A CAVERN OF BLACK ICE
by
J.  V.  Jones

This edition published 1999 by EGA By arrangement with Orbit a division of
Little, Brown and Company (UK) CN7148

Copyright 1999 by J.  V.  Jones The
moral right of the author has been asserted.

All characters in this publication are fictitious and any resemblance to real
persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental.  All rights reserved.

No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system,
or transmitted, in any form or by any means, without the prior permission in
writing of the publisher, nor be otherwise circulated in any form of binding
or cover other than that in which it is published and without a similar
condition including this condition being imposed on the subsequent purchaser.

Printed and bound in Great Britain by Mackays of Chatham pie, Chatham, Kent

To Paul, who, on the far side of the Atlantic, keeps hours every bit as
strange as mine

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

It's easy to get lost in a book the size of this one.  Luckily, I had the
help of many good people with flashlights.  My thanks and gratitude are owed
to Betsy Mitchell, Tim Holman, Sona Vogel, Mari Okuda and the staff at Warner
Books; Russ Galen; and Richard, who reads everything first.

PROLOGUE.

A Birth, a Death, and a Binding, anssa whispered a hope out loud before looking
up at the sky.

"Please make it lighter than before.

Please.  " As her lips came together she looked up past the wind twisted
pines and the ridge of frost-riven granite, up toward the position of
the sun.  Only the sun wasn't there.  Stormheads rolled across the sky,
cutting out the sunlight, massing, churning, driven by winds that
snapped and circled like pack wolves around sheep.

Tarissa made a small gesture with her hand.  The storm wasn't passing
overhead.  It had come to the mountain to stay.  Dropping her gaze, she
took a steadying breath.  She couldn't afford to panic.  The city lay a
thousand feet below her, rising from the shadow of the mountain like a
second, lesser peak.  She could see the ring towers clearly now, four of
them, two built hard against the wall, the tallest piercing the storm
with its iron stake. It was a long way down.  Hours of walk, even.  And
she had to be careful. Resting her hand on her swollen stomach, she
forced herself to smile. Storms?  They were nothing.  She moved quickly.
Loose scree, bird skeletons, and snags of wind-blasted wood tripped her
feet.  It was hard to walk, even harder to keep her balance on the ever
sharpening slope.  Steep draws and creases forced her sideways instead
of down.  The temperature was falling, and for the first time all day
Tarissa noticed her breath came out white. Her left glove had been gone
for days--lost somewhere on the far side of the mountain--and she
stripped off her right glove, turned it inside out, and pulled it onto
her left hand.  The fingers there had started to grow numb.

Dead trees blocked her path.  Some of their trunks were so smooth they
looked polished.  As she reached out to steady herself against one of
the hard black limbs, she felt a sharp pain in her lower abdomen.

Something shifted.  Wetness spilled down her thighs.  A soft sting
sounded in her lower back, and a wave of sickness washed up her gullet,
depositing the taste of sour milk in her mouth.  Tarissa closed her
eyes.  This time she kept her hopes to herself.

Wet snow began to fall as she pushed herself off from the dead tree.

Her glove was sticky with sap, and bits of pine needles were glued to
the fingers.  Underfoot the agranite ledge was unstable; gravel spilled
from deep gashes, and husks of failed saplings crumbled to nothing the
instant they took her weight.  Despite the cold, Tarissa started to
sweat.  The pain in her back chewed inward, and although she didn't want
to admit it, didn't even want to acknowledge it, her lower abdomen began
contracting in rhythmic waves.

No.  No.  NO.  Her baby wasn't due yet.  Two weeks more--it had to be.

She needed to make it to the city, to find shelter.  She'd even held
back enough coins for a midwife and a room.

Finding a lead through the rocks, she picked up her pace.  A lone raven,
its plumage dark and oily as a scorched liver, watched her in silence
from the distorted upper branch of a blackstone pine.  Spying it,
Tarissa was conscious of how ridiculous she must look: fat bellied, wild
haired, scrambling down a mountainside in a race against a storm.
Grimacing, she looked away from the bird.  She didn't like how it made
her feel.

Contractions were coming faster now, and Tarissa found that it helped if
she kept on the move.  Stopping made the suffering linger, gave her
seconds to count and think.

Mist rose from crevices.  Snow flew in Tarissa's face, and the wind
lifted the cloak from her back.  Overhead, the clouds mimicked her
descent, following her down the mountain as if she were showing them the
way.  Tarissa walked with her gloved hand cradling her belly.  The fluid
between her legs had dried to a sticky film that sucked her thighs
together as she moved.

Heat pumped up through the arteries in her neck, flushing her cheeks and
the bridge of her nose.  Faster.  She had to move faster.  Spotting a
clear run between boulders, Tarissa switched her path farther to her
right.  Thorns snagged her skirt, and she yanked on the fabric, losing
patience.  As she turned back to face the path, the raven took flight.
Its black wings beat against the storm current, snapping and tearing
like teeth.

The instant Tarissa stepped forward, gravel and rocks began running
beneath her feet.  She felt herself falling, and she flung out her arms
to grab at something, anything, to hold her.  The mist hid everything at
ground level, and Tarissa's hands found only loose stones and twigs.
Pain exploded in her shoulder as she was thrown against a rock.  Pine
cones and rocks bounced overhead as she tried desperately to break her
fall.  Her bare hand grasped at a tussock of wolf grass but her body
kept sliding downward and the roots pulled free in her hand.  Her hip
bashed against a granite ridge, something sharp shaved skin from the
back of her knee, and when she opened her mouth to scream, snow flew
between her lips, freezing the cry on her tongue.

She came to.  There was no pain, just a fog of ragged light lying
between her and the outside world.  Above her, as far as her eyes could
see, stretched walls of hand-polished limestone, mason cut and smooth as
bone.  She'd finally made it to the city with the Iron Spire.

Dimly she was aware of something pushing far below her.  Minutes passed
before she realized that it was her body working to expel the child.

She swallowed hard.  Suddenly she missed all the people she had run
from. Leaving home had been a mistake.

Kaaw!

Tarissa tried to shift her head toward the sound.  A hot needle of pain
jabbed at the vertebrae in the base of her neck.  She blacked out.  When
she came to again she saw the raven sitting on a rock before her.
Black-and-gold eyes pinned her with a look that was devoid of pity.
Bobbing its head and raising its scaly yellow claws, it danced a little
jig of damnation.  When it was done it made a soft cluckmg noise that
sounded just like a mother scolding a child and then flung itself to the
mercy of the storm.

Cold currents bore it swiftly away Pushing Her body kept pushing.

Tarissa felt herself drifting .  .  she was so tired .  so very, very
tired. If only she could find a way through the fog .  if only her eyes
could show her more.

As her eyelids closed for the last time and her ribs pressed an unused
breath from her lungs, she saw a pair of booted feet walking toward her.
The tar-blackened leather melted snowflakes on contact.  They
applied the leeches to him in rings of six.  His body was crusted with
sweat and rock dust and dirt, and the first man scraped the skin clean
with deer tallow and a cedar wood wedge, while the second worked in his
shadow with metal pincers, a pitch pine bucket, and heavy buckskin
gloves.

The man who no longer knew his name strained against his bindings,
testing. Thick coils of rope pressed into his neck, upper arms, wrists,
thighs, and ankles.  He could shudder and breathe and blink.

Nothing more.

He could barely feel the leeches.  One settled in the fold between his
inner thigh and groin, and he tensed for a moment.  Pincer took a pinch
of white powder from a pouch around his neck and applied it to the
leech.  Salt.  The leech dropped away.  A fresh leech was applied,
higher this time so it couldn't attach itself to skin that wasn't fit.

That done, Pincer stripped off his gloves and spoke a word that sent
Accomplice to the far side of the cell.  A moment later Accomplice
returned with a tray and a soapstone lamp.  A single red flame burned
within the lamp, heating the contents of the crucible above.  When he
saw the flame, the man with no name flinched so hard that the rope
binding his wrists split his skin.  Flames were all he had now.
Memories of flames.  He hated the flames and feared them, yet he needed
them, too. Familiarity bred contempt, they said.  But the man with no
name knew that was only half of it.  Familiarity bred dependence as
well.

Thoughts lost in the dance of flames, he didn't see Pincer kneading an
oakum wad in his fist.  He was aware only of Accomplice's hands on his
jaw, repositioning his head, brushing his hair to one side, and pushing
his skull hard against the bench.  The man with no name felt the frayed
rope and beeswax wad thrust into his left ear.  Ship's caulking.  They
were shoring him up like a storm- battered hull.  A second wad was
thrust into his right ear, and then Accomplice held the nameless man's
jaws wide while Pincer thrust a third wad into the back of his throat.
The desire to vomit was sudden and overpowering, but Pincer slapped one
large hand on the nameless man's chest and another on his belly and
pressed hard against the contracting muscles, forcing them flat.  A
minute later the urge had passed.  Still Accomplice held on to his jaw.
Pincer paid attention to the tray, his hands casting claw shadows
against the cell wall as he worked.

Seconds later he turned about.  A thread of animal sinew was stretched
between his thumbs.  Seeing it, Accomplice shifted his grip, opening the
nameless man's jaws wider, pulling back lip tissue along with bone.  The
man with no name felt thick fingers in his mouth.  He tasted urine and
salt and leech water.  His tongue was pressed to the base of his mouth,
and then sinew was woven across his bottom teeth, binding his tongue in
place.

Fear came alive in the nameless man's chest.  Perhaps flames weren't the
only things that could harm him.

"He's done," said Pincer, drawing back.

"What about the wax?"  breathed a third voice from the shadows near the
door. It was the One Who Issued Orders.

"You are supposed to seal his eyes shut."

"Wax is too hot.  It could blind him if we use it now."

"Use it."   The flame in the soapstone lamp wavered as Accomplice drew
the crucible away.   The man with no name smelled smoke given off from
the impurities in the wax.   When the burning came it shocked him.

After everything he had been through, all the suffering he had borne, he
imagined he had outlived pain.  He was wrong.  And as the hours wore on
and his bones were broken methodically by Pincer wielding a goose down
padded mallet, Accomplice following after to ensure the splintered ends
were pulled apart, and his internal organs were manipulated with needles
so long and fine that they could puncture specific chambers in his lungs
and heart while leaving the surrounding tissue intact, he began to
realize that pain--and the ability to feel it--was the last sense to go.

When the One Who Issued Orders stepped close and began breathing words
of binding older than the city he currently stood in, the man with no
name no longer cared.  His mind had returned to the flames.

There, at least, was a pain that he knew.

CHAPTER ONE.

The Badlands Raif Sevrance set his sights on the target and called the
ice hare to him.  A moment of disorientation followed, where the world
dropped out of focus like a great dark stone sinking to the bottom of a
lake; then, in the shortest space that a moment could be, he perceived
the animal's heart.  The light, sounds, and odors of the badlands slid
away, leaving nothing but the weight of blood in the ice hare's chest
and the hummingbird flutter of its heart.  Slowly, deliberately, Raif
angled his bow away from the target.  The arrow cracked the freezing air
like a word spoken out loud. As its iron blade shot past the hare, the
creature's head came up and it sprang for cover in a cushion of black
sedge.

"Take the shot again," Drey said,

"You sent that wide on purpose."

Raif lowered his bow and glanced over at his older brother.  Drey's face
was partially shaded by his fox hood, but the firm set of his mouth was
clear. Raif paused, considered arguing, then shrugged and reset his
footing on the tundra.  It never felt good deceiving Drey.

Fingers smoothing down the backing of his horn-and-sinew bow, Raif
looked over the windblown flats of the badlands.  Panes of ice already
lay thick over melt ponds.  In the flattened colt grass beneath RaiPs
feet hoar frost grew as silently and insidiously as mold on second-day
bread.  The few trees that managed to survive in the gravelly floodplain
were wind-crippled blackstone pines and prostrate hemlock.  Directly
ahead lay a shallow draw filled with loose rocks and scrubby bushes that
looked as tough and bony as moose antlers.  Raif dipped his gaze a
fraction lower to the brown lichen mat surrounding a pile of wet rocks.
Even on a morning as cold as this, the lick was still running.

As Raif watched, another ice hare popped up its head.  Cheeks puffing,
ears trembling, it held its position, listening for danger.  It wanted
the salt in the lick.  Game animals came from leagues around to-drink at
the trickle of salt water that bled across the rocks in the draw.

Tern said the lick welled up from an underground stream.  Raif raised
his bow, slid an arrow from the quiver at his waist.  In one smooth
motion he nocked the iron arrowhead against the plate and drew the
bowstring back to his chest.  The hare swiveled its head.  Its dark eyes
looked straight at Raif.  Too late.  Raif already had the creature's
heart in his sights. Kissing the string, Raif let the arrow fly. Fingers
of ice mist parted, a faint hiss sounded, and the arrowhead shot
straight into the hare's rib cage. If the creature made a sound, Raif
didn't hear it.  Carried back by the force of the blow, it collapsed
into the lick.

"That's three to you.  None to me."  Drey's voice sounded flat,
resigned.

Raif pretended to check his bow for hairpin cracks.

"Come on.  Let's shoot at targets.  No more hares are going to show now
you've sent a live one into the lick."  Drey reached out and touched
Raits bow.

"You could have used a smaller head on that arrow, you know.  You're
supposed to kill the hare, not disembowel it."  Raif looked up.  Drey
was grinning, just a bit.  Relieved, Raif grinned back at him.  Drey was
two years older than he, better at everything an older brother should be
better at.  Up until this winter he had been better at shooting, too.  A
lot better.

Abruptly Raif tucked his bow into his belt and ran for the draw.  Tern
never let them shoot anything purely for sport, and the hares had to be
taken back to camp, skinned, and roasted.  The pelts were Raifs.

Another couple more and he'd have enough for a winter coat for Effie.
Not that Effie had much use for a coat.  She was the only eight-year-old
in Clan Blackball who didn't enjoy running around in the snow. Frowning,
Raif twisted the arrows free from the twig- thin bones of the hare's rib
cage, careful not to break the shafts.  Timber straight enough for
arrows was rare in the badlands.

As he sealed the carcass in his game pouch, Raif checked the position of
the sun.  Nearly noon now.  A storm heading elsewhere blew eastward in
the far north.  Dark gray clouds rolled across the horizon like smoke
from a distant fire.  Raif shivered.  The Great Want lay to the north.
Tern said that if a storm didn't begin in the Want, then it sure as
stone would end there.

"Hey!  Rough Jaw!  Get your bow over here and let's shred some wood."

Drey sent an expertly pitched stone skittering off rocks and hummocks,
to land with a devilish skip precisely at Raifs feet.

"Or are you scared your lucky streak just ended?"

Almost against his will, Raifs hand rose to his chin.  His skin felt as
bristly as a frozen pine cone He was Rough Jaw all right.  No argument
there.

"Paint the target, Sevrance Cur.  Then I'll let you take a hand's worth
of practice shots while I restring my bow for wood."

Even a hundred paces in the distance, Raif saw Drey's jaw drop.

Restring my bow for wood was exactly the sort of high-blown thing a
master bowman would say.  Raif could hardly keep from laughing out loud.
Ignoring the insult and the boasting.  Drey snorted loudly and began
plucking fistfuls of grass from the tundra.  By the time Raif caught up
with him, Drey had smeared the grass over the trunk of a frost-killed
pine, forming a roughly circular target, wet with snow melt and grass
sap.

Drey shot first.  Stepping back one hundred and fifty paces, he held his
bow at arm's length.  Drey's bow was a recurve made of winter-cut yew,
dried over two full years, and hand-tillered to reduce shock.

Raif envied him for it.  His own bow was a clan hand-down, used by
anyone who had the string to brace it.

Drey took his time sighting his bow.  He had a sure, unshakable grip and
the strength to hold the string for as long as his ungloved fingers
could bear. Just when Raif was set to call

"Shot due," his brother released the string.  The arrow landed with a
dull thunk, dead center of the smeared-on target.  Turning, Drey
inclined his head at his younger brother.  He did not smile.

Raifs bow was already in hand, his arrow already chosen.  With Drey's
arrow shaft still quivering in the target, Raif sighted his bow.  The
pine was long dead.  Cold.  When Raif tried to call it to him as he had
with the ice hare, it wouldn't come.  The wood stood its distance.  Raif
felt nothing: no quickening of his pulse, no dull pain behind his eyes,
no metal tang in his mouth.  Nothing.  The target was just a target.
Unsettled, Raif centered his bow and searched for the still line that
would lead his arrow home.  Seeing nothing but a faraway tree, Raif
released his string.  Straightaway he knew the shot was bad.  He'd been
gripping the handle too tightly, and his fingertips had grazed the
string on release.  The bow shot back with a thwack, and Raifs shoulder
took a bad recoil.  The arrow landed a good two hands lower than the
target.

"Shoot again."  Drey's voice was cold.

Raif massaged his shoulder, then selected a second arrow.  For luck, he
brushed the fletchings against the raven lore he wore on a cord around
his neck.  The second shot was better, but it still hit a thumb's length
short of dead center.  Raif turned to look at his brother.  It was his
shot.

Drey made a small motion with his bow.

"Again."

Raif shook his head.

"No.  It's your turn."

Drey shook his own head right back.

"You sent those two wide on purpose.  Now shoot."

"No, I didn't.  It was a true shot.  I" -- "No one heart-kills three
hares on the run, then misses a target as big as a man's chest.  No
one."  Drey pushed back his fox hood.  His eyes were dark.  He spat out
the wad of black curd he'd been chewing.

"I don't need mercy shots.  Either shoot with me fair, or not at all."

