hand. One day I’ll learn the use of this thing, she thought. A far less pleasant idea followed. But only if I survive the night.

They stood stiffly for a long time, but nothing moved in the forest, and none of the men guarding the edge of the clearing raised an alarm.

“Have half the men gather all the wood they can find,” Aedran ordered One Eye Thal. “Keep the rest on watch.”

One Eye Thal spun away and began bawling orders.

Erryn, feeling useless, watched and waited.

Chapter 29

In short order, the Prythians had carved out and smoothed a wide area at the heart of the meadow. They used excess snow to build a broken circle of steep-walled ramparts divided at four points by roaring bonfires. Ramps on the inside led to the top of each section of wall, where guards stood watching the forest. Outside the ramparts, below the watchmen’s feet, bristling hedges of wooden spikes waited to impale enemies. Men not looking for iceworms continued cutting down small trees to use as spears and to feed the fires. If they were to survive till dawn, Aedran had told the soldiers, they would need constant fire and light. None of them needed another reason to gather as much wood as they could.

Erryn stood near the bonfire at the center of camp, first warming one side, then turning to heat the other, her eyes following the ongoing preparations.

“If any of us are still alive come morning,” she said to Aedran, “what then?”

Aedran surveyed the men and the fortifications. “We’ll make all haste to the River Sedge.”

And to my surprise, Erryn thought, not really caring what awaited her there. “The caterpillars at Stormhold were drawn to our heat,” she said, looking at the fires set between the ramparts. At first, the flames had melted the edges of the broken walls, but once the flames died back a little, the wet sheen had become a glaze of ice. “Fire is sure to attract them.” She meant it as a warning, but Aedran was of another mind.

“Aye, that’s my hope. With any luck, the iceworms will come and die upon our blades. That’s better than us hunting them.” Without warning, he moved off to speak with One Eye Thal, Kormak, and Romal. So far, Captain Murgan was still absent.

Watching him go, Erryn again drew the sword Nesaea had given her. The hilt was cold through her gloves, but the weight of the weapon, the promise of its keenness, calmed her. She wondered if Lady Nesaea ever felt unease when she ceased being the mistress of a troupe of entertaining women, and became a general commanding a company of skilled warriors.

Erryn decided Nesaea knew nothing of nervousness. In all she did, the woman was the picture of confidence and poise. No one would ever catch her shaking in her boots on the eve of battle.

Not like me … so afraid that I’m near to pissing myself. Erryn wished she could feel some of Nesaea’s sureness. Right now, she couldn’t help but pray all this was a terrible dream from which she would soon awaken.

But this was no dream.

To her mind, that left only one choice. A queenly choice.

When Aedran and One Eye Thal returned, they both glanced at her sword, their eyes approving. Their expressions changed when she said, “We must retreat.” The command sounded frail to her ears, uncertain, but it was out now, and she felt as if a crushing weight had lifted off her chest.

“Where would we go?” One Eye Thal asked, giving no indication that he agreed. Aedran was also looking at her, his features unreadable.

To him she said, “You mentioned there was something waiting for me at the River Sedge … a surprise. If by that you meant safety, then we should make for the river at this very moment.” Now her voice sounded surer. “Even if there’s no safety at the river, we should still retreat, lest I lose what little is left of my army.”

One Eye Thal glanced at Aedran. “You told her?”

“Not enough to spoil anything,” Aedran answered, flashing an unconvincing smile.

“Why mention it at all?”

Aedran shrugged helplessly. “Our queen should know our destination.”

One Eye Thal rubbed his face. When his hand fell away, he had put on a belated grin. “Just so, lad, just so.”

Erryn looked between them, disliking the idea that they had kept secrets from her-something far more important than a mere surprise, by One Eye Thal’s reaction. I’ll deal with them and their secrets later, she silently promised, anger overriding her fear.

She raised herself up, prepared to issue a formal command before either man could attempt to talk her out of it, but a warning cry from atop the wall stilled her tongue. A second later, a piercing whistle echoed through the forest.

“Ready the men,” Aedran said to the captain.

