'And he's dangerous?'
Radok shrugged. 'To a man like you? Before this journey I would have said no, but my friends believe he serves the Black Wind now, that death is his friend. They say he killed a group of Empty Faces in single combat before they crossed the Velga.'
'We saw the bodies,' said Mikilov. 'He did that alone?'
'So they say, and I have no reason to doubt them.'
'Then why doesn't he come down here and kill us? What's he waiting for?'
It was a new voice that answered, soft and young. 'He wants the Seven to see it.' Radok and Mikilov turned in unison to see Nyana standing behind them, her fur cloak dragging in the snow behind her, unseeing eyes gazing off into the darkness of the north. 'He wants them to truly see it,' she said. 'He serves the Eighth now, and there is nothing he wants more than to shame the Seven. He will wait for us at the Blackstone. That's where the journey ends.'
Mikilov grunted, shifting on his feet in an effort to keep warm. 'I understand none of this,' he muttered.
'It's simple really,' said Nyana, and Radok smiled. Young as she was, the girl had a habit of making old men feel stupid. One reason among many that Talak and the elders must hate her.
'Why don't you teach him, Little Sparrow?'
Nyana tutted at the indignity of it all, but Radok saw the eagerness light her face. 'It's the All Song,' she said, in a tone that suggested she was the one talking to a child. 'It's the eternal dance between life and death.'
The girl paused and Radok chuckled. He could almost see her mind trying to work out the best way to explain her gods to an outsider. It would not be an easy task. The wolf had only ever heard talk of the Seven from men who had tried to kill him, and he wouldn't offer much slack if she lost her way. After a moment though, the girl had her angle.
'When we speak of the Seven, think of them as seven rivers, all flowing in the same direction, from beginning to end.' Radok smiled. This was the version he'd been told as a boy, back when the Grey Crow fished him from the waters of the south and taught him their words. He had heard it many times since, always through Ilgor, seeking to convert those children taken in raids and ambushes. Now it's Nyana shining the light, taught by the best…
'Running through it all is the largest river, Kamra, what you would call life itself. All living things are born from this river. We are carried along by its current, ageing as we go, until our part in the All Song is done.
'The other six flow beside it, weaving in and out, sometimes merging with the life stream, sometimes flowing far away. If we are caught in any of their currents, one of these rivers can sweep us away, our lives changing dramatically, for better or worse. Yet all seven flow in the same direction, their differences ironed out along the way, so that what is meant to be will be - what we call the Will.'
'Tell him about the Seven, girl,' said Radok. He had closed his eyes to listen. Hearing the words from Ilgor was one thing, but hearing it in the sweet song of his Little Sparrow was something else entirely. It brought Radok a deep sense of joy. She is made for this. She is made for the Blackstone.
Nyana sighed at the interruption, but she knew well to give the audience what they wanted. 'There is Padra,' she said, 'fate, for those who stick to the course they are given, and very few ever break free once she has them in her stream. Kari, destiny, plucks out those who strive for greatness, sweeping them up from Kamra as a beggar and casting them back as a chief.
'Then there's the Idari, the two sisters of fortune. They are the most unpredictable of the Seven. Idra can raise you up when you least expect, but Idri can send you tumbling over the falls. They are the balance that holds the Will in check.
'And finally the Dacari, the two brothers of desire. Dacri you would know as lust, and Dacra is love. One river we can resist if we swim hard enough, the other there is no fighting. …Both can bring great joy or great sorrow.'
'That's the Seven,' said Radok, 'and theirs is the Will. Now tell him of the Eighth.'
Mikilov grunted. 'Him I've heard of.'
'They say you serve him,' said Nyana. 'That the Black Wind circles the blades of your axe, and in return you pay for it with the souls of the children of Basilla.'
'Then what would he pay me for yours?' asked Mikilov, a wicked glint in his eye.
'The Eighth, Little Sparrow. Tell him of the Eighth.'
'Chadra,' she said, 'the Black Wind. He cares nothing for the whims of the Seven, only for death and destruction. He weaves his way through the All Song in defiance of the Will, crossing the Seven and bringing death to any unfortunate souls caught in his path.'