Looking at his brother, seeing his big hands pressing hard into the wood
of his bow and the whiteness of his thumbs as he worked on an imagined
imperfection, Raif knew words would get him nowhere.  Drey Sevrance was
eighteen years old, a year man in the clan.  This past summer he'd taken
to braiding his hair with black leather strips and wearing a silver
earring in his ear.  Last night around the fire pit when Dagro Blackball
had burned the scum off an old malt and dropped his earring into the
clear liquor remaining, Drey had done the same.  All the sworn clansmen
had.  Metal next to the skin attracted frostbite.  And everyone in the
clan had seen the black nubs of unidentifiable flesh that the 'bite left
behind.  You could find many willing to tell the story of how Jon
Marrow's member had frozen solid when he was jumped by Dhoonesmen while
he was relieving himself in the brack.  By the time he had seen the
Dhoonesmen off and pulled himself up from the nail-hard tundra, his
manhood was frozen like a cache of winter meat.

By all accounts he hadn't felt a thing until he was brought into the
warmth of the roundhouse and the stretched and shiny flesh began to
thaw.  His screams had kept the clan awake all night.

Raif ran his hand along his bowstring, warming the wax.  If Drey needed
to see him take a third shot to prove he wasn't shamming, then take
another shot he would.  He'd lost the desire to fight.  Again Raif tried
to call the dead tree to him, searching for the still line that would
guide his arrow to the heart.  Although the blackstone pine had perished
ten hunting seasons earlier, it had hardly withered at all.

Only the needles were missing.  The pitch in the trunk preserved the
crown, and the cold dryness of the badlands hindered the growth of
fungus beneath the bark.  Tern said that in the Great Want trees took
hundreds, sometimes thousands, of years to decay.

Seconds passed as Raif concentrated on the target.  The longer he held
his sights, the deader the tree seemed.  Something was missing.  Ice
hares were real living things.  Raif felt their warmth in the space
between his eyes. He imagined the lode of hot pulsing blood in their
hearts and saw the still line that linked those hearts to his arrowhead
as clearly as a dog sees his leash.  Slowly Raif was coming to realize
that still line meant death.

Frustration finally got the better of him, and he stopped searching for
the inner heart of the target and centered his sights on the visual
heart instead.  With the fletchings of Drey's arrow in his eyeline, Raif
released the shot.

The moment his thumb lifted from the string, a raven kaawed.  High and
shrill, the carrion feeder's cry seemed to split the very substance of
time. Raif felt a finger of ice tap his spine.  His vision blurred.

Saliva jetted into his mouth, thick and hot and tasting of metal.

Stumbling back, he lost his grip on the bow and it fell to the ground
point first.  A crack sounded as it landed.  The arrow hit the tree with
a dull thud, placing a knuckle short of Drey's own shot.  Raif didn't
care.  Black points raced across his vision, scorching like soot belched
from a fire.

"Raifl Raif!"

Raif felt Drey's huge, muscular arms clamp around his shoulders, smelled
his brother's scent of neat's-foot oil, tanned leather, horses, and
sweat. Glancing up, Raif saw Drey's brown eyes staring into his.  He
looked worried. His prized yew bow lay flat on the ground.

"Here, sit."  Not waiting for any compliance on Raifs part, Drey forced
his younger brother onto the tundra floor.  The frozen earth bit into
RaiFs buckskin pants.  Turning away from his brother, Raif cleared his
mouth of the metal-tasting saliva.  His eyes stung.  A sickening pain in
his forehead made him retch.  He clenched his jaw until bone clicked.

Seconds passed.  Drey said nothing, just held his brother as tightly as
he could.  Part of Raif wanted to smile; the last time Drey had crushed
him like this was after he fell twenty feet from a foxtail pine three
springs back. The fall only broke an ankle.  Drey's subsequent bear hug
had succeeded in breaking two ribs.  Strangely, the memory had a calming
effect on Raif, and the pain slowly subsided.  Raifs vision blurred
sharply and then reset itself.  A feeling of badness grew in him.
Swiveling around in his brother's grip, Raif looked in the direction of
the camp.  The stench of metal washed over him, as thick as grease smoke
from the rendering pits.

Drey followed his gaze.

"What's the matter?"  His voice was tight, strained.

"Don't you feel it?"

Drey shook his head.

The camp was five leagues to the south, hidden in the shelter of the
flood basin.  All Raif could see was the rapidly darkening sky and the
low ridges and rocky flats of the badlands.  Yet he felt something.

Something unspeakable, as when nightmares jolted him awake in pitch
darkness or when he thought back to the day Tern had shut him in the
guide house with his mother's corpse.  He had been eight at the time,
old enough to pay due respect to the dead.  The guide- house was dark
and filled with smoke.  The hollowed-out basswood where his mother lay
smelled of wet earth and rotten things.  Sulfur had been rubbed into the
carved inner trunk to keep insects and carrion feeders away from the
body when it was laid upon the ground.

Raif smelled badness now.  He smelled stinking metal and sulfur and
death. Fighting against Drey's grip, he cried,

"We have to go back."

Drey released his grip on Raif and pulled himself to his feet.  He
plucked his dogs king gloves from his belt and pulled them on with two
violent movements.

"Why?"

Raif shook his head.  The pain and nausea had gone, but something else
had come in its place.  A tight shivering fear.

"The camp."  Drey nodded.  He took a deep breath and looked set to
speak, then abruptly stopped himself.  Offering Raif his hand, he heaved
his brother off the ground with a single tug.  By the time Raif had
brushed the frost from his buckskins.  Drey had collected both bows and
was pulling the arrow shafts from the dead tree.  As he turned away from
the blackstone pine, Raif noticed the fletchings in Drey's grip were
shaking.  This one small sign of his brother's fear worried Raif more
than anything else.  Drey was his older brother by two years.  Drey was
afraid of nothing.

They had left the camp before dawn, before even the embers on the fire
pit had burned cold.  No one except Tern knew they had gone.  It was
their last chance to shoot game before they broke camp and returned to
the roundhouse for winter.  The previous night Tern had warned them
about going on" on their own in the badlands, though he knew well enough
that nothing he said would stop them.

"Sons!"  he had said, shaking his large, grizzled head.

"I might as well spend my days picking ticks from the dogs as tell you
two what you should and shouldn't do.  At least come sundown I'd have a
deloused pup to show for my trouble."  Tern would glower as he spoke,
and the skin above his eyebrows would bunch into knots, yet his eyes
always gave him away.

Just this morning as Rail pulled back the hide fastening on the tent he
shared with his father and brother, he noticed a small bundle set upon
the warming stone.  It was food.  Hunters' food.  Tern had packed two
whole smoke-cured ptarmigan, a brace of hard- boiled eggs, and enough
strips of hung mutton to mend an elk-size hole in a tent.  All this for
his sons to eat on a hunting trip he had expressly forbidden them to
take.

Raif smiled.  Tern Sevrance knew his sons well.

"Put on your gloves."  It was Drey, acting just like an older brother.

"And pull up your hood.  Temperature's dropping fast."

Raif did what he was told, struggling to put on gloves with hands that
felt big and slow.  Drey was right: It was getting colder.  Another
shiver worked its way up Rail's spine, making his shoulders jerk
awkwardly.

"Let's go."  Drey's thoroughness was beginning to nettle him.  They had
to get back to the camp.  Now.  Something wasn't right.

Although Tern warned them constantly about the danger of using up all
their energy by running in the cold, Raif couldn't stop himself.

Despite spitting profusely, he couldn't remove the taste of metal from
his mouth.  The air smelled bad, and the clouds overhead seemed darker,
lower, closer.  To the south lay a line of bald, featureless hills, and
west of them lay the Coastal Ranges.  Tern said that the Ranges were the
reason why the Want and the badlands were so dry.  He said their peaks
milked every last drop of moisture from passing storms.

The three hares Raif had shot earlier thumped up and down in his pack as
he ran.  Raif hated their warmth against his thigh, was sickened by
their fresh-kill smell.  When the two brothers came upon Old Hoopers
Lake, Raif tore the pack from his belt and threw it into the center of
the dull black water.  Old Hoopers wasn't frozen yet.  River fed, it
would take a full week of frost before its currentA CAVERN OF BLACK ICE
f 15 driven waters plated. Still, the lake had the greasy look of
imminent ice about it.  As RaiPs pack sank to the bottom, swirls of
vegetable oils and tufts of elk hair bobbed up and down on the surface.
Drey swore.  Raif didn't catch what he said, but he imagined the words
waste of fine game in their place.

As the brothers ran south, the landscape gradually changed.  Trees grew
straighter and taller, and there were more of them.  Beds of lichen were
replaced by long grasses, bushes, and sedge.  Horse and game tracks
formed paths through the frozen foliage, and fat grouse flew up from the
undergrowth, all flying feathers and spitting beaks.

Raif barely noticed.  Close to the camp perimeter now, they should have
been able to see smoke, hear the sound of metal rasping against metal,
raised voices, laughter.  Dagro Blackhail's foster son, Mace, should be
riding to greet them on his fat-necked cob.

Drey swore again.  Quietly, to himself.

Raif resisted the urge to glance over at his brother's face.  He was
frightened of what he might see.

A powerful horseman, archer, and ham merman Drey pulled ahead of Raif as
he charged down the slope to the camp.  Raif pushed himself harder,
balling his fists and thrusting out his chin.  He didn't want to lose
sight of his brother, hated the thought of Drey arriving at the tent
circle alone.

Fear stretched over Raif's body like a drying hide, pulling at his skin
and gut.  They had left thirteen men standing by at the camp: Dagro
Blackhail and his son, Mace; Tern; Chad and Jorry Shank; Mallon Clayhorn
and his son, Darri, whom everyone called Halfmast.  .  .  Raif shook his
head softly. Thirteen men alone on the badlands plains suddenly seemed
unbelievably easy prey.  Dhoonesmen, Bluddsmen, and Maimed Men were out
there.  Raifs stomach clenched.  And the Sull.  The Sull were out there,
too.

The dark, weather-stained tents came into view.  All was quiet.  There
were no horses or dogs in sight.  The fire pit was a dark gaping hole in
the center of the cleared space.  Loose tent flaps ripped in the wind
like banners at battle's end.  Drey had broken ahead, but now he stopped
and waited for Raif to join him.  His breath came hard and fast, and
spent air vented from his nose and mouth in great white streams.  He did
not look round as Raif approached.

"Draw your weapon," he hissed.

Raif already had, but he scored the blade of his half sword against its
boiled-leather scabbard, mimicking the noise of drawing.  Drey moved
forward when he heard it.

They came upon Jorry Shank's body first.  It was lying in a feed ditch
close to the horse posts.  Drey had to turn the body to find the death
wound The portion of Jorry's face that had been lying against the earth
had taken on the yellow bloom of frozen flesh.  The wound was as big as
a fist, heart deep, made with a great sword and for some reason there
was hardly any blood.

"Maybe the blood froze as it left him," Drey murmured, settling the body
back in place.  The words sounded like a prayer.

"He never got chance to draw his weapon.  Look."  Raif was surprised at
how calm his voice sounded.

Drey nodded.  He patted Jorry's shoulder and then stood away.

"There's horse tracks.  See."  Raif kicked the ground near the first
post. He found it easier to concentrate on what he could see here, on
the camp perimeter, than turn his sights toward the tent circle and the
one shabby, oft repaired, hide-and-moose-felt tent that belonged to Tern
Sevrance.

"Those shoe marks weren't made by Blackhail horses."

"Bluddsmen use a grooved shoe."

So did other clans and even some city men, yet Raif had no desire to
contradict his brother.  Clan Bludd's numbers were swelling, and border
and cattle raids had become more frequent.  Vaylo Bludd had seven sons,
and it was rumored he wanted a separate clan hold for each of them. Mace
Blackhail said that Vaylo Bludd killed and ate his own dogs, even when
he had elk and bear meat turning on the spit above his fire.  Raif
didn't believe the story for a moment--to eat one's own dogs was
considered a kind of cannibalism to a clansman, justifiable only in the
event of icebound starvation and imminent death--but others, including
Drey, did.

Mace Blackball was three years older than Drey: when he spoke, Drey took
heed.

As Drey and Raif approached the tent circle, their pace slowed.  Dead
dogs lay in the dirt, saliva frozen around their blunted fangs, their
coats shaggy with ice.  Fixed yellow eyes stared from massive gray
heads.  Glacial winds had set rising hackles in place, giving the dogs'
corpses the bunched-neck look of buffalo.  As with Jorry Shank's body,
there was little blood.

Raif smelled stinking, smelted metal everywhere.  The air around the
camp seemed different, yet he didn't have the words to describe it.

It reminded him of the slowly congealing surface water on Old Hoopers
Lake. Something had caused the very air to thicken and change.

Something with the force of winter itself.

"Raif!  Here!"

Drey had crossed into the tent circle and was kneeling close to the fire
pit Raif saw the usual line of pots and drying hides suspended on spruce
branches over the pit, and the load of timber waiting to be quartered
for firewood. He even saw the partially butchered black bear carcass
that Dagro Blackhail had brought down yesterday in the sedge meadow to
the east.  The bearskin, which he had been so proud of, had been set to
dry on a nearby rack.  Dagro had planned to present it as a gift to his
wife, Raina, when the hunt party returned to the roundhouse.

But Dagro Blackhail, chief of Clan Blackhail, would never return home.

Drey knelt over his partially frozen corpse.  Dagro had taken a massive
broadsword stroke from behind.  His hands were speckled with blood, and
the thick-bladed cleaver he still held in his grip was similarly marked.
The blood was neither his nor his attackers'.  It came from the skinned
and eviscerated bear carcass lying at his feet; Dagro must have been
finishing the butchering when he was jumped from behind.

Raif took a quick unsteady breath and sank down by his brother's side.
Something was blocking his throat.  Dagro Blackhail's great bear of a
face looked up at him.  The clan chief did not look at peace.

Fury was frozen in his eyes.  Glaciated ice in his beard and l8 f ).  V.
JONES mustache framed a mouth pressed hard in anger.  Raif thanked the
Stone Gods that his brother wasn't the kind of man to speak needlessly,
and the two sat in silence, shoulders touching, as they paid due respect
to the man who had led Clan Blackhail for twenty-nine years and was
loved and honored by all in the clan.

"He's a fair man," Tern had said once about the clan chief in a rare
moment when he was inclined to speak about matters other than hunting
and dogs.

"It may seem like small purchase, and you'll find others in the clan
willing to heap all manner of praise upon Dagro Blackhail's head, but
fairness is the hardest thing for a man to practice day to day.  A chief
can find himself having to speak up against his sworn brothers and his
kin.  And that's not easy for anyone to do."  It was, Raif thought, one
of the longest speeches he'd ever heard his father make.

"It's not right, Raif."  Drey said only that as he raised himself clear
of Dagro Blackhail's body, but Raif knew what he meant.  It wasn't
right.

Mounted men had been here; broadswords and great swords had been used;
clan horses were gone, stolen.  Dogs were slaughtered.  The camp lay in
open ground.  Mace Blackhail was standing dogwatch: a raiding party
should not have been able to approach unheeded.  Mounted men made noise,
especially here in the badlands, where the bone-hard tundra dealt
harshly with anything traveling upon it.  And then there was the lack of
blood .  .  .

Raif pushed back his hood and ran a gloved hand through the tangle of
his dark hair.  Drey was making his way toward Tern's tent.  Raif wanted
to call him back, to tell him that they should check the other tents
first, the rendering pits, the stream bank, the far perimeter, anywhere
except that tent.  Drey, as if sensing some small portion of his younger
brother's thoughts, turned.  He made a small beckoning gesture with his
hand and then waited.  Two bright points of pain prickled directly
behind Raifs eyes.  Drey always waited.  Together the sons of Tern
Sevrance entered their father's tent.  The body was just a few paces
short of the entrance.  Tern looked as jfhe had been on his way out when
the broadsword cracked his sternum and clavicle, sending splinters of
bone into his windpipe, lungs, and heart.  He had fallen with his half
sword in his hand, but as with Jorry Shank, the weapon was un bloodied

"Broadsword again," Drey said, his voice high and then rough as he
sought to control it.

"Bludd favors them."

Raif didn't acknowledge the words.  It took all he had just to stand and
look upon his father's body.  Suddenly there was too much hollow space
in his chest.  Tern didn't seem as stiff as the others, and Raif
stripped off his right glove and bent to touch what was visible of his
father's cheek.  Cold, dead flesh.  Not frozen, but utterly cold,
absent.

Pulling back as if he had touched something scorching hot rather than
just plain cold, Raif rubbed his hand on his buckskins, wiping off
whatever he imagined to be upon it.

Tern was gone.

Gone.

Without waiting for Drey, Raif pushed aside the tent flap and struck out
into the rapidly darkening camp.  His heart was beating in wild,
irregular beats, and taking action seemed the only way to stop it.

When Drey found him a quarter later, Raif's right arm was stripped to
the shoulder and blood from three separate cuts was pouring along his
forearm and down to his wrist.  Drey understood immediately.  Tearing at
his own sleeve, he joined his brother as he went among the slain men.

All had died without blood on their weapons.  To a clansman there was no
honor in dying with a clean blade, so Raif was taking up their weapons
one by one, drawing their blades across his skin, and, spilling his own
blood as a substitute.  It was the one thing the two brothers could give
to their clan. When they returned home to the roundhouse and someone
asked, as someone always did, if the men had died fighting, Raif and
Drey could now reply,

"Their weapons ran with blood."

To a clansman those words mattered dear.