One Eye Thal nodded and spun away. A moment later, everything had become a chaos of movement. Shouting men sprinted up the ramps, doubling the number of warriors on each section of the wall. Others moved to guard the narrow openings on either side of the bonfires, each bearing hastily made spears. Above the racket, the iceworms’ shrilling cries came closer.

“They’re all around us,” Erryn said, sword held before her.

“If we survive this,” Aedran said, eyeing her wavering blade, “remind me to show you how to use that damned thing. For now, just remember to poke at their eyes and underbellies.” Between him and the captains, that was the best strategy they had come up with.

“If we survive?”

“Gold and glory demand their own price, and that fee is usually wet and red.”

Blood, Erryn thought with a shudder. A sudden half-mad chortle bubbled past her lips. “If we survive this, I expect-” she paused to shake her head briskly “-no, I demand that you put aside all the adoring nonsense you heap upon Prythian queens, and treat me as a woman.”

His gaze flickered uncertainly. “What you want is forbidden.”

Erryn ground her teeth in frustration. “I care not about what is forbidden.”

“Nor do I,” Aedran admitted softly. “It is wrong that I can so easily imagine putting aside my duty and destiny … but for you, in this matter, I would.”

Her heartbeat increased. “So, you will do as I ask?” The grave way the words came out, she might have been asking him to die for her, instead of sharing her bed.

Aedran swallowed. “It would be my greatest privilege and, doubtless, my greatest pleasure.”

Erryn’s cheeks burned under his steady blue gaze. “We’ll see about that.”

“Indeed,” he said, and barked sudden laughter.

Her insides fluttering, Erryn looked away before he could take anything back and deny her again. They stood unspeaking for a long while. The camp grew silent, save for crackling bonfires.

“I want to go up on the wall,” Erryn said.

Aedran shook his head. “This is the safest place.”

Erryn scanned the camp. “You know as well as I that bonfires and walls of snow offer little safety.” They also needed more weapons-namely bows, of which there were only four or five among her men, and far too few arrows. “Take me to the wall, general,” she said. Then, to soften the order, she added, “If anything happens, you have my permission to drag me back here.”

Aedran rubbed his chin, brushing frost from his beard. “Very well. But if anything happens, do not think to resist me.”

“Of course not.”

He gave her a doubtful look, then led her across camp to the nearest ramp of packed snow. He stayed no more than two strides ahead as they climbed. Atop the wall, some of the soldiers gave her uneasy glances.

Aedran pointed off to one side. “There! Two of them, winding around that split tree. Do you see them?”

When Erryn saw the iceworms, she wished she had stayed put at the center of camp. The two Joraxa moved with the ease of serpents swimming across a still pond. Unlike serpents, the iceworms used dozens of legs to drive them along at twice the speed of a running man, their segmented bellies hissing over the crusty snow. As she had guessed before, they were not the color of bronze, but rather the hue of dusty bones, save for their black eyes and pincers.

Then they were gone, vanished back into the gloom.

She kept a sharp eye, and it was not long before she caught more glimpses of the creatures circling the camp. Always they appeared briefly, before fading beyond the firelight, as if they only wanted a quick peek to satisfy some curiosity. As far as she could tell, more and more of them were growing curious.

Erryn was not the only one to take notice of the behavior. Her Prythians took stock and stood tense, their swords, axes, and mauls ready.

After watching the circling creatures for a time, Erryn noted something else. “They get closer each time around.”

“Aye,” Aedran said. “They grow bolder the longer we wait.”

“Perhaps we should attack them before they attack us?”

Aedran thought about it. “I could send a few men out to meet them, but Joraxa will have the advantage in deep snow. Better to stand fast and let them come to us, where we have fire, walls, and hard-frozen ground underfoot.”

Erryn had no counter to his counsel, so she remained silent. The longer she stayed so, the tenser she became. Until a man screamed, she hadn’t known she was waiting for the worst. She whirled a blink faster than Aedran.

Across the camp, high up on another parapet, a Prythian was struggling to pull his foot out of the snow. A muffled crunching noise swept around the camp. The man cried out again and fell to his backside. Using his sword, he stabbed at the snow around his buried foot, and then abruptly dropped his weapon to grab his leg. Those nearby moved closer to the thrashing man, but warily.