'Sounds like any Basillian I've ever met,' said Mikilov, and the sincerity of the words pained Radok. Perhaps because he knew the truth of them.
Radok opened his eyes and gazed at the wolf. 'We kill to survive,' he said, 'but the Black Wind takes from both sides. He wants us all dead.'
'It sounds like this Talak only wants you. So why not let him?'
'It's not him,' said Nyana. 'It's me. He wants to stop me touching the Blackstone. He fears I will become a conduit for the Will like none before me, and the thought of it terrifies him. It terrifies the Eighth too.'
Mikilov looked as confused as ever, but even Radok struggled to make sense of that. 'Why?' he asked.
She fixed her dead eyes on Radok, the seriousness sending a shiver down his spine. 'Because I could change the tribes. Not just the Grey Crow, but all the tribes of Basilla. And if I change the tribes, I change the Wolves; I change the people of the One God; I change the future of nations, and, with it, all the wars to come.'
Radok sank to his knees before the girl and laid a hand on her shoulder. 'You don't expect much of yourself, eh Little Sparrow?'
She smiled shyly. 'I just read it as I see it.'
'Very well,' said Mikilov. 'First we'll kill this Talak, and then you'll touch the Blackstone.'
'You believe her then?' asked Radok.
'I think she believes it, and that's enough for now. Scar gave his life to protect her. Now I'm duty bound to do the same.'
Nyana caught Mikilov's hand before he could turn away, her big empty eyes meeting his. 'Thank you, Grey Wolf.'
'Don't thank me yet, child, there's still a long way to go.'
'Do you speak for the She-Wolf too?' asked Radok.
'Senya?' Mikilov laughed. 'No one speaks for her. But if you stay away from her, I'll make sure she keeps away from you.'
Radok nodded, satisfied. 'Then we best get some sleep. There's still a long road ahead of us.'
✽✽✽
On the fourteenth day out from the Velga they crested a large rise, where they were met by a sight that took their breath away. For the first time on their journey there was nothing to see on the horizon; no hills or snow dunes, no rocky outcrops nor frozen trees. The long arm of the Spears, known as the Körangar mountains to the Grey Crow, loomed out of the west, reaching towards them, but there was nothing else beyond that. Only the sprawling, empty waste of the Whitelands themselves.
Senya held a hand to her brow, shielding her eyes from the bright sunlight, which bounced off the white landscape with an almost blinding harshness, and peered at the distant mountains. The jagged, snow-capped peaks of the Spears stabbed at the sky like white steel, the memory of them burning into Senya's vision. She wondered, not for the first time, how a place so cold could still find a way to burn?
'Are you sure this bloody rock of yours isn't out that way?' she asked, waving a hand at the distant mountains. She turned back to the group of Grey Crow gathered behind her, relieving her eyes of the painful glare, and slowly focused on her new companions. She found no comfort there, only the cold animosity of an enemy sworn to peace. Senya found her fingers playing at the hilt of her sword, the gesture not entirely subconscious.
'There's nothing that way,' said Radok, his voice growing weaker by the day. 'Only ice and rock, and death.'
'Still more than what's out here,' muttered Senya, turning her gaze back to the bleak empt
iness of the north.
'Two days,' put in Talgar, Nyana's head peering over his left shoulder from where she dangled from his back. In light of Radok's worsening decline, Talgar had taken over transport duties of the little one, with neither of them complaining too much about it, all things considered. 'Give it two days,' he went on, 'and you'll see the Käda… the Last Rock.'
'Best we keep moving,' urged Jian. 'Daylight is already wasting.'
The party started to move off, but Radok hung back, gazing off to the distant mountains. 'Huh,' he muttered.
Following his gaze, Senya saw a flock of birds flying south, like black arrows moving across the bright blue sky, the distant sound of the cawing carried over the silent emptiness.
'What is it?' asked Nyana.
'Grey crow,' Radok told her. 'A flock of them, heading south.'
'Tell me,' the girl said, her voice anxious, desperate almost.