So the two brothers moved around the camp, discovering bodies in and out
of tents, some with pale icicles of urine frozen to their legs, others
with hair set in spiky mats where they had been caught bathing, a few
with frozen wads of black curds still in their mouths, and one man--Meth
Ganlow--with his beefy arms fixed around his favorite dog, protecting
the wolf ling even in death.  A single sword stroke had killed both man
and beast.

It was only later, when moonlight formed silver pools in the hard earth,
and Terns body was lying beside the fire pit close to the others but set
apart, that Raif suddenly stopped in his tracks.

"We never found Mace Blackball" he said.

CHAPTER TWO.

Days Darker Than Night Ash March shot awake.  Sitting up in bed, she
dragged the heavy silk sheets up over her arms and shoulders and
clutched them tight. She had been dreaming of ice again.

Taking deep breaths to calm herself, she looked around her chamber,
checking. Of the two amber lamps on the mantel, only one was still
burning.  Good. That meant Katia had not been in to refuel it.  The
small ball of Ash's silver blond hair that she had pulled from her
hairbrush before she slept still lay fast against the door.  So no one
else had entered her chamber, either.

Ash relaxed just a little.  Her toes formed two knobby lumps beneath the
covers, and as they looked a ridiculously long distance from her body,
she wiggled them just to check that they were hers.  She smiled when
they wiggled right back at her.  Toes were funny things.  The smile
didn't quite take.  As soon as Ash's face muscles relaxed, the fact of
her dream came back to her. The sheets were twisted around her waist and
they were sticky with sweat, and the yeasty smell of fear was upon them.
She'd had another bad dream and another bad night, and it was the second
in less than a week.  Without thinking Ash brought her hand to her
mouth, almost as if she were trying to hold something in.  Despite the
warmth of the chamber--the charcoal smoking in the brazier beneath a
layer of oil-soaked felt,-and the hot water pipes so diligently tended
by a furnace man and his team working three stories below--her fingers
felt icy cold.  Against her will and her very best efforts, images from
the dream came back to her.  She saw a cavern with walls of black ice. A
burned hand reaching toward her, cracks between its fingers oozing
blood.  Dark eyes watching, waiting .  .  .

Ash shivered.  Swinging her hand down onto the bed, she beat the images
back by pummeling the mattress as hard as she could.  She wouldn't think
about the dream.  Didn't want to know what those cold eyes wanted.

Thht.  Thht.  Thht.  Three knocks rang lightly against the fossil- wood
door.

Something deep inside Ash's chest, a band of muscle connecting her lungs
to her heart, stiffened.  Although breathless from beating the pillow,
she didn't take a breath or even blink.  Silent as settling dust, she
told herself as her eyes focused on the door.  Finely grained and hard
as nails, the door's perfect gray surface was marred by three black
thumb-size pits: bolt holes.  Six months earlier Ash had paid her
maidservant, Katia, four half silvers to go down to the metalworkers'
market near Almsgate and purchase a bolt and socket for the chamber
door.  Katia had done her bidding, returning with an iron bar big enough
to secure a fort.  Ash had fixed the metal plate and socket in place
herself.  She had blackened a fingernail in the process and broken the
backs of two silver brushes, but the bolt pins had gone in and the
fastening mechanism had worked smoothly, and for a week Ash had slept
more soundly than she could ever remember sleeping.

Until.  .

Thht.  Thht.  Thht.

Ash stared at the empty bolt holes.  She made no motion to answer the
second round of knocking.

"Asarhia."  A pause.

"Almost-daughter, I will have no games played with me."

Tilting her body minutely, Ash slid down amid the covers.  One hand
stole beneath her head to turn the sweat-stained pillow face- down upon
mattress, while her other hand smoothed her hair.  Just as she closed
her eyes, the door creaked open.

Penthero Iss had brought his own lamp, and the fierce blue glow of
burning kerosene put Ash's own resin lamp in the shade. Iss stood in the
doorway and looked at Ash.  Even with her eyes closed she knew what he
was about.

He made her wait before he spoke.

"Almost-daughter, don't you think I know when I'm being deceived?"

Ash kept her eyelids closed, but not tightly--he had caught her on that
in the past.  In no way did she respond to his words, simply
concentrated on keeping her breathing low and metered.

"Asarhia!"  It was hard not to flinch.  Mimickinga kind of dazed
surprise, she opened her eyes and rubbed them vigorously.

"Oh," she said.

"It's you."

Ignoring her show of bafflement, Penthero Iss walked into the room
proper, set his lamp on the root wood prayer ledge next to the offering
bowls of dried fruits and pieces of myrrh, brought his long-fingered
hands together, and shook his head.

"The cushions, almost-daughter."  The index finger on his left hand
circled, indicating the foot of the bed.

"A sound night's sleep seldom includes kicking cushions so hard that the
impression of one's foot stays upon them till dawn."

Ash cursed all the cushions in Mask Fortress.  She cursed Katia for
piling the silly, fluffy, useless bags ofgoosedown high on her bed each
night.

Penthero Iss crossed over to Ash's bed.  Fine gold chains woven into the
fabric of his heavy silk coat chinked softly as he moved.  Although not
muscular, he carried something hard within him, as if his skeleton were
made out of stone.  His face had the shape and smoothness of a skinned
hare. Holding out a long, carefully manicured, completely hairless hand,
he asked,

"How much do I love you, almost-daughter?"  Untaken, the hand moved away
to carve a circle in the air.

"Look at all I give you: dresses, silver brushes, perfumed oils" -- "You
are my rather who loves me more than any real rather ever could."  Ash
spoke Iss' own words back to him.  She had lost count of how many times
he had said them to her over the past sixteen years.

Penthero Iss, Surlord of Spire Vanis, Lord Commander of the Rive Watch,
Keeper of Mask Fortress, and Master of the Four Gates, shook his head
with disappointment.

"You would mock me, almost-daughter?"

Feeling a bite of guilt, Ash slid her hand over his.  She owed love and
respect to the man who was her foster father and surlord.  Sixteen years
ago, before he took the title of surlord for his own, Penthero Iss had
found her outside Vaingate.  She was a newborn, a foundling abandoned
within ten paces of the city gate.  All such foundlings were considered
Protector's Trove. Iss had been Protector General at the time, in charge
of city security and defenses.  He had patrolled the Four Gates, led his
red-bladed brothers-in-the- watch, and commanded the forces that manned
the walls.

Ever since Thomas Mar had forged the first Rive Sword with the steel and
rendered blood of the men who had betrayed him at Have Hill, no
protector general had ever been paid for his work.  For centuries
protector generals lived off income from their grange holds
inheritances, and land grants. Today there was no land left to grant,
and more and more baseborn men were joining the Watch, and protector
generals now gained income by other, less noble means.  Contraband
goods; swords of illegal length or blade curvature, arrows with barbed
tips; prohibited substances such as sulfur, resins, and saltpeter that
could be used in making siege powders; unlawfully produced liquor,
poisons, sleeping drafts and pain dullers; ill-gotten gains; anything
found in the possession of known criminals; and all goods abandoned
within the city--whether they be crates of rotting cabbages, fat pigs
broken loose from their tethers, or newborns left to die in the
snow--were the protector general's to do with as he saw fit.

Protector's Trove had made Penthero Iss a rich man.

As if guessing her thoughts, Iss brought his lips close to Ash's ear.

"Never forget, almost-daughter, that during my commission I came upon
dozens of foundling babies, yet you were the only one I chose to raise
as my own."

Ash tried, but she couldn't quite stifle the shiver that worked its way
down her spine.  He had sold the other babies to the dark- skinned
priests in the Bone Temple.

"You are cold, almost-daughter."  Penthero Iss' hand, with its hairless
knuckles that never cracked, glided up Ash's arm and along her shoulder.
His fingers prodded the flesh of Ash's neck, testing for warmth, blood
pulse, and swollen glands.

The urge to shrink away from his touch was overwhelming, but Ash fought
it. She didn't want to provoke Iss in any way.  If she needed any proof
of that, all she had to do was look at the three blind bolt holes in the
fossil wood door.

"Your blood is racing, Asarhia."  Iss' hand moved lower.

"And your heart .  .."

Unable to stand it any longer, Ash jerked back.  Iss grabbed hold other
nightgown and twisted the fabric in his fist.

"You've been having the dream again, haven't you?"  She didn't answer.
Threads of muslin in her nightgown were laddering under the pressure of
his grip.

"I

said haven't you?  "

Still Ash made no reply, but she knew, she just knew, that her face gave
her away.  Her skin flushed with every lie.

"What did you see?  Was it the gray land?  The cavern?  Where were you?

Think.  Think.  "

Shaking her head.  Ash cried,

"I don't know.  I don't know.  There was a cavern lined with ice ... it
could be anywhere."

"Did you see what lay beyond?"  The words left Iss' mouth like frost
smoke, sparkling blue and utterly cold.  They hung in the air, cooling
the space between Ash and her foster father, making it difficult for Ash
to breathe. Ash saw Iss' lower jaw come to rest.  She heard saliva smack
inside his mouth.

"Father, I don't understand what you mean.  The dream was over so
quickly; I hardly remember what I saw."

Penthero Iss blinked at Ash's use of the word Father.  Sadness flitted
across his face so quickly, she doubted she'd seen it at all.  Slowly,
intentionally, he showed his gray-cast teeth.

"So it has come to this?  Lies from the foundling I raised as my own."

Rare were the times when Iss show his teeth.  They were small and
positioned well above his lip line.  Rumor had it that a sorcerous
healing practiced upon him when he was just a boy had burned the enamel
from them.  Whatever the cause, Iss made it his habit to speak, smile,
eat, and drink without ever drawing back his lips.  With one quick
movement Iss found and pressed the curve of Ash's left breast.

He weighed the small globe of flesh and then pinched it.

"You can't stay a child forever, Asarhia.  The old blood will show soon
enough."

Ash felt her cheeks burn.  She didn't understand what he meant.  Iss
regarded Ash for a long moment, his green silk robe switching colors in
the fierce light of burning kerosene, before releasing his hold on her
nightgown and standing.

"Tidy yourself up, child.  Do not force me to lay hands on you again."

Ash kept her breath steady and tried not to let her fear show.

Questions piled on her tongue, but she knew better than to ask them.

Iss had a way with answers.  He gave them, they sounded perfectly
logical, but then later when you were alone and had time to think, you
realized he had told you nothing at all.

As Iss moved away.  Ash got a whiff of the smell that sometimes clung to
her foster father.  The smell of old, old things locked away so tightly
that they dried to brittle husks.  Something shifted at the edge of
Ash's vision.  All the hairs on her body bristled, and against her will
she was drawn back to her dream .  .  .

Reaching, she was reaching in the darkness.

"Asarhia?"

Ash snapped back.  Penthero Iss was looking at her, his long,
skinned-man's face showing the faintest sheen of excitement.  Light from
his lamp sent his shadow flickering across the watered-silk panels on
the walls.  Ash could still remember the soft marten and sable furs that
had once hung in their stead.  Iss had sent a brotherin-the-watch to
tear them down and replace them with smooth, bloodless silk.  Furs and
animal hides were distasteful to him; he called them barbaric and would
have none hung in any chamber he might chance to enter in the massive,
sprawling, four-towered fortress that formed the heart of Spire Vanis.

Ash missed the furs.  Her chamber seemed cold and bare without them.

"You are not well, almost-daughter."  As Iss spoke, his hands came
together in a smooth knot of knuckle and flesh that was peculiar to him
alone.

"I will sit with you through the last hour of night."

"Please.  I need to rest."  Ash rubbed her forehead, struggling to keep
her mind in the now.  What was wrong with her?  Raising her voice, she
said,

"Go.  Just go.  I have to use the chamber pot.  I drank too much wine at
dinner."

Iss remained calm.

"Yes, wine .  .  .  and to think Katia informed me that you refused both
the pewter containing the red and the silver she brought later with the
white." A dull metal tap sounded: Iss kicking the empty chamber pot that
lay at the foot of Ash's bed in the center of a hill of cushions.

"And somehow you managed to wait until now to relieve yourself."

Katia.  Always Katia.  Ash scowled.  Her head ached, and her body felt
as tired and shaky as if she'd spent the night running uphill rather
than sleeping in her bed.  She desperately wanted to be alone.

Surprisingly, Iss crossed over to the door.  Fingers slipping into the
vacant bolt holes, he turned to face Ash and said,

"I will have my Knife stay outside your door tonight.  You are not well,
almost daughter I worry."

The idea of having the Knife camped outside her chamber frightened Ash
nearly as much as her dream.  Marafice Eye scared her--he scared at lot
of people in Mask Fortress.  That was, she supposed, the main reason her
foster father kept him around.

"Can't we call Katia instead?"

Iss began shaking his head before Ash finished speaking.

"I think our little Katia might not be a wholly reliable guardian.  Take
tonight: You said you drank wine, yet she swore you didn't, and of
course I must take my daughter's word over that of a common servant.  So
I have no choice but to conclude the girl reported wrongly and might
easily do so again."  A cold smile.

"You are not well, Asarhia.  Ill dreams trouble you, headaches plague
you. What sort of a father could I call myself if I did not watch my
daughter closely?"

Ash bent her head.  She wanted to sleep, close her eyes, and not have to
dream.  Her foster father was too clever for her.  Lies, even small
ones, were as silken rope in his hands.  He could pull and distort them,
use them to tie their speaker up in knots.  She had gotten herself into
enough trouble tonight.  The best thing to do would be to say nothing
more, nod her head meekly, and let her foster father bid her good night.
He was already making his way toward the door; another minute and he
would be gone.

Yet.  She was Ash March, Foundling, left outside Vaingate to die.  She
had been abandoned in two feet of snow, wrapped in a blanket stiff with
womb blood, beneath a sky as dark as night in the twelfth storm of
winter.  She had been forsaken, yet somehow she had lived.  She had been
weak, yet some tiny spark of life within her had proven strong.

Straightening her spine, she looked her foster father straight in the
eyes and said,

"I want to know what's happening to me."  Holding her gaze, Iss reached
for the kerosene lamp.  The iron base was stamped with the Surlord's
seal: the Killhound rampant, the great smoke gray bird of prey sinking
claws the size of meat hooks into the tip of the Iron Spire.  Ash
remembered her foster father telling her that although kill hounds fed
on spring lambs, bear cubs, and elk calves, they were known for killing
hunting dogs that ranged too close to their aeries.

"They never feed upon the hounds they kill," Iss had said, a gleam of
fascination firing his normally cold eyes.

"Though they do make sport with the carcasses."

Ash shivered.

Iss closed the spill hole snuffing the lamp.  Holding open the fossil
wood door, he stepped into the column of cold air that rushed in from
the corridor beyond.

"There's nothing for you to be worried about, almost-daughter.  You're
just catching up, that's all.  Surely Katia must have told you that most
girls your age are women in all senses of the word?  Your body is simply
doing those things that theirs have already done.  One would hardly
expect such changes to occur without some small measure of pain."

With that he moved into the shadows of the corridor, swiftly becoming
one himself.  The metal chains sewn into his coat chimed softly like
faraway bells, and then the door clicked shut and there was silence.

Ash fell back onto the bed.  Shaking and strangely excited, she pulled
the covers over her chest and set her mind to thinking of ways she could
find answers for herself.  Her foster father's words only sounded like
the truth. She knew she wouldn't sleep, could absolutely swear she
wouldn't sleep, yet somehow, unbelievably, she did.  Her dreams, when
they came, were all of ice. t t t The Listener could not sleep.  His
ears--what were left of them-pained him like two rotting teeth.  Nolo
had brought him fresh bear tallow from the rendering pit, and it was
good and white and looked creamy enough to eat, so the Listener had done
just that.  Waste of good tallow--using it to plug up two old black
holes that had once been ears.  Waste of good musk ox hair to warm them,
too.  But there was little to be done about that: Nothing needed warming
as much as an old scar.

Nolo's footprints formed a visible line to and from the rendering pit
and then over to the meat rack in the center of the cleared space.

Looking at them, the Listener made a mental note to have a talk with
Nolo's wife, Sila: She wasn't filling her husband's mukluks with enough
dried grass. Nolo's booted feet had melted snow!  Sila would have to get
chewing.

The Listener spent an idle moment imagining Sila's plump lips chewing on
a tuft of colt grass to make it soft enough for stuffing into the space
between her husband's outer and inner boots.  It was a very pleasant
moment.  Sila had unusually fine lips.

Still, he was old and had no ears, and Sila was young and had a husband,
and together they had four good ears between them, so the Listener
nudged aside the image of Sila and turned to the matter at hand: his
dream.

Sitting on a stool carved out of whalebone, with his old brain- tanned
bear's hide around his shoulders, the Listener sat at the entrance to
his ground and looked out at the night.  Heat from his two soapstone
lamps warmed his back, and cold from the still, freezing air chilled his
front: that was the way he liked it when he was listening to his dreams.

Lootavek, the one who listened before him, swore that a man could only
hear his dreams ds he was having them, yet the Listener thought him
mistaken. Much like Nolo's boot lining, dreams needed to be chewed on.

The Listener listened.  In his lap he held the hollow tip of a narwhal's
tusk, a little silver knife that had once been used to kill a starving
child, and a chunk of sea salt-hardened driftwood from a wrecked ship
that had been beset then stoved in by the cold blue ice of Endsea.  Like
all good talismans, they felt right in the hand, and as the Listener's
body heat warmed them in varying degrees, they released his mind into
the half world that was part darkness and part light.

Fear gripped at the Listener's belly as he fell into his dreams.

Hands reached.  Loss wept.  A man with an impossible choice made the
best decision he could .  .