“Kormak!” Aedran shouted. “Go see what he’s on about.”

Captain Kormak obeyed with a brisk nod, but his stride slowed when that crunching noise came again. The struggling man wailed and redoubled his efforts to escape. When his leg came free of the hole, a spurting stump had taken the place of his boot. He began scooting backward, the shredded stub of leg leaving a bloody trail. “Help me, you craven shits!”

The shock clutching his companions broke. They rushed forward, caught hold of the man’s arms, and began pulling him down the ramp toward the center of camp. Kormak pushed by them and sprinted to the place the man had lost his foot. Despite the distance, Erryn saw the tightness around his eyes.

“What is it?” Aedran called.

“A deep hole, general … and blood.”

“Gods,” Erryn said, feeling caught in a whirlwind in which the passage of time had increased tenfold, “they’re burrowing through the walls. We need to get everyone down.”

“Aye,” Aedran said, but his attention had turned to the wounded man.

The soldier’s cries had become a string of oaths directed at those hauling him to safety. They made it no farther than halfway down the ramp, when pair of black pincers burst out of the packed snow and snapped around the man’s good leg. He reared back, mouth gaping around silence, his body convulsing between the Joraxa fighting to drag him under, and the men trying to pull him loose. Erryn heard leather ripping, bone crunching, and then the soldier lost most of his second leg to the iceworm. He fell back and went still, his shortened legs pumping scarlet streams.

“Get him down!” Erryn shrieked.

Captain Kormak had just turned to help, when another Joraxa surged out of the hole behind him, its spindly legs waving and clattering together like bones. The worm caught the captain about the waist and raised him up on his tiptoes. Eyes bulging and mouth working, Kormak made a feeble strike with his sword, managing to cut off a claw-tipped leg. Before he could swing his blade again, the belly of his armor bulged. Kormak thrashed weakly, a horrid gargling noise issuing from his throat.

Erryn’s skin flashed cold when a pair of the worm’s forelegs punched through Kormak’s middle. The captain’s choking squeal cut off when those legs ripped him in half. Erryn turned away, shaking, retching.

Aedran pulled her near. Ordering a retreat to the center of camp, he jerked her off her feet and hauled her down the ramp. She didn’t resist or try to stand. Instead, she hung limp.

With a series of violent tugs, the worm that had killed Captain Kormak now yanked his torso down into its burrow. Soldiers began slashing and stabbing at the snow. Erryn’s few remaining Queensguard rushed to defend her.

Aedran deposited her near the central bonfire, and she watched in a daze as One Eye Thal raced across the camp, batting men aside in his haste to reach the warrior who’d lost his legs. By the time he reached the fellow, a Joraxa had crawled several feet out of its hole. Its bloodied head swung toward the captain, its dead black eyes focusing on him. As its flattened head reared to strike, its pincers snapped together with a resounding clack!

With his sword out and swinging, One Eye Thal dropped into a slide that took him under the Joraxa’s lunging attack. His blade sliced across the creature’s middle with a ringing screech. Uttering a whistling shriek, the worm twisted around, following its attacker. One Eye Thal slid to a halt, ran the tip of his sword deep between a pair of bony plates, and wrenched the blade to the side. Cut nearly in two, the thrashing iceworm folded over, its dying shrieks making Erryn’s hair stand on end.

Coated in the worm’s greenish blood and viscera, One Eye Thal stood up to deliver an overhand strike that smashed through the front part of the worm’s skull. Half the creature’s head, along with it snapping pincers, tumbled away.

Staggering clear of the Joraxa’s spasming legs, One Eye Thal thrust his gore-streaked sword overhead and roared a battle cry. With that, he rushed to help a trio of men battling another great iceworm that had burst through the base of a rampart.

“More are coming!” warned the last soldier atop the wall. “They’re everywhere! Scores of them! Hundreds!”

“You must stand up, Erryn,” Aedran said urgently.

Hearing him speak her name cleared some of the shock from her mind, but she could not seem to make herself move.

Trying to look everywhere at once, Aedran reached out. His gloved hand swayed before her staring eyes. “Get up!”