'There's maybe fifteen, flying against the wind, battling hard.' Radok paused, turning his eyes on the girl, watching her for a moment as she strained her own unseeing eyes toward the distant marvel. 'It's a thing of beauty.'
'I can see it,' she said, her voice almost a delighted squeal. 'The snow-capped mountains behind them!'
'That's right, Little Sparrow. That's right.' Radok smiled warmly. There was no mistaking the emotion behind that expression. It was a look Senya had seen a thousand times before, back in her father's days, when he would cast her that same smile.
It was love, pure and simple. The love of a daughter beaming out from a proud father. And she'll never know what it looks like. Senya felt a swell of pity for the girl, and even for the Wolfeater. Perhaps there was more to him than the rabid killer she had taken him for. He'd killed Velimir, and no displays of tenderness would undo that, but Senya was starting to understand what Mikilov and the old woman had tried to tell her. Nothing was ever black and white. It was always shades of grey.
'Where are they going, do you think?' the girl asked.
'The same place we should be going,' said Radok. 'Somewhere warm.'
Talgar was right. Two days later they got their first glimpse of the Last Rock, peeking its pointed head over the flat horizon. Energised by the sight, they marched on with renewed vigour, every step taking them a little closer, the mountain slowly emerging from the white haze of landscape up ahead.
Little by little, the lonely mountain climbed up out of the earth until it stood brazenly before them, beckoning them on like a beacon in the darkness. By the third day they could pick out the details: three lower spires of sharp rock glazed with the ice of a thousand years, crowned by a fourth peak climbing high enough to scrape at the sky above, and all crisscrossed by a spider's web of wind carved crags and ridges, ice forged ledges and passes.
The party took a break once the sun reached its zenith, taking drink from their water skins and sharing in the dried strips of kragan meat they'd gathered when they joined forces.
The water was an issue. Senya hadn't given it much thought until they were out in the frozen wastes, when Mikilov told her to ration her water. 'Why?' she asked. 'We're surrounded by water; we'll just drink the snow!'
'If old Finn could hear you now,' Mikilov had scoffed. 'How do we melt it? We'll be lucky if we see another fire before we're back south, and if you try to melt it in your mouth it will steal your body warmth and you'll freeze all the quicker.'
'Then what?'
'We share skins,' Mikilov had said. 'When one is empty, we fill it with snow and start drinking from the other. We'll carry them between the layers of our clothes, let our body warmth melt it that way. It will take a while for it to melt enough, so we'll have to ration the good one.'
That was what they did. Senya took her swig now and passed the skin back to Mikilov. 'How are you feeling?' he asked, returning the stopper and slipping the skin back beneath his coat.
He had asked the same question each time they came to a stop, and each time she had fed him the same lie. I'm fine. Yet the closer they got to the Last Rock, the further they were from home. And the further they were from home, the more it seemed the time for lies was coming to an end.
'It's my hands,' she told him. 'I can barely feel my fingers.'
'Frostbite,' he muttered. 'Here.' Grabbing Senya's arms, he crossed them over her chest and shoved her hands into her armpits. 'You need to keep them as dry and warm as possible. If your fingers start turning black, you'll lose them. And don't rub them. That will only make it worse.'
Radok ambled up beside them, offering a sympathetic half-smile. Gazing off toward the mountain, he said, 'We'll reach the foothills by tomorrow afternoon, and with any luck we'll meet the Ashan Daru. He should give us everything we need.'
'The Ashan Daru?' asked Senya.
'A servant of the Seven. The First and the Last. He is the gatekeeper to the Blackstone. He'll offer us shelter and prepare us for the climb ahead.'
'And if Talak reaches him first?' asked Mikilov.
'He will,' said Nyana, standing just behind them. 'But the Ashan Daru picks no sides. He serves the Seven and the Eighth. Talak will not harm him.'
Radok shrugged his shrunken shoulders, loosening them. 'I hope you're right, Little Sparrow. Without him, there's no way we make the climb.'
As she watched him walk on, each staggered step crunching through a layer of crusted snow, Senya knew the truth of what the Wolfeater said. Even in the short time since they had joined forces, she had watched him wilting away, like a flower caught in the winter of its life. 'I'm not sure he'll even make the mountain, let alone the climb,' she told Mikilov.