"Sadaluk!  Sadaluk!  You must awaken before the cold burns your skin."

The Listener opened his eyes.  Nolo was standing above him.  The small,
dark-skinned man had his prized squirrel coat tucked under his arm and a
bowl of something hot and steaming in his hand.

The Listener shifted his gaze from Nolo to the night sky.  The pale glow
of dawn could clearly be seen across the Bay of Auks.  Stars faded even
as the Listener looked away.  He had been listening to his dream for
half the night.

Nolo tucked the squirrel coat around the Listener's shoulders and then
held out the steaming bowl.

"Bear soup, Sadaluk.  Sila made me swear to watch you drink it."

The Listener nodded gruffly, though in truth he was quite pleased--not
about the bear soup, which he could get from any fire around the
rendering pit, but for the fact of Sila's attention.  The bear soup was
hot, dark, and strong, and bits of sinew, bear fat, and marrow bobbed
upon the surface.

The Listener enjoyed the feel of steam on his face as he drank.  The
warmth of the bone bowl soothed the joints in his black, hard-as-wood
hands.  When he had finished he held out the empty bowl for Nolo to
take.

"Go now.  I will return the squirrel coat to you when I am rested."

Nolo took the bowl with all the usual carefulness of a husband handling
one of his wife's best dishes and made his way back to his ground.

The Listener envied him.

After what his dreams had shown him this night, the Listener knew that
such a base and mortal emotion should be beneath him.  But it wasn't,
and that was the way of the world.

The Listener had seen the One with Reaching Arms reach out and beckon
the darkness.  And that meant only one thing.

Days darker than night lay ahead.

Pulling hides across his doorway, the Listener retreated into the warmth
and golden light of his ground.  His bench was thick with animal skins
heaped high with fresh white heather, and he lay down upon it and closed
his eyes. He had no wish to dream and sleep, so he turned his thoughts
to Sila and imagined her and Nolo sledding across the frozen margins of
Endsea.  He imagined the rime of ice beneath the sled runners wearing
thin and Nolo calling a halt so that his wife could make new ice by the
quickest way she could.

This pleasant image held the Listener's attention for only a short
spell. There was work to be done.  Messages had to be sent.  Days darker
than night lay ahead, and those who lived to know such things needed to
be told.  Let no one say that Sadaluk, Listener of the Ice Trapper
tribe, was not the first to know.

CHAPTER THREE.

A Circle of Dust re you sure you checked the rear of the horse corral?
" The freezing wind made Drey Sevrance squint as he spoke.

Ice crystals glittered in the fox fur of his hood, and pine needles
clung like matted hair to his shoulders, arms, and back.  Raif thought
his brother looked tired, and older than he had ever looked before.

Dawn light was showing yellow on the horizon, and it cast pits of sulfur
shadow on his face.

"I checked," Raif said.

"No sign of Mace."

"What about the alder swamp and the stream?"

"Swamp's frozen.   I walked along the stream bank.   Nothing."   Drey
stripped off his gloves and ran his bare hands over his face.

"The current might have carried the body downstream."

Raif shook his head.

"There's not enough water to carry a bloated fox from one bend to
another, let alone a full-grown man clear from the camp."

"It would have been running faster yesterday at noon."  Raif took a
breath to speak, then thought better of it.  The only time that stream
would ever be strong enough to carry a body was during the second week
of spring thaw when the runoff from the balds and Coastal Ranges was at
its height--Drey knew that.  Suddenly uneasy but not sure why, Raif
reached out and touched Drey's sleeve.

"Come on.  Let's get back to the fire pit

"Mace Blackhail is out here somewhere, Raif."  Drey pushed a hand
through the frozen air.

"I know he's more than likely dead, but what if he isn't?  What if he's
wounded and fallen?"

"There were those tracks" -- "I don't want to hear about those tracks
again. Is that clear?  They could have been left by anyone at any time.
Mace was standing dogwatch--he could have been anywhere when the raid
came.  Now either the raiders got to him first and he's lying frozen in
some draw on the floodplain, or he made it back to the camp, warned the
others, and we just haven't found him yet."

Raifhung his head.  He didn't know how to reply.  How could he tell his
brother he had a feeling that no matter how long and carefully they
searched, they would still find no sign of Mace Blackhail?  Shrugging
heavily, he decided to say nothing.  He was dead tired, and he didn't
want to argue with Drey.

Drey's face softened a fraction.  Frozen colt grass cracked beneath his
feet as he shifted his weight from left to right.

"All right.  We'll head back to the fire pit We'll search wider for Mace
come full daylight."

Too exhausted to hide his relief, Raif followed Drey back to the tent
circle. Wind-twisted hemlocks and blackstone pines thrashed against the
sky like chained beasts.  Somewhere close by, water trickled over loose
shale, and far beyond the horizon a raven screamed at the dawn.

Hearing the rough and angry cry of the bird the clan called Watcher of
the Dead, Raif raised his hand to his throat.  With his thick dogs king
gloves on he could barely feel the hard hook of the raven's bill he wore
suspended on a length of retted flax.  The raven was his lore, chosen
for him at birth by the clan guide.

The guide who had given Raif the raven lore was five years dead now.

No one had been more deeply honored in the clan.  He was ancient and
he'd stunk of pigs and Raif had hated him with a vengeance.  He had
saved the worst possible lore for Tern Sevrance's second son.  No one
before or after had ever been given the raven.  Ravens were scavengers,
carrion feeders; they could kill, but they preferred to steal.  Raif had
seen how they followed a lone wolf for days, hoping to snatch a meal
from an opened carcass.  Everyone else in the clan, men and women alike,
had fared better with their lores. Drey had been given a bear claw, like
Tern before him.  Dagro Blackhail's lore was an elk stag, Jorry Shank's
a river pike, Mallon Clayhorn's a badger. Shor Gormalin was an eagle,
like Raina Blackhail.  As for Dagro's foster son, Mace .  .  Raif
thought for a moment.  What was his lore?  Then it came to him: Mace
Blackhail was a wolf.

The only person in the entire clan who had a lore stranger than a raven
was Effie.  The guide had given her nothing but an ear-shaped piece of
stone. Raif grew angry just thinking about it.  What had the Sevrances
ever done to the old bastard to deserve such short shrift?

Raif tugged at the raven's lore, testing its oiled binding.  When he was
younger he had thrown the thing away more times than he could recount,
yet somehow the guide always found it and brought it back.

"It's yours, Raif Sevrance," he would say, holding out the black piece
of horn in his scarred filthy palm.

"And one day you may be glad of it."

All thoughts of ravens flew from Raifs mind as he and Drey approached
the tent circle.  The first rays of sunlight slid across the frozen
tundra, illuminating the campsite with long threads of morning light.

Already the six hide-and-moose-felt tents, the horse posts, the fire pit
the drying racks, and the chopping stump had the look of ruins about
them.  Tern had once told Raif a story about a great dark death ship
that mariners swore guarded the entrance to Endsea, keeping all but the
blind and insane away. That was what the tents looked like now: the
sails of a dead ship.

Raif shivered.  His hand dropped from his neck to the hollowed- out
antler tine that was attached to his gear belt by a ring of rusted
brass.  Sealed inside the tine was hallowed earth: dust ground from the
guide stone that formed the Heart of Clan.  Every clan had a guide stone
and every clansman carried a portion of it with him until he died.

The Clan Blackhail guide stone was a massive slab of folded granite as
big as a stable block, shot with veins of black graphite and slick with
grease. Clan Bludd's guide stone was also folded granite, but it was
studded with seams of red garnets that shone like drying blood.

Raif had never seen the powder that came from the Bluddstone, but he
thought it must look pretty much the same as that ground from the
Hailstone: smooth gray powder that ran through the hand like liquid
smoke.

As he neared the fire pit he plucked the tine from his belt, breaking
the brass ring.  The tine was sealed closed with a cap of beaten silver,
and Raifran his thumb along the tine's length, feeling for the edge.
Twelve men had died here, and only two remained.  And two men without
horses, carts, or sleds could never hope to bring back the dead.  The
roundhouse lay five days' hard travel south, and that was more than time
enough for scavengers to tear the bodies to shreds.

Raif wouldn't have it.  Ravens were in the sky already, turning circles
a league across, and soon wolves, coyotes, bears, and tundra cats would
harken to the sound of their kaawmg.  All beasts that fed upon dead
things would be drawn to the camp, in search of one final meal to gorge
on before winter started true.

Shaking his head with a single savage blow, Raif flicked the cap from
the tine.  It popped open with a small hiss.  Fine powder from the guide
stone streamed in the wind like a comet's tail, bringing the taste of
granite to RaiPs lips.  After a moment of utter silence, he began
walking the circle. Around the fire pit the drying racks, the tents, and
the bodies he moved, carvinga path of air and dust.  The gray powder
sailed long on winter's breath, riding the cold eddies and swirling
updrafts before sinking to its frozen bed.  Nothing was ever going to
take Tern Sevrance.  Ever.  No ravens would pick at his eyes and his
lips, no wolves would sink their fangs into his belly and his rump, no
bears would suck the marrow from his bones, and no dogs would fight over
scraps.  He'd be damned to the darkest pits in hell if they would.

"Raif?"

Looking round, Raif saw Drey standing at the entrance to their father's
tent, carrying a bundle of supplies pressed hard against his chest.

"What are you doing?"

"I'm drawing a guide circle.  We're going to burn the camp."  Raif
hardly recognized his own voice as he spoke.  He sounded cold, and there
was a challenge in his words he had not originally intended.

Drey looked at him a long while.  His normally light brown eyes were as
dark as the walls of the fire pit He knew Raifs reasons--they were too
close as brothers not to know each other's minds--but Raif could tell he
was not pleased.  He'd had plans of his own for the bodies.

Finally the muscles in Drey's neck began to work, and after a moment he
spoke, his voice hard.

"Finish the circle.  I'll load these supplies by the horse posts, then
find what oil and pitch I can."  A deep band of muscle in Raifs chest
relaxed. His mouth was dry--too dry to speak.  So he nodded once and
continued walking.  Raif felt Drey's gaze upon his back until the moment
the circle was joined.  And he knew with utter certainty that he had
taken some- tiling precious from his brother.  Drey was eldest.  He
should have had first say with the dead.

Drey Sevrance did what was needed to start a good fire.  He worked
thoroughly and tirelessly; chipping and shredding firewood, stripping
nearby trees of their needles to kindle the bare ground between the
tents and the pit, spreading great heaps of moss around the bodies, and
lacing everything with wads of rendered elk fat and ribbons of oil and
pitch.  The tent hides he doused with the hard liquor that was always to
be found in Meth Ganlow's pack.

Through all the preparations, Raif did only those things Drey asked of
him, nothing more; suggesting nothing, saying nothing.  Giving Drey his
due.

Ravens circled closer as they worked, their long black wings casting
knife shadows on the snow, their harsh carrion calls a constant reminder
to Raif of the thing he wore at his throat.  Watcher of the Dead.

When it was all done and the two brothers stood outside the guide
circle, looking in at the primed firetrap they had created, Drey took
out his flint and striker.  The circle Raif had drawn was not visible to
the eye.  The powder was fine and the colt grass thick, and the wind had
carried much of it away.  But it was there.  Both Raif and Drey knew it
was there.  A guide circle carried all the power of the guidestone it
had been drawn with.  It was Heart of Clan, here, on the frozen tundra
of the badlands.  All those within it lay upon hallowed ground.

Tern had once told Raifthat far to the south in the Soft Lands of
flat-roofed cities, grassy plains, and warm seas, there were others who
used guide circles to protect them.  Knights, they were called.

And Tern said they burned their circles into their flesh.  Raif didn't
know about that, but he knew a clansman would sooner leave the
roundhouse without his sword than without a flask, pouch, antler tine,
or horn containing his measure of powdered guide stone With a sword, a
man could only fight.  Within the hallowed ground of a guide circle, he
could speak with the Stone Gods, ask for deliverance, absolution, or a
swift and merciful death.

A wolf howled in the distance, and as if its call had woken him from a
trance, Drey pushed back his hood and stripped off his gloves.  Raif did
the same.  All was still and quiet.  The wind had died, the ravens
landed, the wolf silent, perhaps scenting prey.  Neither brother spoke.
Words had never been the Sevrances' way.

Drey struck the flint.  The kindling caught, flaring fiercely in Drey's
hand. Drey stepped forward, knelt on one knee, and lit the run of
alcohol-laced moss he had laid.

Raif forced himself to watch.  It was hard, but he was clan, and his
chief and his father lay here, and he would not look away.  Flames raced
toward Tern Sevrance, eager yellow fingers, sharp red claws.

Hellfire.  And it would eat him as surely as any beast.

Tern .  .

Suddenly Raif could think of nothing but stamping the blaze out.  He
stepped forward, but even as he did so, liquid fire found the first
tent, and the primed elk hide burst into a sheet of flames.  Sparks flew
upward with a great gasp of smoke, and a thunderous roar of destruction
shook the badlands to its core.  Flames so hot they burned white danced
in the rising wind. Pockets of ground ice melted with animal hisses, and
then the stench of burning men rose from the pyre.

Ripplingair pushed against Raifs cheek.  His eyes burned, and salt water
streamed from them, running down his cheeks.  He continued to look
straight ahead.  The exact piece of ground Tern lay on was etched upon
his soul, and it was his Stone God--given duty to watch it until it had
burned to dust.  Finally there came a time when he could look away.
Turning, he looked to his brother.  Drey would not meet his eyes. Drey's
hand was bunched so tightly into a fist it caused his chest to shake.
After a moment he spoke.

"Let's go."

Without glancing up to check his brother's reaction, Drey crossed over
to the horse posts, picked up his share of the supplies, and hefted them
over his back.  From the bulky look of the packs, Raif guessed Drey had
chosen to carry the heaviest bundles himself.  Drey waited by the post.
He would nofclook at his brother, but he would wait for him.

Raif walked to meet him.  As he suspected, the packs Drey had left were
light, and Raif shrugged them on his back like a coat.  He wanted to say
something to Drey, but nothing seemed right, so he kept his silence
instead.

The fire roared at their backs as they left the badlands campsite and
headed south.  Smoke followed them, fire stench sickened them, and ashes
settled on their shoulders like the first shadows of night.

They crossed the floodplain and the sedge meadow and headed over the
great grasslands that led home.  The sun set slow but early, lighting
the sky behind them with a lingering bloody light.

Drey never mentioned continuing the search for Mace Black- hail, and
Raif was glad.  Glad because it meant his brother saw the same things he
did along the way: a broken pane of ice on a melt pond, a horse's hoof
clearly stamped in the lichen, a ptarmigan bone, its end black from the
roast fire picked clean.

When exhaustion finally got the better of them, they halted.  An island
of blackstone pines formed their shelter for the night.  The great
centuries-old trees had grown in a protective ring, originally seeded
from a single mother tree that had matured in the center, \ then later
died.  Raif liked being there.  It was like camping within a guide
circle.

Drey lit a dry fire and pulled an elk hide over his shoulders to keep
warm. Raif did the same, and the two brothers sat close around the
flames and ate strips of hung mutton and boiled eggs gone black. They
drank Tern's dark, virtually undrinkable home brew and the sour taste
and tar like smell reminded Raifso strongly of his father it made him
smile. Tern Sevrance's home brew was the worst in the entire clan;
everyone said so, no one would drink it, and it was rumored to have
killed a dog.  Yet Tern never changed his brew.  Much like heroes in
stories who poisoned themselves a little each day to protect against
attacks from artful assassins, Tern had become immune to it.  Drey
smiled, too.  It was impossible not to smile when faced with the very
real possibility of death by beer.  A soreness came to Raifs throat.
There was just three of them now: he.  Drey, and Erne.  Effie. The smile
drained from Raifs face.  How would they tell Effie her da had gone? She
had never known their mother.  Meg had died on the birthing table in a
pool other own blood, and Tern had reared Erne on his own.  Many
clansmen and more than a few clanswomen had told Tern he should remarry
to provide his sons and daughter with a mother, yet Tern had flatly
refused.

"I have loved once, completely," he would say.

"And that's blessing enough for me."

Suddenly Drey reached over and cuffed Raif lightly on the cheek.

"Don't worry," he said.

"We'll be all right."

Raif nodded, glad to his heart that Drey had spoken and comforted by the
realization that the same thoughts sifting through his mind were sifting
through Drey's as well.

Sitting back, Drey adjusted the fire with a stick.  Red-and-blue flames
danced close to his gloved hand as he turned out charred logs.

"We'll make Clan Bludd pay for what they did, Raif.  I swear it."  A
hand of pure ice gripped Raifs gut.  Clan Bludd?  Drey had no proof of
what he said. The raid could have been mounted by any number of parties:
Clan Dhoone, Clan Croser, Clan Gnash, a band of Maimed Men.

The Sull.  And then there was the nature of the wounds, the stench of
badness, the feeling that something more than death had taken place.

The warriors of Clan Bludd were fierce beyond telling, with their spiked
and lead-weighted hammers, their case-hardened spears, their partly
shorn heads, and their great swords cut with deep center grooves for
channeling their enemies' blood; yet Raif had never once heard either
Tern or Dagro Blackhail say that Clan Bludd was involved in .  Raif
shook his head.  He had no words for what had happened at the
campground.  He just knew that any clansman worth his lore would turn
his back on such a thing.

Glancing over at Drey, Raif took a breath to speak.  Then, seeing how
viciously Drey poked at the fire and how the stick he held was bent
close to breaking, he let the breath out, unused.  In five days they
would be back home.  All truths would come out then.