Erryn barely heard. She quailed at the bloody chaos spreading all around. Iceworms exploded from the packed snow, catching hold of her men, ripping them asunder. Slashing steel rang against bony plates. Blood of worm and man flowed and splashed.

“On your goddamned feet, girl!” Aedran bellowed.

His harsh tone struck Erryn like a blow. With a curse, she shoved his hand away and clambered to her feet. “Where’s my sword?” Erryn snapped, dismayed to find that she had dropped it.

Before he could answer, the ground underfoot cracked and gave way. Erryn tumbled to her arse, and Aedran sank to his knees. A Joraxa surged out of the loose rubble of frozen dirt and packed snow. Aedran took a stab at the worm, and in answer, a clawed foot slashed his face, driving him back.

“Run!” he screamed at Erryn, floundering toward her. He sank to his waist, then to his chest. The Joraxa rose behind him, neck arched, pincers spread wide.

Ignoring his command, Erryn struggled to her feet and moved to help him, only to sink to her knees in the broken ground. She ducked a slashing leg, but the clawed foot ripped a tuft of dark hair from her head. Her pained cry became a grunt when she toppled face first into the crumbly mire.

Aedran’s shouts filled her ears. She didn’t waste a moment looking his way, but flung herself onto firmer ground. At the edges of her vision, men were clashing with too many iceworms to count. She saw other men fall, torn and bloody. She saw nothing to give her hope.

Another warning sent her into a rolling dive, and the Joraxa slammed its pincers down where she had been. Then she was on her knees, fighting to rise. The worm swung its head, knocking her aside.

She flew a short span and bowled over one of her soldiers. He fell on her, crushing the breath from her chest. His weight vanished a second later, and a steaming drizzle spattered across her cheeks and brow. More of it flooded her eyes, stinging, turning everything red. When she opened her mouth to scream, that scarlet rain flooded her tongue with a taste of salted rust. Blood! It’s his-The frantic thought cut off when shredded bits of armor and meat began pelting her.

Aedran called out again, off to her left.

Scrabbling madly through a forest of stout legs, Erryn’s fingers touched something familiar, and they wrapped convulsively around the hilt of the dead man’s sword. The blade was far longer and heavier than hers, but in her terror, the weapon felt light as a feather.

Swiping at her eyes, Erryn hastened toward Aedran’s voice. Through a crimson fog, she saw a serpentine shape swaying above him.

“Stay back!” Aedran roared.

Erryn lurched forward until the Joraxa’s girth filled her vision. Imitating a Prythian battle cry, she stabbed at the iceworm’s flank. The tip of the blade scraped over a smooth plate before slipping deep between two segments. The creature spasmed, jerking the sword out of her hand. She dropped to her knees and tried to crawl out of reach. The iceworm’s attack went wide, but its stone-hard belly cracked against the back of her head, knocking her flat.

Stunned, chest hitching, she rolled over to see the Joraxa soaring above her. Clustered obsidian eyes regarded her over snapping pincers. Erryn had a moment to wish her vision had remained fuzzy, before the iceworm lanced down. She flinched to the side just before the Joraxa crashed into the ground.

Flopping to her belly, she made to wriggle away, but her hands had become a pair of gloved fools. Beyond her clutching fingers, the torn snow went on and on, dotted with pieces of what had once been whole men and savaged iceworms. Behind her, Aedran screamed. Below her, the ground trembled.

A crushing pressure closed around her waist, and the iceworm lifted her high, titling her back until she saw only the night sky overhead, the depthless black expanse filled with coldly glittering stars. Something like a blunt spear jabbed brutally against her spine. Erryn heard her wolfskin cloak tearing, felt icy points digging into her skin. Searing trickles of blood began to flow, and she envisioned Captain Kormak dying. Erryn ground her teeth together, making them into an impassable bulwark. She didn’t want to die screaming. If she trapped her pain inside, the last of her army would keep fighting. And, after they had won the night and tended their wounds, they would sing a lament for their good, strong queen.

All at once, the iceworm shook beneath her, whipped her back and then forward, and she felt herself hurtling through the air without a whit of grace, her arms and legs stretched out as if held by invisible ropes.

