by David Hair
Banno hesitated. ‘Father?’
‘I said kill her, you blasted weakling – kill her!’
‘He’ll do no such thing,’ a new voice crackled.
He spun, outraged, to see Kemara Solus at the flap of the tent, and behind her, Mater Varahana stood with the two guards who should’ve prevented the interruption. But they were plainly terrified, because blue lightning was dancing on the healer’s fingertips, the air was sizzling and her eyes were lit with pale, feral light.
‘Holy Gerda,’ Elgus breathed, going stock-still.
‘Tami didn’t warn anyone of anything,’ Varahana stated in a lordly voice. ‘We’ve been alert to treachery from the get-go – but I’m willing to give you the benefit of the doubt over whether Osvard was acting under your orders.’
He bunched a fist, finding courage in his rage. Sorcery was a clumsy weapon in close combat – it was too slow. That’s why most sorcerers did their work from behind phalanxes of infantry. ‘If I say the word, you won’t get out of here alive,’ he snarled.
‘Neither will you,’ Kemara replied, her face hard and that unearthly light gleaming brighter. ‘Shall we?’
He decided she meant it and slowly withdrew his hand from his sword hilt. ‘Now what?’ he rasped.
‘We all take ten paces back and a deep breath,’ Varahana said. ‘We did what we had to, to protect ourselves; you didn’t know what Osvard planned, and there’s an end to it. Oh, and a runner has arrived – Vyre’s party defeated the imperial force. They’ll be here soon.’
Shit.
But realising that the game was up, he feigned relief, and judging by the healer’s control of magic – he’d not realised she was so advanced – taking her on might well have been suicidal.
‘I really didn’t know what Osvard intended,’ he lied. ‘There’ll be no further problems.’
Tami will tell them the truth if I free her, but they likely know that anyway. The real issue is whether they believe I’m repentant and won’t try again. Neither Varahana or Kemara were fools, but they wished to preserve the peace. They’d want to believe he’d changed his mind.
‘I misunderstood Tami’s role in this matter,’ he said, as if won over. He bent over her and stroked her cheek as if regretful. ‘From now on, we’re behind Vyre all the way.’
With knives sharpened and drawn.
Varahana said nothing, probably worried that rejecting his words would provoke violence.
Elgus turned to his son. ‘Banno, cut Tami free.’
His son obeyed, with considerably more alacrity than he had the instruction to kill her. Not only that, but he put his shoulder under Tami’s arm and helped her from the tent. Varahana followed, and Kemara backed out last.
‘You learn fast,’ Elgus said. ‘Or else you’re only pretending to be a novice sorcerer?’
‘That’s for me to know and you to guess. If I were you, I’d be putting aside any remaining ambitions to cheat us, Sir Elgus. We’re only going to succeed if we work together.’
‘Or else?’
She slammed a bolt of energy into his armour tree and the wood split in a blinding flash, sending sparks flying and leaving the timber blackened. The spare greaves that were hanging from it fell, twisted and glowing orange.
Deo on high . . .
‘There is no “or else”,’ she rasped, then she spun and was gone.
He let out his breath slowly, trembling with fear and rage, and wondering if this was the beginning of his end.
*
Raythe, Jesco and Vidar led their band into the camp, looking round them curiously as they were met by Cal Foaley. A runner had intercepted them downstream, so they knew what had transpired at the camp, or a version of it, anyway.
‘What’s happening?’ Raythe asked.
Foaley, who was considerably younger than his grey hair and weathered features suggested, gestured towards Varahana’s tent. ‘The healer is tending Tami, Varahana’s blessing the bodies and Rhamp’s men are digging holes.’
‘How’s Elgus taking this?’
‘He hasn’t come out of his tent.’
Raythe frowned. ‘Best I go pay my respects.’
‘Is that wise?’ Vidar asked.
‘Probably not, but we need to normalise things again.’ He shook Foaley’s hand and said, ‘Well done, Cal. You’re on bonuses when we get some money out of this venture.’
‘I’ll take that, milord,’ the rangy hunter said. ‘What’s double nothing anyway?’ He smirked at his own humour and sauntered off.