Chapter FOUR.

A Raven Has Come Angus Lok was receiving kisses.  Fourteen of them, to
be exact, one for each halfpenny that Beth and Little Moo would cost
him.  It was Beth's idea, of course; she wanted new ribbons for her
hair, and she was prepared to do anything--kissing included--to get
them.  Little Moo was far too young to have formed any opinion on
ribbons other than that they were good to chew on; yet she was kissing
her father anyway, giggling wildly and wetting Angus' face with sticky,
ever-so-slightly gritty kisses that tasted of oatcakes.

"Please, Father.  Please," Beth said.

"You promised."  "Pweez, Papa," echoed Little Moo.

Angus Lok groaned.  He knew when he was beaten.  Slappinga hand on his
chest, he cried,

"All right!  All right!  You've torn your poor father's heart out along
wi' his purse!  Ribbons it is!  I suppose I should ask what colors
you'll both be wanting?"

 "Pink," said Beth.

"Noos," said Little Moo.

Angus Lok picked up Little Moo, lifted her from his lap, and planted her
gently on the fox pelt rug at his feet.

"Pink and noos it is, then."

Beth giggled as she laid one last kiss on her father's cheek and stood.

"Blue, Father.  Little Moo wants blue."

 "Noos.   Noos," echoed Little Moo happily.

"Angus."

Angus looked up at the sound of his wife's voice.  Two syllables, yet
straightaway he knew something was wrong.

"What is it, love?"  Darra Lok hesitated a moment in the doorway, as if
reluctant to move forward, then took a small, resigned breath and walked
into the farmhouse kitchen.  Coming to join Angus by the fire, she
paused to push a stray strand of hair from Beth's face and deprive
Little Moo of a hairy bit of oatcake that the child had just plucked
from the depths of the fox pelt rug.

Sitting down on the oak wood bench that her father's steward had made
for her as a wedding gift eighteen years earlier, Darra Lok took her
husband's hand in hers.  Checking first that the two youngest of her
three daughters were caught up in their own worlds of ribbons and
oatcakes, she leaned close to Angus and said,

"A raven has come."

Angus Lok took a deep breath and held it.  Closing his eyes, he spoke a
silent prayer to any and all gods who might be listening.  Please let it
not be a raven.  Please let Darra be mistaken and it be a rook, a
jackdaw, or a hooded crow.  Even as he wished it, he knew he was wrong.
Darra Lok knew a raven when she saw one.

Angus raised his wife's hand to his lips and kissed it.  He knew the
gods didn't like it if a man asked for one thing straight after another,
so he didn't pray that his fear wasn't showing on his face.

He simply hid it as well as he could.

Darra's dark blue eyes looked into his.  Her normally lovely face was
pale, and little lines Angus had barely noticed before were etched deep
into her brow.

"Cassy spotted it this morning, circling the house.  It didn't come to
land until now."

"Take me to it."

Darra Lok let go of her husband s hand and nodded.  She stood slowly,
reluctantly, brushing imaginary dirt from her apron.

"Beth.  Watch your sister.  See she doesn't get too close to the fire.
I'll be back in just a minute."

Beth nodded in a movement that was so similar to the one i \; Darra had
just made, it turned Angus' heart to lead.  A raven had come to his
house, and although the massive blue black birds with their long knife
wings, powerful jaws, and human voices meant many different things to
many different people, to Angus Lok they meant just one: leaving home.
Darra walked ahead of him out of the kitchen, and Angus paused a moment
to run his hand over Beth's cheek.

"Pink and blue," he mouthed as he left, so she knew he wouldn't forget
about the ribbons.  It was raining outside, a steady drizzle that had
begun just before dawn, and the grounds around the Lok farm were turning
to mud.  Darra had spent most of the morning harvesting the last other
herb garden before first frost, and the small patch of ground just below
the kitchen window was stripped bare.  To the side of the herb garden,
the chickens clucked nervously in the coup, built in a lean-to against
the kitchen chimney.  They knew all about ravens.

"Father!"  Angus Lok turned toward the voice of his eldest daughter.
Cassy Lok had dirt smeared on her face, her hair was plastered to the
sides of her head in two wet sheets, and she was wearing an ancient
oilskin cape that had come with the farm together with a milk churn and
two rotting plows.  Yet to Angus she looked perfectly beautiful.  High
spots of color glowed in her cheeks, and her hazel eyes were as bright
as raindrops glistening on amber. Sixteen, she was.  Old enough to be
wed and have children of her own.  Angus frowned.  How was she ever
going to meet a young man, hidden out here in the farm and woodlands two
days' northeast of Ille Glaive?  She wasn't.  And that was one reason
Angus Lok didn't sleep well at night.

"Have you come to take a look at the raven?"  Cassy said, excitement
spilling into her voice as she ran to join her father.

"It's a messenger, like the rooks that sometimes come.  Only bigger.
There's something tied to its leg."  Darra and Angus Lok exchanged a
glance.

"Cassy, go inside and warm yourself.

Your father and I will see to the bird.  "

^n i.  if But-- "Inside, Casilyn."

Cassy brought her lips together, made a small huffing sound, then turned
and made her way inside the house.  Darra seldom used her full name.

Angus ran a hand over his face, brushing the rain from his eyebrows and
beard.  He watched as Cassy closed the kitchen door behind her.

She was a good girl.  He'd talk to her later, explain what he could.

"This way.  The bird has no liking for the rookery like the rest.  It's
perched itself in the old elm around the back."  Without waiting for her
husband to acknowledge what she said, Darra cut across the yard and down
along the side of the house.  Angus had lived with his wife too long not
to know that her briskness was a cover.  Darra was nervous and trying
not to show it.

To the rear of the Lok farmhouse lay open woodland.  Great old oaks,
elms, and basswoods grew tall and spread wide over a rich damp underwood
of lichen, dead leaves, loam, and ferns.  In spring Gassy and Beth would
search for blue duck eggs, wood frogs, and wild mint, and in summer
they'd spend entire days in the woods, picking cloud berries
blackberries, gooseberries, and black plums, coming home after sundown
with sticky faces and baskets crammed with dark mushy fruits that would
have to be soaked in water to drown the maggots out.  In autumn they
would hunt for field mushrooms and milk caps, and in winter, during
those times when Angus' work took him away, Darra would set traps to
catch small game.

Kaawl Kaawl The raven announced its presence with two short, angry
notes, drawing Angus Lok's gaze skyward, up through the branches of the
great white elm that provided summer shade for the entire house.  Even
surrounded by branches as thick as arms, the raven's form was
unmistakable.  It perched in the tree with all the arrogance of a
panther resting after an easy kill. Black and still, it watched Angus
Lok with eyes of liquid gold.

Angus' gaze shifted from the creature's eyes to its legs.  A marked
thickening directly above its left claw was clearly visible: pikes king
sinew bound, then painted with a resin seal.

Kaawl Kaawl Look, 1 dare you.

Angus heard the raven's call as a challenge.  Only two people in the
Northern Territories used ravens to carry their messages, and Angus knew
in the soft marrow of his bones that he didn't want to hear from either
of them.  The past lay within that pikes king pouch, and he and the
raven knew it.

"Call it down."

Darra's voice was low, her hands twisted at the fabric other apron.

Nodding softly, Angus whistled as he had once been taught nearly twenty
years earlier: two short chirrs followed by a single long note.

The raven bobbed its head and shook out its wings.  Gold eyes appraised
Angus Lok.  Seconds passed, and then, making a noise that sounded just
like human laughter, the raven flew down from the branch.

Darra stepped back as the huge bird landed.  Angus had to fight the urge
to step back himself.  The raven's bill was as big as a spearhead, sharp
and hooked like the shredder on a plow.  Apparently delighted by Darra's
fear, the bird danced toward her, bobbing its head and calling softly.

"Nay, yer little beastie."  Angus grabbed at the raven, one hand
circling its belly, the other clamping down on its bill.  Pulling the
bird from the ground, he hefted it fast against his chest.  The raven
jerked its wings and clawed its feet, but Angus held it firm, increasing
his pressure on its bill.

"Darra.  Take the knife from my belt and cut the message."

Darra did as she was asked, though her knife hand shook so much as she
broke the seal that she nearly bled the bird.  With the sinew and resin
bindings broken, the small package, no bigger than a child's little
finger, fell into Darra's left palm.

Angus turned away from his wife and threw the raven from him.  The bird
spread its wings and soared into the air, laughing, laughing, as it
disappeared into the blade-metal sky.

"Here.  Take it."  Darra Lok held out the package.  The pikes king
wrapping was badly stained by rain, resin, and bird lime, but small
silvery green patches of skin were still visible along its length.

Pike- skin was light, strong, and waterproof and could be molded in
place when wet.  A useful material, yet Angus couldn't recall the last
time he'd received a message so wrapped.  The moment Angus' fingers
closed around the soft, damp package, Darra took a step back.  Angus
sent his wife a glance.  Stay.

Darra shook her head.

"No, my husband.  I've been married to you for eighteen years, and I
have never once looked upon any message they have sent.  I do not think
it would be a good time to break my tally now."  With that Darra Lok ran
a hand over her husband's right cheek and turned and walked away.

Angus cupped his hand to his face where his wife had touched him,
holding on to her warmth as he watched her disappear behind the corner
of the house.  He didn't deserve her.  She was a Ross of Clad Hill, and
her father was a grange lord and nineteen years ago when they'd first
met, she could have had any man she chose.  Angus Lok never forgot that.
It ran through his mind now as he unraveled the roll of pikes king and
pulled out the length of saliva- softened white spruce bark.

Sliced so thinly that Angus could see his thumb through the fibers, the
soft strip of inner bark carried a border of seals chasing quarter moons
burned into the wood.  The message was also burned in, painstakingly
pricked out with the tip of a red-hot needle: The One with Reaching Arms
Beckons Days Darker Than Night Lie Ahead Sadaluk Angus stepped toward
the great old elm and leaned heavily against its trunk.  Rain dripped
around him, forming a curtain of beaded light.

Many things he had been prepared for, many terrible, terrible things.

But this .  A bitter smile flashed across Angus' face.  This was
something he had thought well behind him.  They all had.  It's your
choice, Angus Lok. Make of it what you will.  The past pulled like a
much used muscle within Angus' chest.  It shortened his breath, making
it difficult to breathe.  He would have to leave.  Tonight.  Head for
Ille Glaive, meet with those who needed to be told.  It never occurred
to him to doubt the message.  Sadaluk of the Ice Trapper tribe was not
the sort of man given to rash communication.  Twenty years, and this was
the first time Angus had ever heard from him.

Beneath Angus' feet, the bald earth around the elm turned to mud.  The
raven's laughter echoed in the last of the tree's attached leaves.

Angus glanced at his house.  Inside Cassy would be helping Darra stack
the fire before supper, Beth would be rolling dough for the sweet,
sticky unnameable pastries that she and Little Moo loved to eat.  As for
Little Moo .  .  .  well, she had probably keeled over on the rug and
was currently fast asleep.  That child could sleep anywhere.  Pain,
which had never quite left Angus' chest, reasserted itself with a
single, soft stab.  How safe were all his children tonight?  Tucking the
message in a slip inside his waistcoat, Angus pushed himself off from
the elm and headed for the warmth of his house. No.  He wouldn't leave
his home, not in darkness.  Those who sent messages could go to the
deepest spiraling hell.  He had promised Beth and Little Moo ribbons,
and by all the gods, they were going to get them.  Yet even as Angus Lok
found some satisfaction in defiance, fear settled like dust within his
bones.  A raven had come, and a message had been received, and the past
was now a tightly held fist knocking at his door.  t t t As quiet as
settling dust, Ash March told herself as she slipped through her chamber
door.  Cool air from the corridor brushed against her nightdress, and
Ash had to bite the inside of her mouth to stop herself from shivering.
Why did it have to be so cold?  She glanced back at the door.  Should
she have brought an outer robe after all?

Suddenly the idea of wandering around Mask Fortress wearing little but a
nightdress and a wool tunic didn't seem nearly as clever as it had
earlier. Still, this way, if she were caught, she could at least claim
sleepwalking and have a chance of being believed.  Wearing a cloak would
make things harder. Did sleepwalkers dress before they went outside? Ash
didn't know.

Looking ahead at what she could see of the gently spiraling corridor of
cut and angled stone, Ash listened for the sound of Marafice Eye.

The Knife had moved from his post by Ash's door some minutes earlier,
probably assuming his charge was fast asleep.  Ash didn't know where he
had gone, had no idea when and if he would return.  She just knew that
he was sick of spending his nights camped outside her door.  She didn't
blame him. It was cold enough to turn breath white, and, discounting
watching dust settle and greenwood torches burn out one by one, there
was nothing to do.

Laughter.  Ash tensed.  The sound came again, down the corridor and off
to the right.  Katia's room.  Yet that wasn't Katia laughing.  Not
unless she'd spent the night swilling hot tar and chewing on gravel.

"I said blow out the light."

Immediately Ash recognized the cold, imperative tones of Marafice Eye.
He was in Katia's room .  .  with Katia.  Ash shuddered; she didn't like
the thought of that one bit.  Katia was so small, dark and tiny like a
doll.  And Marafice Eye was a huge bull of a man, with arms that took
the sleeves of four men to cover them and wrists like iron bars.
Slipping into the shadows against the opposite wall, Ash walked quickly
ahead.

The limestone walls were bitterly cold, and Ash avoided touching them as
she moved.  Both her own and Katia's chambers were situated in the
shortest and thickest of the four towers in Mask Fortress: the Cask.

The Cask was the principal fortified structure in Spire Vanis, and its
walls were twenty feet thick.  A series of spiraling corridors and
winding staircases led up from its base like a path weaving around a
hill, breaking occasionally for defensive bastions, archers' roosts,
chambers, walled-in snugs, and recessed alcoves with cut stone benches
known as gray meets

Ash's chamber formed the heart of the Cask.  Directly below her | floor,
the tower wall was spiked with a ring of fortifications so thick that
from outside they looked a like a massive limestone bird's nest
clustered around a tree.  The Cask was not a pretty sight.  Of the three
towers that were livable within the fortress, it was the least
graciously set, having none of the wrought ironwork and lead cladding
found in the Horn or the crow-step gables and black marble eyelets of
the Bight.

As for the Splinter, the tallest tower in Mask Fortress, capped with the
Iron Spire, where high traitors were once impaled at a height of six
hundred feet so that everyone within the city could see them and know
fear.  .  .  Ash shook her head.  No one had been there for years.

The Splinter was unstable, uninhabitable, freezing, damp, broken.  It
was a wonder the whole thing didn't collapse.  One end was said to be
embedded so deeply within the frozen bedrock of Mount Slain that the
tower shuddered along with the mountain.  And the other end soared so
high into the clouds that moisture continually ran in rivulets down its
walls whether it was raining or not.  In winter the entire structure was
encased within a layer of rime ice a knuckle thick.

Pale, narrow, and twisting, the ice-bound tower had been called by many
names: the Winter Spire, the White Thorn, Penthero Iss' Bloodless Prick.
Ash frowned.  Katia was always passing along such nonsense.

Reaching the first set of steps.  Ash risked looking back.  Katia must
have blown out the light as Marafice Eye had bidden, for the space
beneath the little maid's door was now dark.  That was good, Ash told
herself, moving her mind away from the subject.  She did- n't want to
think about what might be happening within.

Solid limestone steps muffled her footfalls as she descended the stairs.
Brass hooks, mottled blue and orange with rot and rust, jutted from the
stair wall like bird claws, forcing her to walk dead center.

Once they had been used to suspend great fire-blackened chains that
linked all the Cask's portcullises to a single lever in the strongroom
below.  Now they were just one more hazard to avoid, like servants,
brothers-in-the-watch, and the raw mountain air.  Ash rubbed her arms.
She was so cold.  Freezing.  Yet she had thought to wear her thickest
nightgown, and her feet were slippered in moleskin.  It wasn't even
winter yet, not properly, so why could she never get warm?

You are not well, almost-daughter.  1 worry.

Ash shook her foster father's voice from her head.  She wasn't unwell in
the way he meant.  Katia had told her all about what happened to girls
when they came into their blood, and nightmares and cold sweats formed
no part of it.

"You get stomach cramps," Katia had said, an air of vast superiority
warming her voice.

"And your mind starts turning to men."  Ash blew air through her
nostrils. Men.  No, that definitely wasn't happening to her.

Something else was.  Ten nights in a row she had dreamed of ice.

Always she awoke to find sheets damp with sweat twisted around her arms
like rope.  The dreams were so real, and the voices of the creatures who
spoke to her were like nothing she had ever heard before.  Misfressss,
they murmured, as sickly pleasing as sweet rolls spread with honey and
jam, come for us, stretch toward us, reach .  Ash took a deep breath to
stop herself from shivering.  The thought of returning to her bedchamber
was suddenly there in her mind, and it was hard to keep moving forward.
Her foster father knew what was wrong with her, she was sure of it.  She
was also sure he would never tell her the truth.

He watched her constantly; stealing into her room when she was sleeping,
examining her breasts, her hair, her teeth, questioning Katia about the
tiniest details of her life.  Nothing was too insignificant for him: the
contents other chamber pot, the amount of goose fat left on her plate
after dinner, the changing dimensions of her corselet and small linens.
What did he want with her?  Wasn't being his almost-daughter enough?

Ash pushed the hurt away before it reached her.  He wasn't her real
father, she had to remember that.  He never called her daughter without
speaking the word almost first.