Weightless, Erryn soared over the rampart and thumped into a deep drift of snow. A swirling white cloud engulfed her, filled her nose with icy powder. Too dazed to think, she lay there looking up at the stars, listening to the clamor of battle, and waiting for a breath to fill her chest. When it did, she gulped the bitter air, relishing the painful ache it put into her lungs. Then, for a long time, she lost herself in a cold stupor.

When the first trumpeting beast charged past, Erryn mistook it for a new kind of murdering horror. When the second went by, she sat up with a wince. Men on horses were galloping in every direction across the meadow. Men bearing torches and wielding lances, all wearing armor and strange uniforms-true uniforms, not like the wolfskin cloaks and leathers her Prythians wore. Red-and-white quartered shields emblazoned their snowy tabards, and upon each shield soared a jet-black raven. Where these men rode, iceworms died.

Her confusion deepened when rivers of Prythians began charging out of the forest and converging on the makeshift camp. There were many hundreds of them, far more than had marched with her across the Gyntors.

The battle raged on, oblivious to her.

While the Prythians herded the great iceworms with fire and steel, riders used their lances to impale the creatures before they could escape. Where that failed, they ran their warhorses over the top of the worms, letting steel-shod hooves crush the Joraxa.

Far sooner than she could have hoped, the fighting began to slack off. A familiar voice turned her head. She saw her general pushing through teeming hordes of Prythian newcomers. His cloak was tattered, blood speckled his face, and greenish ooze befouled his sword.

“Aedran!” Erryn called, but it came out as a hoarse croak. He couldn’t have heard, but his roaming gaze halted on her. Aedran came on at a run.

Erryn began digging herself out of the snow, the length of her spine filled with a throbbing ache. The longer it took, the harder she fought, until each breath burned in her raw throat. She didn’t care. She had to get to her general. To Aedran.

She had pulled herself free and was stepping clumsily to meet him, when a loud fluttering gave her a fright. She spun, hands raised in defense, but there was no danger, so far as she could see.

Erryn stared in openmouthed wonder at the scrawny little man standing next to her. She was sure he had not been there a moment earlier.

He reached out, but hesitated to touch her arm. “By the grace of Lady Mylene of House Akarlen, and by the strong arms of the Wardens of Tanglewood, you’re quite safe. Of course, if your Captain Murgan hadn’t found one of Ravenhold’s patrols, things might have taken an unfortunate turn for you and your men.” Despite the fine cut of the little man’s bulky woolen cloak, he looked ratty and rumpled, and his black hair hung in lank strands about his thin face. “But then, we’re all the safer for the arrival of Lord Lofgrem and his army of Prythians.”

Why would there be another army of Prythians here besides my own? Erryn decided that could wait. “Who are you?”

He beamed. “I’m Horge, kennelmaster of Ravenhold.” His shoulders gave a fidgety twitch. “Truth told, I’m also the master of horse and, too, I mind chickens and geese, swine and sheep, and….” He trailed off with a helpless shrug. “As it concerns Lady Mylene’s stock, I tend them all. I understand them, you see, more than most.”

There was something curious about the way he said that last, but then Aedran was at Erryn’s side, looking suspiciously at the ratty fellow.

Before her general could say a word, Horge asked Erryn, “If I may be so bold, who are you?”

“She’s the chosen Queen of Pryth,” Aedran answered.

Horge blinked, his thin fingers tapping against his lips. “Queen of Pryth, you say? Oh my. That isn’t good. No, no, not good at all.”

“Why?” Erryn asked, bewildered.

Horge’s nose twitched like that of a forest creature detecting a raging woodland fire. “Because the other chosen Queen of Pryth will be none too pleased to learn of a rival. Nor, I suspect, will those who chose her,” he added, waving a hand over the host of Prythians busily ensuring all the iceworms were dead.

Erryn faced Aedran. “What’ve you gotten me into?”

He shook his head, concern etched deep into his face. “I don’t know, but rest assured, I will find out.”