The camp remained quiet, despite his return. The wives and children of the hunters and villagers were being kept a long way from Rhamp’s people; there were armed men stalking back and forth either side of a hundred-foot strip of no-man’s-land. As soon as Raythe and Jesco set out across it, a bunch of Rhamp’s men gathered behind Bloody Thom and came to meet them.
‘You’ve got a bloody nerve coming here,’ the big mercenary snarled.
‘I think it’s more important that we talk right now, rather than beat our chests – don’t you?’ Raythe replied. ‘Enough lives have been lost.’
Bloody Thom paused, then growled, ‘Wait here,’ and headed for Rhamp’s pavilion.
After a few minutes of silent staring from the other mercenaries while Jesco blithely whistled a jig, Bloody Thom returned with Sir Elgus. The big knight looked sunken and grey, with bloodshot eyes and a haunted air.
‘You made it back,’ he said glumly.
‘Aye. The plan worked perfectly, we bloodied the Bolgravs’ noses and with luck they still don’t know which way we went. But we need to press on, just in case. The river carrying the istariol traces runs into the north edge of this lake, according to the cartomancer’s journal. The real hunt begins now.’
The Pelarian knight listened in silence, then mumbled, ‘You probably think I tried to work you over.’
‘It crossed my mind.’ Raythe held up his hand to cut off Elgus’ next words. ‘But I expect it was just Osvard and his cronies. I’m sorry for your loss, but he overstepped once too often.’
They studied each other in silence, then Elgus asked, ‘So you’ll still work with me?’
‘Of course. Must the sins of the son be visited upon the father? Listen Elgus, we’re just a group of refugees, walking off the map’s edge. We don’t know what we’re going to face, but to survive we must work together. Osvard didn’t understand that, but I’m sure you do.’
Actually I’m not sure of any such thing, but I still don’t believe you’re irredeemable.
They engaged in another ‘you blink first’ contest, then Sir Elgus growled, ‘You’re in charge, Lord Vyre. We’ll play our part. Now if you don’t mind, I have two sons to bury.’
*
Kemara was dabbing at Tami’s face with a wet cloth when the Pelarian woman stirred and opened her eyes. She’d been sedated and now she woke in stages, blinking dimly before seeing Kemara. Her eyes flickered about, taking in the healing tent and the other patients in their bedrolls.
‘Wor’appen’d?’ she wheezed.
‘We got you out,’ Kemara said. ‘I’ve straightened your nose and strapped your ribs.’
‘I think I remember . . . your eyes went funny.’ She grabbed Kemara’s hand. ‘Thank you.’
‘We owed you – but you were stupid to go back into his camp afterwards.’
‘Thought I could brazen it out,’ Tami croaked. ‘You’re right . . . kraggin’ stupid.’ She fluttered her eyelids weakly. ‘But you came for me. My heroine.’
Kemara extricated her hand, giving her a forbidding look. ‘Shut up and hold still.’
She finished cleaning up the battered woman. ‘I suppose I’d better find a new camp,’ Tami said when they were done. ‘Raythe’s, I think.’ She gave Kemara a sly wink. ‘He and I go back.’
Like I care. ‘That’s up to Lord Vyre. Now, if you’ll excuse me?’
She left Tami to tend her other patients. One of the four had developed pneumonia and his lungs w
ere clogging up, but two were nearly healed. And then there was Trimble, her rescuer.
I’m grateful, but he makes me uneasy, Kemara thought as she knelt beside his pallet. There was a troubling intensity to his gaze, and she wished he’d leave her hair alone. She’d taken to tying it up to keep it from his reach. But when Osvard came, it was him who saved me. He’s entitled to a few liberties.
So she put on a warm smile as she asked, ‘How’s my best patient today?’
‘Pretty damn sore,’ the sailor replied, grimacing.
‘Roll onto your front,’ she told him, helping him twist onto his belly. She peeled off the bandages while he groaned at each tear. His back was a mess of weeping wounds, but they weren’t infected and they’d been scabbing over nicely, until he’d torn the stitches open in the struggle with Osvard Rhamp.
‘This is going to hurt,’ she told him, reaching for her needle and thread.