The stairs came to an abrupt halt between stories to allow access to the
battlements, then resumed after a short ramp.  Ash increased her speed.
The light level was rising, and shouted orders and the clatter of steel
on steel began to filter up from the Red Forge below.

Penthero Iss knew something, something about her, her parents, or the
circumstances other birth.  Something that made him guard her closely at
all times, set his Knife outside her door, and call upon her day and
night unannounced, hoping to catch her.  .  doing what?  Ash shook her
head.  She might find the answer to that tonight.  Every evening in the
hour before midnight, Iss left his private chambers in the base of the
Cask and went elsewhere.  Ash had seen him leave and return countless
times over the years, yet she did not know where he went.  According to
Katia, he seldom locked the chamber door behind him.  It was late, and
the Cask was secure, and only Ash, Katia, and a handful of trusted
servants were allowed access during the night.  The Rive Watch garrison,
the mighty Red Forge where brothers-in-the-watch struck and cooled their
bloodred swords, was situated adjacent to the Cask.  No one could enter
the tower unchallenged.  Iss' chamber was secure against intruders, but
not against someone who was already within the tower.

All her foster father's private papers were held within his chamber.

If there was any record of the day he had found and claimed her, it
would be buried somewhere deep beneath his slate books and ledgers, his
onionskin atlases and manifests and lists.

Ash began her descent of the second flight of stairs, her hand trailing
from hook to hook along the stair wall Iss' voice followed her like
smoke from the greenwood torches.  Is this how you repay me,
almost-daughter?  1 clothe you and feed you, and then as soon as my back
is turned you betray me like this. You disappoint me, Asarhia.  I
thought you loved your father more.

Asarhia.  Ash bristled.  She was Ash, just Ash, yet no one within Mask
Fortress would acknowledge it.  Everyone called her Asarhia or Lady
Asarhia or mistress.  It was yet another thing she owed to Penthero Iss.
He had found and then named her: Asarhia because it was a fashionable
name given to ladies of high birth, and March because of where she was
found: on the very border of the city itself.  Five paces farther south
of Vaingate, almost-daughter, and you would not have been mine to keep.
Protector's Trove ends within a shadow's fall of the gate.

Ash breathed in cold air from the shadows as she paused upon the final
landing to listen for sounds of brothers-in the-watch.  Vaingate.

Why Vaingate?  Spire Vanis had four gates, each one facinga cardinal
point. Vaingate faced south.  South.  No roads led from it, no
brothers-in-the-watch patrolled it, no carts loaded with wares ever
trundled past its posts. Vaingate opened onto the north face of Mount
Slain!  It had been built purely for show, satisfying some ancient
masonic code of order that demanded a walled city have four gates.  Who
would leave a baby outside a gate that was never used?

The answer came to Ash with the same sickening pull as always: Someone
who wanted their baby dead.

Voices.  Close by.

Ash stilled herself.  She spent hours each day watching fortress cats
chase mice and birds in the quadrangle, and one thing she knew for sure
was that a cat never pounced unless it saw something move.  The trick
was keeping your nerve.  Mice didn't, birds didn't, but some old hares
did.  Ash had seen them, sitting perfectly still on the archers' block
as brazen as you like. The shadows on the stairwell were deep, slanting,
and Ash leaned into them, pressing her shoulders against the limestone
wall.  The voices grew louder. Footsteps clicked over tile, click,
click, click.

"Don't hold the bowl out at arm's length like a used chamber pot, you
great moose.  It'll cool in no time that way.  Hold it against your
chest.  Can't have His Coldness complaining about lukewarm beans--not
with them being late and all."

"And why not?  It's certainly not him that eats them.  Beans is common
fare, and we all know how high and mighty the Killhound is.  Wouldn't
eat a pork sausage if his life depended on it."

"I don't know nothing about that.  Beans in soft butter he's asked for,
and beans he's going to get.  Now deliver 'em sharpish--they're long
past due as it is.  And be sure to let him know that no one in the
kitchen's to blame. Furnacemen!  Hmph!  When I find which of those
dog-faced devils killed my stove, I swear I'll.  .  ."

The voices trailed off as the two figures disappeared along the
corridor, and Ash pulled back from the wall.  It was just Mistress ';
Wence and a manservant.  They hadn't even glanced up as they , passed.

From the sound of things, they were late delivering food to her foster
father.  Which meant that Iss was still in his chamber.

Annoyed, Ash brushed lime dust from her shoulders.  What was she going
to do now?

Matters were decided for her by the sound of booted feet descending the
stairs.  A brother-in-the-watch, judging from the faint jingle of metal
that accompanied each step, so there was no going back.  Leaving the
safe haven of the shadows, Ash took the last of the steps and moved into
the corridor below.  The entrance to the Red Forge lay on the south side
of the tower, so she took the way north instead, following Mistress
Wence and the manservant toward Iss' chamber.  At ground level the
curvature of the Cask's corridors was so slight, it was easy to forget
they ran in a circuit around the base of the tower.  Only a quarter of
the rotunda was given over to Iss' private rooms.  The remaining space
was taken by state rooms: the Hall of Trials, the Blackvault, and the
main entrances to the quadrangle and the Red Forge. Along the entire
length of the circuit ran a series of life-size statues hewn from marble
the color of smoke: the Founding Quarterlords and Impaled Beasts of
Spire Vanis.

Ash shivered hard as she heard the brother-in-the-watch open the main
rotunda door behind her.  Cold air pushed against the backs of her legs.
She was beginning to wish she hadn't started this.  But then,
doinganything these days was preferable to sleeping.  Dreams woke her
every night.  Her mind drifted .  .  .  she saw the ice cave, felt the
terrible cold breath that steamed from its shining walls.  Another door
banged closed, bringing Ash back.  Voices again.  Mistress Wence and the
servant returning from Iss' chamber.  They would be here any moment.

Panicking, Ash wheeled around.  Smooth walls, an iron-plated door that
led to the unused east gallery and was kept locked at all times, a lit
greenwood torch, and a recess housinga statue ofTorny Fyfe, Bastard
Lord, swordsman and glutton, and least highly regarded of the Founding
Quarterlords, were the only things in sight.  Mistress Wence's heels
tapped a march against the limestone floor.  Her thin nasal voice piped
in displeasure.

Ash ran for the greenwood torch, tugged it from its pewter casing, and
rammed the burning end against the wall.  The flames died instantly,
killing the light.  Thick smoke from the charred end curled toward the
ceilingas Ash re couched the torch.

The smell of burned resin helped clear her head.  Turningabout, she ran
for the statue of Torny Fyfe, squeezing herself behind his great marble
thighs and thanking the Maker for every eight-course meal the
Quarterlord had ever eaten.  The shadow cast by his overhanging belly
was enough to provide a team of dogs with shade.

"Really!  Between you and furnace men I don't know who's the dimmest.

You were supposed to tell Iss that it wasn't the kitchen staffs fault.
Not just stand there mumblinga lot of old nonsense about the lumber and
the fire. "

Rounding the curve, Mistress Wence and the manservant came to an abrupt
halt several paces short of Torny Fyfe's likeness.  Although light in
the corridor was now limited, it was far from dark, and Ash could
clearly see Mistress Wence's sharp nose quiver.

"Torch has gone out.  Take a flint to it, Grice.  We don't want to give
His Coldness anything else to find fault with."

As Grice slapped his tunic looking for a flint, Ash felt a trickle of
cold sweat slide past her ear.  Dream or no dream, she was returning to
her chamber as soon as this pair was gone.  She should never have come
here.  The whole idea had been a mistake from the start.  She'd rather
be lying in bed dreaming of ice than wedged behind a marble backside,
hiding from the fortress staff.

Realizing Grice was flintless.  Mistress Wence sniffed with venom.

"Really!  How can you call yourself a man and not carry a flint?"

"I can relight it from one of the torches, mistress."   To Ash's very
great relief, Mistress Wence shook her head, shoulders, and chest.

"You will do no such thing, you great oaf.  What if Iss came from his
chamber and saw you hulkingaround with a smoking torch in your hand at
this time of night?"  Three sniffs followed in rapid succession.

"He'd think you were a hide clad come to finish him off, that's what.

And sure as rotten apples bring flies, he'd make you pay for it.

You're coming to the kitchen with me and pick up a flint this minute.

Move sharpish, now!  " With that Mistress Wence and the manservant
resumed their journey along the corridor.

Slumping forward against Torny Fyfe's shoulder.  Ash exhaled softly.  A
wisp of marble dust spilled down her neck, cold and grainy like powdered
snow. Ash shook it away.  She was stiff, half-frozen, and her nightgown
was plastered to her back with icy sweat.  Sucking in her chest and
stomach, she squeezed herself free of Torny Fyfe's shoulders and
shuffled her ankles clear of his blocky, base- stone feet.  As she
stepped into the open corridor, her head jerked back painfully.
Turningabout, she saw where a lock other hair had snagged in the
Quarterlord's elaborately worked scabbard.  Cursingall fat men with
swords, Ash edged back to release it.

Besides arming Torny Fyfe with a sword long enough to impale a horse,
the sculptor had also conceived of a brisk wind to blow at his cape, and
sharp folds of marble shaved Ash's shins as she moved.  Letting out a
sound halfway between a squeak and a sob, Ash vowed to run back to her
chamber and never, ever, venture out again.

Sss.  A door whirred open in the distance, making a faint hissing sound.
Ash looked up.  The noise came from the direction of Penthero Iss'
private chamber.  Even before she could decide what to do, she heard
softly soled feet slapping stone.  Iss was coming this way.

Wrenching her trapped hair free.  Ash drew herself into the deepest
shadows of the recess.  Iss would be furious if he found her here.

Furious.  The time she fixed the bolt on her door was nothing compared
to this.

Before she had chance to settle herself into a position she could
comfortably hold, her foster father rounded the corner.  Thin, pale, and
hairless except for his closely shorn scalp, Penthero Iss had the look
of something drowned and then pulled up a week later from a lake.
Everythingabout him was pallid, smooth, and bloodless.  His eyes were
green, but barely so; his lips and cheeks had the color and texture of
cooked veal; and the skin on his earlobes let through light.

Carrying a covered bundle in his left arm, Iss walked faster than was
normally his wont.  Blue silk, heavily embroidered with metal chains and
pieces of agate, thrashed against his thighs as he moved.  Ash held her
breath.  All of her shrank back, away from her foster father.  She
closed her eyes as he passed.  Only he didn't pass.  Not completely.  He
walked to a point and then stopped.  All was silent.  Realizing she had
been discovered, Ash opened her eyes.  The sleepwalking excuse was a
dead dog now. Ash blinked.  Fully expecting her foster father's pale
green gaze to be upon her, she was surprised to see that he wasn't even
looking her way.  His back was toward her, and he was standing in front
of the iron door.  Ash saw the tendons in his wrist rise and fall, and
then a muffled clunk sounded as lock and key turned.

In all her years of living within Mask Fortress, Ash had never once seen
the iron door opened.  It led through to the unused east gallery and
then to the Splinter beyond.  No one ever visited the Splinter.  It was
forbidden by rule of law.  Workmen had died there, people said, plunging
to their deaths through gaps in rotten timbers, crushed by falling
masonry, and impaled upon the banister of spikes that wove around the
main stairway like a handrail to hell.

Ash inched forward, resting her hand on Torny Fyfe's smoothly chiseled
rear.

The door swung back as Penthero Iss pushed against the metal plating.

Stale air breathed into the corridor like fine mist.  Ash smelled the
dry, itchy odor of old stone and withered things.  It was the same
smell--part of it--that clung to Iss sometimes when he visited her
chambers in the middle of the night.  Ash trembled, not sure if she was
excited or afraid.  The lock had turned with barely a sound!  The door
hinges glided as smoothly as a pat of butter running down a roast.
Everything had been oiled.  Recently.  There was no rust, no rot.

Iss slid into the darkness on the far side of the door.  All previous
vows about returning to her room forgotten, Ash willed her foster father
not to lock the door behind him.  He was in a hurry, she knew that.
Would he pause to lock the door?

The iron door closed as easily as somethinga quarter of its size.

Switchingair caused one of the iron plates to jiggle in its frame.

Ash listened for the sound of iss inserting his key.  She heard
something, a click or tap, and then everything was quiet.

Ash waited.  Her heart was pumping fast and hard, and she was ready to
run for the door.  She forced herself to count seconds.  Her foster
father had gone to the Splinter.  The Splinter.

Minutes passed.  Beneath Ash's hand, Torny Fyfe's backside warmed to a
toasty glow.  Ash patted the marble.  She was growing rather fond of the
old Quarterlord.

This time she slipped smoothly from the recess, tucking her hair beneath
her nightdress and lifting her ankles high to avoid sharp edges. Working
the stiff hess from her legs and back, she crossed to the door.  Seen up
close, the metal plates were scored and then case hardened to form a
rigid skin of steel.  The mark of the Killhound standing high atop the
Iron Spire was stamped upon each one.

Unsettled, Ash pushed against the door.  The cool metal gave, sweeping
back beneath her palm.  Shadows and old air stole across Ash's fingers
and up along her arm.  Iss had not locked the door.  It seemed mad,
impossible. Doubt spiked in her stomach like a violent cramp.  Still she
kept pushing, forcing the door back into the corridor beyond.

Secrets lay ahead, she was sure of it.  And she had to know if those
secrets involved her.

Stepping into the shadows, she let the door fall shut behind her.  A
different kind of coldness from that present in the rotunda gripped at
her chest: dry, bitter, and weighted, as if the air were thick with
particles of freezing dust.  Ash stilled herself for a moment, giving
her eyes time to adjust to the darkness.

The east gallery was a long arcade of limestone arches roofed with
slate--she knew that because the structure formed the massive east wall
of the quadrangle--yet the shadows surrounding her gave little of that
away.  Dark gashes of open space, pale glimmering edges, and hoods of
matted stone were all she could see.  Soft warbling sounds came from
somewhere high above, and Ash guessed that pigeons had found their way
in to roost.

Hoping they were the only living things she would encounter, she began
to walk in the direction she imagined was forward.  Stone dust crunched
beneath her slippers with each step.  Icy fingers of frost tugged at her
arms and ankles.  The odor of dry decay sharpened.  Suddenly nervous,
she picked up her pace, striding into the tunneling darkness.  I can
turn back at any time, she told herself, trying to sound strong.

The gallery stretched on and on, and except for occasional chinks in
boarded-up windows where single beams of moonlight shone through, there
was no increase in light.  Ash glanced into the shadows pooled to either
side of the walkway.  What could a man see in such darkness?

She slowed.  What could he do?

Ash halted and peered into the distance.  A curving end wall black yet
planed smooth enough to reflect some measure of light, blocked the way
ahead.  Just visible against the dark stonework was the outline of a
heavily carved door. Ash recognized it instantly.  Another identical
door, locked, barred, and boarded, stood outside against the fortress
wall.  The wood had been worked in such a way to fool the eyes into
thinking that the door was already open and Robb Claw, great-grandson of
the Bastard Lord Glamis Claw, was on his way through.  The second
entrance to the Splinter.

Even as Ash tensed muscles to step toward it, the ground beneath her
feet shuddered.  Overhead beams creaked.  Dust sifted to the floor like
fine rain. Tiny hairs along her arms lifted.  Everything stilled, yet
something within the air and shadows continued to change.  Ahead the end
wall seemed to grow darker, blacker, deeper, siphoning substance from
the night.  The air temperature dropped so quickly it felt like liquid
against Ash's skin. Shadows bled.  Bearings shifted.  Everything became
somehow less than it was.

And then Ash felt it.

Something evil and wanting and broken.  Something trapped in the
darkness, drying slowly to a scaly husk.  Something nameless and full of
hate, driven by loneliness and terror and savage, blinding, unspeakable
pain.  Malice filled it, fear consumed it, need pumped like blood
through its dark, voided heart.  It wanted, wanted.  It hardly knew
what, but it wanted.  And hated. And was utterly alone.

Dread stole over Ash like deep cold.  All the organs in her chest
stopped pumping, leaving her heart hanging dead in her chest.  An
instant floated in the air like dust too fine to settle.  Ash felt as if
she were sinking in ice cold water.  She couldn't breathe, move, think.

Slowly, slowly, and at terrible cost, the nameless wanting thing turned
its mind toward Ash March.  Ash felt the great mill wheel of its
awareness pass over her, and in those seconds she came to know the full
burden of its existence.  It made her mouth go dry.

The creature reached.

It wasn't there, wasn't beside, above, or beneath her.  But it reached.

Ash shrank back.  She sucked in breath, turned on her heel and ran.

Fists beatingair, hair streaming loose, moleskin slippers smacking
against stone.  Ash raced along the east gallery, back toward the iron
door.  Walls, arches, and openings blurred into a single streak.  Ash's
heart beat in her throat.  When she came upon the iron-plated door, she
blasted through it like a bear through sheet ice.  The rotunda corridor
was warm and full of light. The torch she had extinguished had been
relit and burned with a crackling yellow flame.  Part of her wanted to
rip it from the wall and throw it into the darkness beyond the door and
burn whatever lived there.

The desire to flee was greater.  Not stopping to watch the door swing
shut behind her, or check if anyone was coming, Ash dashed along the
rotunda toward the stairs.  Limestone walls that earlier had felt as
cold as gravestones now seemed as warm as sun-baked clay.  Ash shook her
head as she took the stairs two and three at a time.  She had been a
fool.  A fool. Everyone knew there was no such thingas good secrets. She
should have kept away, not looked, not dared.  Even if she had gone to
her foster father's private chambers instead of heading for the
Splinter, the story would have been the same.  She wasn't really going
to find some magical slip of paper that told of how she was more than
just a foundling, how Penthero Iss had robbed and tricked her real
parents into giving her up.  There were no good secrets.  And she was a
fool for believing otherwise.