His promise should have comforted her, but Erryn felt as if inescapable chains were wrapping her about and cinching tight. A report from a man Aedran trusted had led Erryn to march her army into this frozen wasteland in order to find and destroy her greatest enemy, King Nabar. Such an audacious attack would have secured her hold on northern Cerrikoth, but without warning Nabar, wherever he was in the Iron Marches, had become a minor concern. Recalling how often Aedran had spoken of Prythians willingly fighting amongst each other, she sensed a grave danger with the presence of a second Queen of Pryth and her army. More than ever, Erryn wished she had remained a simple orphan girl who lived free, even if it meant scrounging for every meal and sleeping cold. Crowns, even nonexistent ones like hers, were nothing but shackles of gold and misery.

Chapter 30

“I’ve done all I can,” a woman said.

“You’ve done nothing more than I could have!” came Fira’s sharp retort.

The conversation sounded far away to Nesaea, as if echoing along a dark tunnel that smelled of sopping wool and char.

“She’ll live,” the unknown woman said. “I dare say that’s more than anyone could have hoped for. Most die from the corruption that sets into such wounds, but I’ve seen to it that your friend will live-that is far more than you could have done.”

Nesaea’s eyelids fluttered, but would not open. One side of her face felt stuffed with hot embers. The other was cold.

“What of Jathen?” Fira demanded. “Will you punish that bastard for what he did?”

“My husband and I have an alliance with the monks of Skalos and, in particular, with Brother Jathen. For her sake, I regret what he did, but you and your friend are his to do with as he pleases.”

Nesaea waited for more, but heard instead the sound of muffled footsteps and the rustling of heavy cloth. Fira cursed softly.

Nesaea tried to piece together what had happened, but could only gather tidbits: A wall of stone crushing the Lamprey; swimming in the bitter cold waters of the River Sedge; fetching up on the icy shore; a man, familiar and terrifying. There was more, but the images were blurred, nightmarish, and had to do with … Jathen.

Drifting between wakefulness and sleep, abstract pieces began melding themselves together in her mind, until she saw Jathen peering into her eyes, his glare full of hate and vengeance. In time, his voice came to her down that tunnel of misery. Whenever I look at my face, you see, I wonder what recompense such a grievous wound demands. Now I look at you, and wonder, what would such a pretty young woman cherish most about herself. What, I ask, is that one thing you could lose that would make you understand my pain? Those words rang like the distant peals of a great bell, and Jathen’s agate blue eyes swam before hers, his pupils reflecting flames.

“No!” she cried, her eyes pinched shut, lest the man was actually beside her.

Gentle hands held her down. “You need sleep,” Fira said.

“No,” Nesaea moaned.

“It’s over. But if you’re to get better, you must rest.”

Nesaea carefully opened her eyes on strange surroundings lit by a single candle. Wet and dripping, sagging canvas hung above her, divided down the center by a taut line. A tent? She had seen the same many times, but couldn’t understand how she had come to be in one.

She glanced to one side, surprised to feel a pillow under her head. She was lying on a narrow cot, and heavy rugs covered the floor. Through the half-parted tent flap, soldiers passed by in the light of torches.

“Where are we?”

Sitting on the edge of the cot, Fira studied her hands. “On the bank of the River Sedge. The same place we were after the Lamprey sank. Instead of letting us freeze to death, the gods made us prisoners of the King and Queen of Cerrikoth. The best I can say of them is that they gave us shelter.” She offered a brittle smile. “Did I mention the dragon?”

Nesaea tried to laugh, but it hurt her face. “Surely you jest?”

Fira shook her head, taking great pains, it seemed, to avoid looking at Nesaea. “After Jathen … after what he did … something came out of the forest. A dome of sorts, crawling with lightning, but also somehow clear, like glass. With it came warmth and mist … and the dragon.”

Something tickled the back of Nesaea’s mind, but try as she might, she could not pin it down.

Fira glanced toward the tent’s doorway. “There’s some kind of magic here, and Queen Mirith seems more interested in that, than in anything else. I’ve never seen anything like it, nor have I ever heard of such things as I saw. The magic Horge’s sister used-”

“Yiri,” Nesaea said, remembering the girl’s name, and the deadly green fire she had wielded at Ravenhold.