'He'll make it,' said Nyana, climbing back up onto Talgar's back. 'He still has work to do.'
Chapter Twenty-Three
The Ashan Daru
He found the Ashan Daru waiting for him, as he had known he would. The old man stood in the cave mouth at the foot of the Käda, the mountain towering away behind him. He was dressed only in a grey rag that covered his manhood, with a necklace of small bones dangling against his bony frame. Gaunt and shrivelled, he shivered in the cold air, his breath smoking as he exhaled. His pale skin had a taut, bluish tinge to it, while his small, dark nipples stood as hard as pebbles in the bitter cold. He looked every inch a man freezing to death.
Talak was about to call to him, when his breath caught in his throat. This was not the man he had known. He was dressed the same, with the same apparent indifference to his own wellbeing, but this one was younger. Much younger. There was no grey in his long, scraggly hair and his beard was more that of a youth gone wild than a wizened man's of untold winters.
'Where is Barun?' Talak called to him.
The man's face, all hollowed cheeks and sunken eyes, brightened with a crooked smile. 'Barun is dead,' he said, his voice like dried timber. 'I am Aldur. Welcome to the Käda, Talak of the Eighth.'
'You know me?'
'I live in the shadow of the Blackstone. The All Song is the only company I have. I knew to expect you, as I know to expect the others. Come…' he said, sweeping aside the heavy, tattered hide hanging over the entrance of the cave and waving Talak forward. 'There are rules we must discuss.'
'What rules?'
'The rules of what follows.'
'There is only one rule,' said Talak. 'Life or death. And I have made my choice.'
'And yet there is balance too. Before the scales are tipped in favour of one or the other, there are rules that must be obeyed. Come!'
Without waiting for a response, Aldur ducked into the cave and disappeared from view. Talak lingered a while longer, his eyes scaling the mountain beyond the cave, stopping at each of the ice-blasted spires before pushing on to the summit, where the Blackstone waited.
It sent shivers down his spine, seeing it again. Talak remembered the fear he'd felt the last time he stood there, gazing up at that monstrosity of rock. Yet he was just a boy back then, and the Black Wind was nothing but a whispered warning from the elders of the Grey Crow. Now the Black Wind was with him
and there was nothing to fear. There was only the thrill of anticipation.
Inside the cave Talak found the Ashan Daru sitting beside a roaring fire, tending a broth-filled cooking pot with a wooden ladle. Animal hides decorated the walls and littered the floor, covering every inch of the rough-hewn rock with a look of comfort and cosiness. There was a hand-chiselled chimney over the fireplace for the smoke to escape, but most of the heat stayed within, helping to explain Aldur's choice of clothing. The sound of trickling water echoed from deeper in the cave, reminding Talak of the hot springs he knew could be found around the Käda. There was something magical about those springs, Talak knew, but he had never been close enough to see them for himself.
'I would offer nourishment,' said Aldur, 'but I know servants of the Eighth have little desire for food or drink, even as their bodies waste away.'
'I have what I need,' Talak told him, though his stomach rumbled at the intoxicating smell of the bubbling stew and he had to drive the thought of it from his mind. 'I'll take the rest from the fallen.'
'The fallen?' A smile flickered on the man's lips. 'You think you'll win then?'
Talak's jaw tightened. 'The Black Wind always wins.'
'True enough. All things die… eventually. But before then there is life, and that's not so easy to sweep away. Not when the Seven have plans of their own.'
'I could kill you easily enough,' said Talak, though he wasn't sure if that was a good idea or not. While the Eighth had left him largely to his own devices these past few days, there was always a whisper of guidance. Not so within this cave, where he could hear no trace of the All Song at all, neither the Seven nor the Eighth.
'You could,' said the Ashan Daru, settling back with a bowl of stew. 'But I am merely the gatekeeper. Here at the Blackstone, life and death hold the same value. Neither side has anything to gain from my death. Even if you do kill me, another will come to take my place. There will always be an Ashan Daru, despite what Chadra may wish.'
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