It did, too, she could tell, but he was stolid, too proud to vent more than the occasional involuntary hiss. He had a neat, compact body and, unusually for a seaman, there were no tattoos. And though he spoke like a sailor, he’d clearly been educated; she sensed deeper layers, and she found herself just a little intrigued about what they might be.
When she was done, she rubbed in some cleansing lotions and he groaned with a mix of pleasure and pain. ‘You got good hands,’ he sighed. ‘Best I’ve felt, ma’am.’
‘It’s Kemara.’
‘I know that,’ he said, looking up with one eye, ‘but I’m not sure what’s proper to call a Novate?’
‘I’ve only taken preliminary vows. Gerda and I are still working each other out.’
‘You’d be wasted in the Church. And you can call me Moss.’ He tried a smile, which she frowned down.
‘Stay put, as much as you can,’ she told her. ‘You pull those stitches again and you’re on your own. Anything else you need before we load you in the wagon again?’
He gazed up at her and said, ‘I ain’t been able to shave since . . . the ship. The Bolgravs liked their sailors clean-shaven – some stupid regulation. So what do you reckon – shave or no?’
She studied his stubbled face. The thickening beard gave his features a warmth they might not otherwise have, so she said, ‘Keep the whiskers. It’s going to be cold where we’re going.’
As she rose, he caught her ponytail. ‘I like your hair up. It catches the light different, like that. Like frozen sunlight.’ Then he let go, before she could object.
She’d been propositioned on a nightly basis at Gravis’ tavern, but it’d been a long time since someone had thought her worth courting. It was mildly flattering.
So she didn’t hit him.
*
Raythe strode to the edge of the lake and called, ‘Well?’
Mater Varahana, knee-deep in the freezing waters, was staring at a glass vial she was holding up to the light. It was a bleak day with a bitter wind and the sun was buried in thick cloud.
The caravan had moved to the north side of the lake, beneath the mountains. This was the only river that ran into the lake, so following it upstream should be their path. But Raythe needed to be sure, so they’d taken samples, expecting it to be a formality.
‘There’s still nothing,’ the Mater replied, her voice disappointed.
‘Kragga,’ Raythe fumed. Where in the flaming Pit is the istariol? That sample the cartomancer had was almost orange, so it should be easily spotted – so where is it?
This side of the lake lay in the shadow of towering peaks locked in snow and cloud. Mist hung over the lake. It had a dull, lifeless sheen and looked about to freeze over, despite it being late summer. The glacier in the next bay was barely dissolving into the water. The only sounds were the whispering winds and the lowing of the remaining animals.
If we can’t find a way forward, we’re screwed.
‘Are you sure?’ he called.
‘Yes, I’m sure,’ Varahana replied, in a testy voice.
On the shore, Jesco, Vidar, Kemara and Sir Elgus watched with worried faces. The knight was standing well apart from the others. A further clump of onlookers gathered along the shoreline, wondering if they’d come all this way for nothing. Perhaps they had.
‘Raythe?’ Varahana called.
He turned hopefully. ‘What is it – have you found something?’
‘No. I just want to know if I can get out of the water now, before my fanny ices over?’
‘Yes, of course . . . Damn!’
He stamped away, through the shallow river and onto the far shore, feeling his toes go numb through his soaking boots, but he couldn’t face all those accusatory faces just now. He needed to be alone, to think.
The stony shore took him round the headland to the next bay, where a daunting wall of rock and ice blocked the way forward: the glacier they’d found earlier, a crumbling snake of ice many times his height and a hundred yards or more wide winding out of the mountains. It must’ve been the main river feeding this lake, before the Mizra Wars and the onset of the Ice Age. Now, according to the books he’d read as a student, it crawled forward a few feet every year.
Perhaps I read the journal wrongly – maybe there’s another river flowing in somewhere west of here? Or maybe it’s the wrong kragging lake altogether? Vidar says it’s the right one, but perhaps he’s remembering wrong?
Finding his way around the face of the glacier was easy enough. He found himself splashing through the shallows where the ice slowly melted, trudging over rivulets full of mossy stones, and the remains of ancient branches that had been caught up in the flow before the river froze. He passed on . . .