“Yes, even her magic pales beside what’s at work here. Almost as soon as the dragon appeared, it did something to put everyone to sleep. When I woke, it seemed as though I must have dreamed it all. The air was cold again, and the snow was falling.” She looked at Nesaea for the first time. “That’s when I knew it was no dream, for the snow fell on wet ground, where before the riverbank had been all snow and ice.”

That niggling sensation troubled Nesaea again, and her heart sped up. “Rathe? Loro? Where are they?”

“They came back while you were unconscious. After the dragon … they were gone.”

They are still alive. Nesaea knew there was no reason to think so, but she felt it in her bones.

She sat up, wincing at the hot throbbing that spread from the side of her head to her neck and down her shoulder. She made to touch the source of that pain, but Fira caught her wrist. “Leave it.”

Nesaea pulled away. “What’s the matter with-”

She cut off when her fingers brushed over a wide bandage and snagged in her hair. When she drew them away, some of the hair fell into her blanketed lap. Instead of glossy black strands, they looked like bits of withered straw.

Fira stared at her with an emotion approaching horror, then burst into tears.

Shaking, Nesaea touched her head again, and felt a mass of blistered skin above the bandage. “What happened?”

Fira buried her face in hands, and could not seem to find enough air to speak.

“What happened to me?” Nesaea demanded, seeing again the flames reflected in Jathen’s eyes. When she spoke again, her voice was small. “What did that whoreson do to me?”

“Rest,” Fira sobbed. “Please, just rest.”

An aching knot formed in Nesaea chest. “I want to see.”

“No.”

Nesaea took Fira’s hands in her own. “Show me.”

“We have no mirror.”

A hasty search brought Nesaea’s eye to the candleholder. It was silver and of simple design, but the large round base would suffice. She ordered Fira to retrieve it, and after a long moment, she obeyed.

Careful not to dribble wax, Nesaea pulled the candle free and handed it to Fira. Jaw clenched, she lifted the candleholder, turning it so she could see her distorted reflection.

Much of the hair on one side of her head had been scorched to a yellowish bristle above the bandage. Below the bandage, her cheek was shiny pink and so puffy that it pulled one side of her mouth into a sneer. Nesaea forced herself to say, “The dressings are in the way.”

“The queen and I just put them on.”

“Take them off!”

“No. Not now. On the morrow, when we change them, will be soon enough.”

Nesaea almost agreed to that, but couldn’t let it go with the way Fira was behaving. “Please, do this for me.”

Quivering head to foot, Fira tried again to dissuade her. “Removing them will hurt.”

“It already hurts. Now do as I ask, or I’ll do it myself.”

After wiping away her tears, Fira began unwrapping the bandages. While she worked, the sharp odors of a healing salve, burned meat, and scorched hair assailed Nesaea.

When she finished, Fira sat back. “Look if you will, but I beg you not to.”

Nesaea hesitated, then slowly lifted the candleholder, again turning it so she could see herself. “Oh,” she moaned. The hand holding the candleholder began to shake, so she steadied it with her other hand. The terrible image remained, and she shut her eyes on it. That isn’t me. It cannot be!

But she knew the rippling mass of blackened and weeping flesh, which started near the crown of her head and ran down her neck like melted wax, belonged to her as much as the hand bearing the candleholder. She opened her eyes again, and looked once more.

Where’s my ear, she thought, mystified by a horror that sank marrow deep. Where an ear should have been, she saw only a deformed nub surrounding a hole packed with salve. She thought to ask the question aloud, but a high, mourning wail began to fill up the tent.

Until a pair of guards rushed in and eased her down on the cot, Nesaea didn’t realize that terrible sound was coming from her.

Chapter 31

Loro looked about the sparse but well-appointed and windowless room. “Where do you think we are?”

Rathe had been wondering the same since he woke up an hour before, and found that his clothes were clean and dry, and that someone had bandaged his skull. The wound was still tender where he had bashed his head against the rocks of the River Sedge, but the thudding ache had become tolerable enough that he could think straight. Either a fine healer had attended him, or he and Loro had been here for some time before waking up. “I don’t know where we are, but if this is a prison cell, it’s the finest I’ve ever been in-not that I’ve been in many, mind you.”