Ash let out a hysterical sob.

She was Ash March, Foundling, left outside Vaingate to die.  Tears stung
her eyes as she climbed the last stairs to her chamber. She didn't want
to think about the nameless creature in the Splinter, didn't want to
know what it was.

"What have we here?"  Ash rounded the final turn in the staircase and
came face-to-face with Marafice Eye.  The Knife moved directly into her
path, preventing her from takinganother step.  The bow curve of his
chest forced her to edge back.  Marafice Eye had small eyes and a small
mouth and hands as big as dogs.  Ash was scared of his hands.

She had seen him break iron chains with them.

"Where have you been?  Sick of pissing in a pot?  Thought you might get
up and use the jacks instead?"

Ash made no reply.  Marafice Eye liked to use obscenities around women.
He took pleasure in it.

Holding her gaze down, refusing to meet his eyes, Ash stepped to the
side, meaning to pass the Knife.  She didn't want him to know she was
upset.

Marafice Eye stepped with her, barring her way once more.  The block of
purple flesh that formed the Knife's left fist swung up to Ash's chin.
The fist barely touched flesh, grazing the underside of her jaw with a
knuckle the size of a bird's skull, yet it was enough to make Ash look
up.

The Knife's lips twisted into a smile.

"What's upset our little girly, then?  Did she see something she wasn't
supposed to, or did the frost just bite?"

"Leave me alone!"  Ash exploded forward, pushingagainst Marafice Eye's
chest with all that was in her.  The Knife barely swayed.  His oxblood
leather tunic creaked as he leaned forward to absorb the blow.  Ash fell
back on her heels, jolted and off balance as if she had walked straight
into a door.

Smile twisting to its narrow limits, the Knife resettled his fist under
Ash's jawline, pushing his knuckles into the soft hollow where her neck
and jaw met.

"I've killed women for less," he said, small eyes glinting.

"What makes you so sure I wouldn't kill you?"

Ash's legs felt like straw sticks.  She could feel the nameless
creature's presence like greasy residue against her skin.  Her chest was
shaking with exhaustion, and despite running through the fortress at
full speed, she felt as cold as if she had been standing still.

Raising her head clear of Marafice Eye's fist, she took a deep breath
and said,

"Iss set you to watch, not touch me.  Now step aside and leave me be,
and perhaps, just perhaps, come tomorrow I won't tell him how easy it
was to slip through your guard."

The Knife's eyes narrowed to two dark slits.  The slabs of flesh on his
face stiffened.  He looked at Ash, breathed on Ash, and then, in his own
good time, stood aside and let her pass.

Ash felt malice on her back for the second time that night as she
climbed the last three steps and took the short walk back to her
chamber.  Marafice Eye watched her all the way.  As her hand reached for
the chamber door, he spoke.

"Push me again, Asarhia March, and you will end up dead."

Ash closed her eyes, shutting out the words.  Her knees buckled and she
had to lean into the door to stop herself from falling.  Although she
didn't look around, she knew Marafice Eye had seen her collapse.

She hated him for it.

With all the strength she could muster, she pushed against the door.

It opened and she half staggered, half fell, into her chamber.  Even
though she could barely stand, the first thing she did was pull the
chair from her dresser and jam it against the door.  It wasn't enough.

Ash looked wildly around the room.  Settling on her cedar- wood clothes
chest, she dragged it from its warm, dry place by the charcoal brazier
and set it in place next to the chair.  That done, she picked up her
three-legged night stool and added that to the pile.  Still not
satisfied, she went to work on the dresser itself, shoulderingand then
kicking the wood until it slid along the floor.  She moved slowly,
methodically, dazed with exhaustion, piling things high against the
fossil wood door.

CHAPTER FIVE.

Homecomiru leet fell in gray sheets as they entered the clan hold

Raif I hated sleet--rather rain or snow or hailstones.  Something that
knew what it was.

It was bitterly cold.  Not freezing, but the wind made it seem so,
blowingand switching, making it impossible to feel warm.  Everything in
sight was gray. The old growth forest in the Wedge, the pines on top of
Pikes Peak, the stream that led into Cold Lake, and Mad Binny's crannog
that was built on stilts over the water's edge: all as gray as slate.
Raif kicked at a sod of dirt and grass.  A sense of wrongness itched at
his gut.

Drey jabbed his arm.

"Smoke.  Over there."

Raif looked where his brother pointed.  Ragged gusts of smoke blew above
the line of oaks and basswoods that spread across the rise.

Seeing them made muscles in Raifs throat tighten.  The roundhouse lay in
the valley beyond.  Home was nearer than he thought.

"Be there soon."  Drey made a point of moving into Raifs line of view as
he spoke.  Both of them had their fox hoods pulled close around their
faces, and unless they faced each other head-on, they couldn't see each
other's eyes. Sleet hung in Drey's eyelashes and the bristles of his
six-day beard.

"Be there soon," he repeated.

"Warm fire, warm food.  Home."

Raif knew Drey wanted him to say something, to reminisce out loud about
sleeping around the Great Hearth, or sitting at table and eating Anwyn
Bird's fine mint-wrapped lamb and roasted onions, or standing beside the
guide stone and singing to the Stone Gods.  Yet words wouldn't come.
Raif tried, but they wouldn't.

After a moment Drey moved ahead, shoulders stiffening beneath his
oilskins, gloved hands runningalong his elk hide pack to brush off
sleet.  Raif knew he was disappointed.

"Drey."

"What?"

Raif took a breath.  It suddenly seemed important to say something, now,
before they reached the roundhouse.  Only he wasn't sure what, or why.

"The raid."

"What of it?"  Drey didn't look up.  Thick tufts of grass hid ankle
breaking boulders, bog holes, and snags of long-gone trees, and Drey
suddenly seemed engrossed in choosing his steps.

"We can't say who attacked the camp."  Raif struggled for the right
words.

"We just need to be ... careful, that's all.  You and me.

Careful.  " The wind picked up as he spoke, howling through the trees on
the slope, thrashing grass flat against the earth and driving sleet into
their faces.  Raif shivered.  He glanced at Drey.  His brother's hood
now pointed ahead.  After a moment Drey pushed it back, exposing his
face.  He stopped in his tracks.

"There's Corbie Meese.

Up on the rise, by the old black oak.  "

A muscle in Raifs stomach pulled with a soft, sickening twist.  Hadn't
Drey heard what he said?  Raif opened his mouth to speak again, but
Drey's arm came up and he began shouting.

"Corbie!  Corbie!  Over here!"

Raif pushed back his own hood and ran his hand through his hair.  He
watched as the gray figure on the slope raised a hand in acknowledgment,
then slipped back a few paces and trotted his horse into view.  It was
Corbie Meese all right.  Even from this distance his stocky ham merman
body with its disproportionately muscular arms and neck was clearly
identifiable.  Even the slight flattening on the left side of his head
above his ear, where a training hammer had clipped his skull when he was
just a boy, showed up against the light gray sky.  Corbie's hammer was
strapped to his back, as always.  Raif noticed that its iron head
reflected no light as Corbie swung up to mount his horse.  Which meant
the normally smooth metal had been laid upon an anvil and chisel scored.

"He's riding back," Drey said.  After a moment he spoke again, his voice
soft.

"He must be meaning to gather the clan."

Raif sucked in breath.  A ham merman scored his hammer only in times of
war. Smooth metal reflected light and could give away a position, plus a
glancing blow with smooth metal was just that--a glancing blow--but with
metal raised in jagged ridges a glancing blow could tear the skin from a
man's face.

Raifs hand came up to his neck to search for the reassuring smoothness
of his raven lore.  Clan preparing for war?  Had they already received
word of the raid?

Five days he and Drey had been traveling on foot.  Five days of freezing
nights, bitterly cold days, and driving winds.  Raif was tired beyond
knowing.  He couldn't recall the last time he had felt warm or
completely dry.  They had run out of ale on the second day, and Raifs
lips were cracked from sucking on ice.  It was only yesterday morning,
when they'd finally crossed over the balds and into the clan holds that
the temperature had begun to rise above freezing.  Yet that was when the
sleet started, so there was little reward for leaving the badlands
behind.

Through it all Raif had felt a deep sense of unease.  Freshly broken
twigs, sap frozen around the break, hoofprints stamped in hoar frost and
broken ice over melt ponds kept catching his eye.  Elks and bears could
break surface ice and twigs, he told himself, and lone hunters from Clan
Orri often used Blackhail's hunting paths.  Yet Raif felt no better for
telling himself such things.  They sounded reasonable, but they didn't
stick.

"Come on, Raif.  Race you to the rise."  Drey grabbed Raifs arm and
yanked it hard as he ran ahead.  Raif grinned.  Not wanting to
disappoint his brother again, he tore after him, crashing through
tangles of ground birch and alder, his pack slammingagainst his side as
he ran.

Drey was the stronger runner, and even sweeping in wide arcs and topping
every rock and fallen log he encountered, he reached the slope well
before Raif.

Climbing halfway to the rise, Drey turned, grinned, and waited for his
brother to catch up.  Raif was breathless by the time he reached him.
Blisters on his heels rubbed raw by days of walking throbbed like burned
skin.  Raif found comfort in the fact that Drey was clearly favoring his
right foot, and his face was as red as beet water.

"We're home, Raif," Drey said, punching Raifs pack.

"Home!"  Raif swung a punch at Drey's ribs, then took off at full speed
toward the rise.  Drey yelled after him to wait, called him a devil's
cur and a moose stag in rut, and then started running himself. Laughing,
whooping, and wrestling, the two brothers reached the rise.  They
stopped dead when they saw the meet party riding up the leeward slope
toward them.

Corbie Meese, Shor Gormalin, Orwin Shank and his two middle sons.  Will
Hawk, Ballic the Red, a dozen year men and tied clansmen, Raina
Blackhail, Merritt Ganlow, and the clan guide Inigar Stoop.  All
including the women and Inigar Stoop were heavily armed.  Spears
bristled in their couchings, and great swords hammers, and more than a
few war axes weighed across backs.  Ballic the Red's great yew longbow
was braced and ready in its case, his side quiver fat with the red
arrows that gave him his name.  Shor Gormalin carried only a short sword
It was all the soft-spoken swordsman ever needed.  Then, as Raif and
Drey stood on the ridge, side by side, breathless, their exposed faces
cooling in the sleety air, the troop of two dozen parted and through
their midst, wearing a cloak made of black wolf fur that rippled in the
wind like a living, breathing thing, rode Mace Blackhail high atop Dagro
Blackhail's blue roan.

Drey gasped.

Raif looked hard into Mace Blackhail's face.  And didn't stop looking
until Mace met his eyes,

"Traitor."

The word brought the meet party to a halt.

At his side, Raif heard Drey inhale sharply.

Mace Blackhail didn't blink.  Bringing up a hand gloved in the finest
lamb's leather and dyed three times until it was the perfect shade of
black, he made a settling motion to those behind him.  He held Raifs
gaze for a time, sleet collecting in his oiled braids and sliding down
his narrow nose and cheeks.  When he spoke it was to Drey.

"Where were you when the attack came?"

Drey straightened his shoulders.

"Raifand I were out at the lick, shooting hares."

"Where were you?"  The hardness of Raifs voice caused some in the party
to draw breath.  Raif hardly cared.  Mace Blackball was standing before
him, mounted on Dagro Blackhail's horse, unharmed, well fed, and acting
like lord of the clan.  Raif's lore burned like a hot coal around his
neck.  While he and Drey had stayed at the camp taking care of the dead,
Mace Blackhail had ridden back to the roundhouse in haste.  It was the
blue roan that had stamped its hooves in mud and hoar frost and broken
ice in newly set ponds, not some daring Maimed Raider or a lone Orrlsman
tracking game.

"I," Mace Blackhail said, his voice equally as hard as Raifs, "was
seeing off a bear at Old Hoopers Lake.  The beast broke bounds at first
light, spooked the horses.  Killed two dogs.  I headed it off, chased it
east along the rush, and speared its neck.  Just as I was set to finish
the kill, I heard sounds of fighting from the west.  I rode back to the
camp at full gallop, but it was too late.  The last of the Clan Bludd
raiders were already ridingaway."

As he spoke the last sentence, Mace looked down and touched the pouch
containing ground guide stone that hung from one of the many leather
belts around his waist.  Others in the party did likewise.  After a
moment Drey did the same.  The muscles in his throat worked a moment,
and then he repeated softly,

"Clan Bludd?"

Mace nodded.  His wolf cloak gleamed like oil floating on the surface of
a lake.

"I saw the last of them.  Caught sight of their spiked hammers and the
red felt laid over their horses' docks."  Ballic the Red shook his head
gently, his callused archer's hands caressing the red-tailed hawk
fletchings on his arrows.

"Tis a bad thing for a clansman to do: make raid on another's camp at
first light."  Corbie Meese, Will Hawk, and others grunted in agreement.

Raif spoke up to silence them.

"The raid didn't take place at first light.  It happened at noon.  I
didn't feel anything until- " Raif felt Drey's fist hit the small of his
back.  Not an all-out punch, but enough to knock some wind from his
lungs.

"We don't know when the raid took place, Raif," Drey said over loudly
clearly unhappy at having to speak out.

"You got a bad notion in the pit of your stomach at noon, but who's to
say the raid didn't happen before then?"

"But, Drey" -- "Raif!"

In all his life Raif had never heard Drey speak his name with such
harshness. Raif pressed his lips to a line.  Heat flared in his cheeks.

"Drey."  Raina Blackhail trotted her filly forward, coming to a halt a
few paces ahead of her foster son, Mace.  White smoke streamed from the
filly's nostrils.

"What did you see when you came upon the campsite?"

Raif watched Raina's face as he waited for his brother to reply.

Raina Blackhail's gray eyes gave little away.  Dagro Blackhail's first
wife, Norala, had died of lump fever, and Raina was his second wife,
taken in the hope that she would provide the clan chief with a son to
carry his name. After the second year of marriage, when Raina's belly
had failed to quicken, Dagro Blackhail had reluctantly taken a foster
son, a child of his sister's from Clan Scarpe.  Mace had been eleven
when he was brought to the Blackhail roundhouse, just eight years
younger than his foster mother, Raina.

Drey glanced at Raif before he answered Raina's question.

"We reached the camp about an hour before dark.  We saw the dogs first,
then Jorry Shank .  .  ."  Drey hesitated.  Orwin Shank, Jorry's father,
leaned forward in his saddle, his normally ruddy face as pale as if it
were covered by a sheet of rime ice.

"I don't know how long he'd been there, lying in the scrub, but he was
part frozen.  And there wasn't a lot of blood."

Mace Blackhail kicked the roan's flank, then quickly pulled the reins,
causing the gelding to stamp its feet and shake its head.

"It's just as I said," he cried, easily controlling the agitated roan.

"The Bluddsmen are arming themselves with hell-forged swords.  They slip
into a man's gut as smooth as a spoon scooping bacon fat, then burn his
insides hot and fast, roasting his flesh around the blade."

Merritt Ganlow swayed in her saddle.  White-haired Inigar Stoop leaned
over and steadied her, his pouches, horns, and slices of bone tinkling
like shells as he moved.

Raina Blackhail shot a warning glance to her foster son.

"Drey hasn't finished yet."

Drey shifted his weight.  He wasn't comfortable being the center of
attention.

"Well... I don't know about hell-forged blades.  I didn't see any signs
of burned flesh .  .."

"Go on."  Raina Blackhail's voice, while not gentle, was no longer as
severe as it had been.

"Raif and I went around the camp.  We tended the bodies: Meth Ganlow,
Halfmast--I mean Darri--Mallon Clayhorn, Chad ... all the others."

Drey swallowed hard.  Raif saw where his brother had gripped his oilskin
so tight, the hide had split along the seam.

"All the wounds looked the same: clean, not much blood, swiftly done.
Broadswords or great swords looked to have been used."

 "It's as Mace says," murmured Ballic the Red.

"Clan Bludd."  Many in the party nodded and murmured, "Aye."

Noticing that Raina Blackhail was one of the few who remained silent,
Raif spoke up, addressing his words to her alone.

"Clan Bludd aren't the only ones who use great swords Clan Dhoone, Clan
Croser, Clan Gnash" --Raif stopped himself from naming Clan Scarpe, Mace
Blackhail's birth clan"--Maimed Men: All use swords as their second
weapons."

Mace Blackhail kicked the roan forward, coming to rest mere paces in
front of Raif.

"I said I saw Bluddsmen fleeing from the camp.  Are you calling me a
liar, Sevrance?"

Out of the corner of his eye, Raif saw Drey's hand come up, meaning to
pull him back.  Raif stepped away, out of his brother's reach.  He would
not be silenced in this.  Gaze fixed firmly on Mace Blackhail's narrow,
gray-skinned face, Raif said,

"Drey and I saw to our clansmen.  We didn't leave them out on the tundra
for the carrion beasts to take them.  We gave them blood rites, drew a
guide circle around them.  Paid them due respect.

What I am saying is that perhaps you were in too much of a hurry to get
back to the roundhouse to pay retreating raiders fair due.  " Drey
swore, softly to himself.

Everyone in the meet party had some reaction.  Ballic the Red snorted,
Merritt Ganlow let out a high, wailing cry, Corbie Meese sucked air
between his wind-cracked lips, and the color returned to Orwin Shank's
face as quickly as if he had been sprayed with paint.  Shor Gormalin
moved his head in what might have been a nod of agreement.