. . . and then stopped and walked back, staring at the dirty residue in one such rivulet.
A minute later, he was back at the small headland, screeching at the top of his voice across the river to Varahana and the others, ‘I’VE FOUND IT!’ He couldn’t stop himself jumping with excitement as he screamed again, ‘I’VE FOUND IT!’
3
Ice river
It took them a day to build a ramp from the base of the glacier to the top so they could haul up the remaining carts and the beasts. Raythe had feared the way would be impossible, but Cal Foaley had scouted and returned, reporting that it was in fact a surprisingly easy path to negotiate.
‘Water freezes level when it can,’ Foaley said. ‘The movement of the glacier’s broken it up in parts, but the surface has been snowed on repeatedly for centuries. It’s traversable.’ He laughed. ‘I’m beginning to believe.’
‘Only beginning? Then why’d you leave Teshveld in the first place?’
‘It seemed a better idea than strangling slowly in the empire. Really, I just wanted to breathe free air.’
Unbelievable – but I guess if you’ve got nothing to start with, you’ve nothing to lose. Raythe clapped his shoulder and said, ‘I’m starting to believe too. Did you find anywhere to camp?’
‘We’ll have to camp on the ice,’ Foaley said, ‘but you can build fires against the banks on the leeward side. The ice looks solid right to the bottom. I wonder how old it is?’
‘I imagine it was a river up until the Mizra Wars and the forming of the Iceheart. When it froze, the traces of istariol froze too. We follow the glacier north, we’ll find the istariol.’
‘This trek’s getting harder and harder.’
‘If it was easy, it would’ve been found by now. I wonder how far the glacier goes?’
‘I went about five miles in and it still went on and on,’ Foaley replied. ‘Judging by the size of the canyon, it used to be a long, wide river. I’d say the old headwaters are a ways north, somewhere in the Iceheart.’ He met Raythe’s gaze. ‘Even snow-deer don’t live up there. There’ll be nothing – no vegetation, no forage, and nothing to hunt.’
‘I know. But concentrations of istariol create their own climate zones. Sorcerers have found hundreds of square miles of lush, fertile ground well above the ice fields. Any luck, there’ll even be creatures you’ve never hunt
ed before.’
Foaley’s face lit up. ‘Now you’re talking.’
‘While you were scouting, Vidar’s had the others scouring the land for whatever game we can, and we’ve even got some folk fishing – the lake’s well-stocked. We’ll smoke whatever we find tonight, so that it’s preserved for the journey. I’m hopeful we’ll have two weeks’ food. I know that’s not a lot, but that glacier can’t go on for ever.’
‘It doesn’t have to; we’ll not make more than three or four miles a day on the ice. Raythe, you realise that might mean that after only twenty miles, we’ll pass the point of no return?’
‘Aye. Ideally, we’d camp here and send a smaller team to locate the istariol before we risk anyone else – but the empire might be right behind us, so we don’t have that luxury.’
Foaley considered, then nodded. ‘Aye, we can only go on . . . But what if we reach the point of no return before we find the istariol?’
‘We’ll decide that when we get there,’ Raythe replied grimly.
He thanked Foaley, then headed back to his own increasingly crowded camp – Tami was now a fixture as well as Kemara and whoever she was tending. Tonight that was a trapper named Veet Brayda, who’d been wounded at the beach, then developed pneumonia, and the sailor, Trimble, whose back was still a mess. There was always a constant stream of people with minor and not so minor complaints too.
Raythe found himself beside the Pelarian sailor as they ate. ‘So you’re going to make us rich,’ Trimble observed.
‘We hope so. What would you do with a bit of wealth, Master Trimble?’
‘I’d find me a good woman and settle down.’ He glanced at Kemara. ‘A nice Ferrean girl, I reckon.’
‘Kemara’s a sorceress. I would counsel you to look elsewhere.’
‘Not sure I can, milord.’
Patients and healers, a dance old as time, Raythe thought. Idiot.
*
Kemara spooned the sedative into Veet Brayda’s mouth and listened to his thin, liquid breathing. His pneumonia was getting worse and the slow crawl along the glacier in this frigid air was likely going to kill him, but he couldn’t be left behind.