Across the room, Loro leaned back on his narrow featherbed and laughed. “Well, I’ve been in plenty of cells, brother, and I can assure you, this place beats them all, along with most inns I’ve frequented. Still, I’m of the mind that we should leave-and the sooner the better.”

Rathe crossed the room to small round table, poured himself a cup of pale wine, and sipped. The flavor was sweeter than nectar. “Once we escape, we’ll have to find Nesaea, Fira, and anyone else who was taken prisoner.”

“Far as I remember, our captor was a dragon,” Loro reminded him.

Rathe remembered that too, but wished it were otherwise. Ever since venturing north of the Shadow Road, he had seen too many dark legends come to life. Beyond the Gyntors, even farther north, it seemed as if only mad gods ruled the world.

“No dragon built this place, which means there are men involved. We’ll deal with either trouble as we come to it. Afterward, we get back to where we belong-”

Rathe cut off when the carved wooden door swung inward.

He recognized Edrik, but not the old man beside him. Behind them stood four tense guards with shaved heads like Edrik, and all heavily armed.

“Ah, you’re both awake!” the older man said, as if they were welcome guests instead of prisoners, and bustled into the room.

Edrik shut the door and stood to one side. His red-rimmed eyes had puffy bags hanging below them. Mud covered his boots, and the rest of his garb was wrinkled and disheveled. Rathe had seen men look so after a night of excessive drinking landed them in a ditch. He guessed too much wine was not Edrik’s problem, but rather worry and lack of sleep.

Wearing an open grin, Rathe faced the old man. “I must thank you for providing such splendid quarters.” He touched his bandaged head. “And for this, of course.”

The old man bobbed his head. “You’ve a glib tongue, but I sense that you are not sincere.”

“You sting me,” Rathe said, his smile slipping a little.

The old man shrugged, making the blue dragon emblazoned on his robes slither and dance. “Be that as it may, we must put aside this utterly false banter and speak plainly.”

“Of course,” Rathe said, abandoning all pretenses. It took all his restraint not to tear out the man’s throat, and then get on with escaping. If not for the armed guards waiting outside the door, and the strong possibility of more lurking out of sight, he would have. “I invite you to begin our conversation by explaining who you are, and finish by telling why you took us prisoner.”

While Edrik didn’t so much as blink, his companion tottered over to the table and poured himself a cup of the sweet wine. He took a sip, smacked his lips, and moved to stand beside Edrik.

“I’m Essan Thaeson of the Munam a’Dett Order and, in the strictest sense, you are not prisoners, but rather honored guests in Targas, the Everlasting City of Light. On the morrow, you will begin preparing the vizien caste of our Order to make war against the faithless malcontents who hope to destroy our city and our way of life. In the meantime eat, drink, and rest, for what awaits you will be, I dare say, grueling.”

Before Rathe could say a word, the old man and Edrik departed.

Looking bewildered, Loro asked, “Does the fool actually believe we will simply do what he wants because he wants it?”

Stunned by the abruptness with which the two men had left, as well as the bald declaration of what this Essan Thaeson intended for them, Rathe studied the closed door. “Not only does he believe it, he expects that we will do exactly what he says.”

“Piss on that,” Loro said.

Rathe wanted to agree with the fat man’s sentiment, but he remembered the dragon and the moving dome, with its skin of lightning. Those two things spoke of powers beyond his ken. Rathe’s gut told him they would have little choice but to do as Thaeson wished. His heart told him he would die before he bowed to the old fool’s demands.

Content

James A. West
Queen of the North

Prologue

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Chapter 5

Chapter 6

Chapter 7

Chapter 8

Chapter 9

Chapter 10

Chapter 11

Chapter 12

Chapter 13

Chapter 14

Chapter 15

Chapter 16

Chapter 17

Chapter 18

Chapter 19

Chapter 20

Chapter 21

Chapter 22

Chapter 23

Chapter 24

Chapter 25

Chapter 26

Chapter 27

Chapter 28

Chapter 29

Chapter 30

Chapter 31