Raina Blackhail, almost as if she were afraid of showingany reaction,
raised a gloved hand to her shoulders and pulled up her sable hood.

Even though he was aware it was ridiculous to think of such a thingat
such a time, Raif couldn't help but be struck by Raina Blackhail's
beauty.  She wasn't pretty, not in the way that young girls like Lansa
and Hailly Tanner were, but a kind of clear strength shone in her eyes
that made everyone who saw her look twice.  Raif wondered if she would
ever marry again.

Mace Blackhail waited until everyone was quiet before he spoke his
reply. His eyes were as hard and bloody as frozen meat.  A small
movement sent his wolf fur ripplingand served to expose the sword at his
thigh.  Ignoring Raif completely, he turned to face the meet party.

"I won't deny that I rode back as fast as I could--the boy has the truth
of it there."  Mace paused, allowinga moment for the slight emphasis he
had placed on the word boy to sink in.

"I wasn't thinking of the dead, I admit that.  And I look back now and
I'm ashamed of what I did.  But when I saw my father's body lying on the
ground near the posts, his eyes frosting over even as I looked, all I
could think of were the people at home.  The Bluddsmen were heading
east, yet what if they turned at the Muzzle and headed south instead?
What if, whilst I stood deciding whether to pull my father's body from
the cold or hold blood rites where it lay, a second, greater party
descended on the roundhouse itself? What if I returned to find that the
same thing that had happened to my father and his camp had happened here
in the Heart of Clan?"

Mace Blackball met the eyes of all who counted one by one.  No one
spoke, but some of the year men including Orwin Shank's two middle sons,
shifted restlessly in their saddles.

Sleet flew into the faces of the meet party, meltingagainst the hot,
flushed skins of Orwin Shank and his sons, Ballic the Red, Corbie Meese,
and Merritt Ganlow, while clingingand staying partially frozen against
the paler skins of Shor Gormalin, Raina Blackhail, and Will Hawk.  All
sleet that fell on Mace Blackball turned to ice.

Finally, after he had forced many in the meet party to look away, Mace
Blackhail spoke again.

"I am sorry for what I did, but I would not change it.  I believe my
father would have done the same.  It was a choice between the living and
the dead, and everyone here who knew and loved Dagro Blackhail must
allow that his first thoughts would have been for his wife and his
clan."

Ballic the Red nodded.  Others followed.  The tendons to either side of
Corbie Meese's powerful ham merman neck strained against his skin, and
after a moment he looked down and murmured,

"That's the truth of it."  Raina Blackhail edged her filly round, so
that her face was not visible to anyone in the party, including her
foster son.  Raif stood at Mace's back.  The bristlinganger he had felt
at being called a boy was now mixed with something else: a kind of
slow-setting fear.  Mace Blackhail was going to get away with it.  Raif
could see it on the faces of the meet party.  Even Shor Gormalin, who
never rushed to judgment on anythingand was as careful about all
decisions he made as he was with his blade around children, was nodding
along with the rest.  Didn't he see? Didn't he realize?  And then there
was Drey.  Raif glanced over his shoulder, where Drey stood only a pace
behind him, a handful of Raif s oilskin twisting in his fist.  If Raif
meant to move forward to speak, Drey meant to pull him back.

"Dagro's body," Raif hissed for Drey's ears alone.

"It wasn't"

"What's that you say, boy?  " Mace Blackhail spun the roan around.

Brass bow and hammer hooks jangled like bells.

"Speak up.  We are all clan here.  What you say to one you must say to
all."

Anger made Raif slam his elbow into Drey's fist to free himself from his
brother's hold.  Blood pumped into his temples as he spoke.

"I

said that Dagro Blackhail didn't fall by the posts.  We found him by the
rack.  He was butchering the black bear carcass when he was taken.  "

Mace Blackhail's eyes darkened.  His lips curled, and for half an
instant Raif thought he was about to smile.  Then just as quickly he
wheeled back to face the meet party, stoppingall hushed mutterings dead.

"I moved the body from the posts to the drying rack.  I didn't want to
leave my father outside the tent circle, exposed.  It may have been
foolish, but I wanted to him close to the fire."

"But the bear's blood" -- Drey grabbed Raifs wrist with such force that
bones cracked.

"Enough, Raif.  You're hounding the wrong person.  It's the Dog Lord and
his clan that we should be attacking.  We both saw the grooved
hoofprints made by the Bluddsmen, you can't deny that.  What else didn't
we see?

In our way we acted just like Mace--doing things foolishly without
thinking. We weren't there, remember.  We weren't there.  While we crept
away in the dark to shoot ice hares, Mace was standing dogwatch over the
camp.  We can't blame him for slipping bounds to see off a bear.  Either
one of us would have done the same.  "

Releasing his hold on Raif's wrist, Drey turned and faced his brother
full on.  Although his expression was tense, there was an unmistakable
appeal in his eyes.

"Mace did the right thing coming back, Raif.  He acted like clan, doing
what any experienced clansman would have done.

We acted like"--Drey hesitated, searching for the right words" --two
brothers who had just lost their da.  "

Raif looked down, away from his brother's gaze and the sharp looks of
the meet party.  Drey had just won himself a lot of respect in the eyes
of the clan; Raif saw it in their eyes as they listened to him speak.
Drey was the voice of reason, humbling himself, speaking with the same
weighted reluctance that his father had before him.  Raif swallowed, his
throat suddenly sore.  For a moment it had been just like listening to
Tern.

Glancing up, Raif saw Mace Blackhail watching him.  His face was fixed
in lines of concern, in keeping with the new mood Drey had set, in
keepingalso with rest of the meet party, who waited quietly, gravely, to
see what Drey Sevrance's troublesome younger brother would do.  Raif's
gaze descended from Mace Blackhail's face to his gloved hands, which
flicked at the roan's mane with all the satisfaction of a wolf switching
its tail.  Drey had done his work for him.

Mace Blackhail's gaze met Raifs, and in that instant Raif knew he was
dealing with something worse than a craven.  Mace Black- hail had ridden
to the badlands on a stocky, fat-necked cob, one of twenty dozen other
year men a fosterling from another, lesser clan.  Now he sat on his
foster father's blue smoke roan, wearing a wolf cloak that reflected
only rich shades of black, speaking with a newly modulated voice and
manner, and adopting the clan chiefs authority along with his clothes
and his horse.

Raif massaged his wrist where Drey had gripped it.  It wasn't even worth
asking how Mace had come to ride home upon his foster father's gelding.
Mace Blackhail wasn't going to be caught out this late in the game.

"Raif."

Drey's voice brought Raif back to the meet.  Looking into his brother's
face, Raif saw how tired his brother looked.  It had been a long six
days for both of them, yet it was Drey who had carried a greater portion
of the weight on the journey back, Drey who had spent an extra hour each
night stripping logs down to the heartwood so the fire wouldn't burn out
while they slept.

"You two lads need to come inside."  It was Shor Gormalin, speaking in
his soft burr.  The small, fair-haired man, whose quiet ways disguised
the fiercest swordsman in the clan, looked from Drey to Raif as he
spoke.

"You've walked a long way, and had a hard journey, and seen things that
none here would wish to see.  And no matter what was the right and wrong
of what you did, you stayed and saw to our dead.  For that alone we owe
you more than any here can repay."

Shor paused.  Everyone in the meet party either nodded or murmured,
"Aye."  A muffled sob escaped from Merritt Ganlow's lips.

"So come wi' me now.  Let Inigar grind some guide stone for your tines,
and let us warm you and feed you and welcome you home.  You are clan,
and you are needed, and you must tell us of our kin."

The swordsman's words had a profound effect on the faces of the meet
party. Orwin Shank closed his eyes and held a fist to his heart.

Seeing their father's actions, the two Shank year men did likewise.

Other year men followed, and within seconds the entire meet party sat
high on their saddles, eyes closed or cast down, paying due respect to
those who were dead.  Raina Blackhail trotted her horse over to Shor
Gormalin's side and laid her hand on the swordsman's arm.  Out of the
corner of his eye, Raif saw Mace Blackhail look up and take note of the
contact.  His eyes caught and reflected a thin break of sunlight, and
for an instant they shone yellow like a wolfs.  Forcingaside his unease,
Raif stepped toward his brother.  Drey was waiting for him and brought
up his arm straightaway, wrapping it around Raifs shoulder.

He didn't speak, and Raif was glad of it.  There was little choice here:
Raif loved his brother and respected Shor Gormalin too much to hold out
against them.

Shor Gormalin vaulted from his horse with the speed and agility that
never failed to surprise Raif, even though he had seen the swordsman do
so many times before.  A moment later Corbie Meese also dismounted, and
the two clansmen came forward, offering Drey and Raif their mounts. Mace
Blackhail trotted his horse down the slope, positioning himself to be
head rider when the meet party turned for home.  Shor Gormalin's blue
eyes looked straight at Raif as he handed him his reins.

"Tis a good thing you did, lad, you and your brother.  We are Blackhail,
the first of all clans.  We must be and act as one in this."

Raif took the reins.  Although he didn't say it outright, Shor Gormalin
spoke of war.

The party of twenty-six rode in single and double file down the slope
toward the roundhouse.  As the wind had turned and quickened, they were
forced to ride through the roundhouse's smoke.  Raif didn't mind. The
smoke was warm and smelled of good, honest things like resinous wood,
charred mutton, and shale oil.  The darkness it created hid his face.

Below lay the roundhouse.  Home.  Raif remembered how it had felt to see
it in the past.  His mood blackened.

From above, the roundhouse looked like a massive island of gray white
stone set in a frozen sea.  Sunk a hundred feet deep into the ground to
protect from the fierce winds, blinding snows, and crippling frosts of
winter, the stronghold was invisible from outside but for the upper
quarter of its curtain wall and its heavily barricaded stone roof.
Windows cut tall to let in light, yet kept narrow enough so that no man
could ever force his way through them, were set into the stonework like
slits.  Over the years mud and dirt had built up around the base,
moundingagainst the outer wall, burying even more of the roundhouse
beneath the earth.  Every autumn Long- head and his crew spent two weeks
diggingaway the excess dirt.  It took them a whole day just to root out
rogue saplings that had seeded on the roof.  Some clans let the dirt
build so high around their roundhouses that eventually even the roof
grew over, and plants and grasses hooked their roots into the stone.
Clan Bannen's roundhouse didn't even look like a building from the
outside, just a perfectly formed hill.  That wasn't Blackhail's way.  We
protect ourselves against the cold and our enemies, but would sooner
face death than hide.  Raif had heard those words and others like them
said a thousand times. Every clansman repeated them, and what had
started out as an idle boast from one clan chief to another had become a
way of life.  Now even clan dead were left out in the open.  Laid in
hollowed-out basswoods in clear sight of wagon trails, passes, and
streams, Blackball corpses scorned hiding until the very last.

Raif shook his head violently.  He had seen the bodies.  Sulfur and
other washes kept the feeders away for only so long. After a good
rainfall or a hard frost the ravens always came.

"Raif."

Raina Blackhail's voice snapped Raif back.  He watched as she turned her
smart chestnut filly on a hairpin and rode along the ranks toward him.
The fur other hood and cloak gleamed like sealskin.  In the few minutes
they had been riding, the temperature had dropped and the sleet was
turning grainy like snow.  Raina's breath purled white as she rode.

Raif watched as others made way to let her pass.  Even though her
husband was now dead, Raina retained her standing in the clan.  Dagro
Blackhail's wealth and respect were her due.  A new clan chief would
have to be chosen, and although Raif knew Mace Blackhail would try to
take his foster father's place, he also knew that if Raina decided to
marry again, the man she chose as her husband had a good chance of
becoming chief.  Raina's decisions were always well heeded.  Whenever
Dagro Blackhail was away from the roundhouse and problems arose that
needed handling, the clan would look to his wife.

"Raina knows her husband's mind," they would say, meaning they trusted
her judgment completely.  Breech births, bad omens, blood rites, wife
heatings, drunken brawls, border and damming disputes, cattle raids, and
matters of clan pride: Raina Blackhail had seen to them all.

AndEffie.  Raif took a deep breath and held it in.  Raina Blackhail had
been as good as a mother to Effie.

"Days are failing," Raina said, glancingat the sky as she fell in by
RaiPs side.

"Soon there'll be scarce enough light to aim an arrow by."  She smiled
briefly.

"But then again Tern was telling me just before he left how you could
find a target in the dark."  That made him turn and pay her heed.

Raina Blackhail didn't permit herself a second smile.

"It wasn't your fault, you know.  Yours or Drey's.  Just about every man
in this clan has slipped bounds at some time or other to run off and
shoot game at the lick."

Raif wound his reins around his fist.

"Is that what you came here to say?"  As he spoke he spied Mace
Blackhail at the head of the party, pointing to the far pasture and
saying something to Will Hawk and Ballic the Red that caused both
clansmen to nod in agreement.  Raif drew the reins tighter, stopping the
blood from flowing to his fingers.

The small display of Mace Blackhail's authority did not go unnoticed by
Raina.  She made a minute movement with her shoulders, squaring them and
causing her sable cloak to resettle on the dock of her filly.

"I came here to talk about Effie.  You must be gentle with her, Raif.
She's such a quiet child.  It's hard to tell what she's thinking."

"What has she been told?"

Raina hesitated.

"Mace spoke to her before I had chance to.  He told her that you and
Drey had died along with her da."

Raif exhaled with a soft hiss.

"How did she take it?"

"Not well.  She seemed .  .  ."  Raina shook her head, searched for the
right word.

"Angry.  She ran away, and for the longest time no one could find her.
We tore the roundhouse apart looking.  Corbie Meese and Longhead
arranged a search party.  Letty and the girls lit torches and walked the
length of the graze.  Orwin Shank's two eldest rode as far as the Wedge.
It was Shor Gormalin who found her in the end--tucked in the corner of
the little dog cote, stiff with cold and covered in dirt.  Had that
blessed stone others in her hand.  Rocking back and forth with it, she
was.  Made herself so sick she could barely stand."  Raina clicked her
tongue.

"How she managed not to get eaten by those wolfhounds the Shanks keep,
I'll never know.  Orwin feeds them but twice a week, I swear."

Relaxing his grip on his reins, Raif guided Shor Gormalin's gelding
around a bank of loose shale.  His own anger suddenly didn't seem
important anymore.

"How's she been since?"

"Well, that's what I came to warn you about.  She's lost a bit of
weight. And she keeps so much to herself.  .  ."  Raina's words trailed
away as a small figure stepped out from the roundhouse below.  As Raif
and Raina trotted their horses down into the valley, and Mace Blackhail
and his lead riders drew close to the roundhouse, the figure took
hesitant, child-size steps forward.  It was Effie.  Her dark auburn hair
gave her away.  Raif leaned forward in his saddle.  She was so thin.

"Just you be careful with her, Raif Sevrance," Raina Blackhail said,
kicking her horse forward.

"You and Drey are all she has."  Raif barely acknowledged what Raina
said. He glanced two riders ahead, where Drey was ridingat Orwin Shank's
side. Drey looked back.  His fox hood was up again, and the sky was
nearly black, but the expression on his face was clear.  What has
happened to Effie? Feeling a stab of unease in his chest, Raif kicked
Shor Gormalin's gelding into a canter and raced along the file.  Drey
came seconds behind.  The beaten clay court outside the roundhouse great
door was filling rapidly with people.  Some carried pitch-soaked
torches, others smoking racks of charred mutton and spits of rabbits
roasted in their skins.  A few brought feed and blankets for the horses.
One figure, Anwyn Bird by the looks of her round belly, rolled a keg of
hearth warmed beer before her that belched steam into the freezing air.

Effie stood ahead of everyone, her shoulders hunched together,
shiveringand clutching her blue woolen dress.  No one had thought to
throw a cloak over her shoulders or push mitts on her hands.  As Raif
approached, he saw where his sister's cheeks had sunk away, leaving
little pits beneath her eyes and around her jaw.  His heart ached to see
them.

He slid from his horse and ran to her.  Effie took a small step forward.
Her grave little face was turned up toward his, and after a moment she
held out her arms and waited to be taken.  Raif scooped her up and
brought her to his chest.  Pushing her body against his, he drew her
within the folds of his oilskin to protect her from the cold.  She was
so light.  It was like picking up a blanket stuffed with straw.  Raif
hugged her harder, wanting to give her his heat and his strength.

Then Drey was there, and Effie shifted in RaiFs arms and Raif released
her to his brother.  Drey's big arms enveloped Effie completely, and his
head came down to hers, and he kissed her hair and her temples and the
bridge of her nose.

"It's all right, little one.  We're back now.  Raifand I are back."
Effie snuggled against Drey's chest.

"I knew," she said quietly, seriously, glancing from Drey to Raif, then
over to Mace Blackball, who was busy hefting the saddle from the roan.

"He said you were dead, but I knew it wasn't so."

CHAPTER SIX.

The Inverted Spire Ash March twisted the sheets around herself as she
turned in her sleep.  Linen spun so smoothly by the old women of Maker's
Isle that it felt as cool as glass rode up between her thighs, wound
around her belly, and coiled about her wrists.

Ash dreamed she was enclosed within a womb of ice.  Blue white light
shone on her arms and legs, making them gleam like smooth metal.  The
ice wall was slick where she had touched it, skin warmed and dripping.

Ice squeaked and cracked as she moved.  Frost fumes filled her mouth
like milk.

If she could just push further, deeper.

Something shifted.  The massive lode of ice above her juddered, and
freezing splinters rained on her face and chest.  Spiky and hard as
needles, they punctured the skin on her arms and her breasts, drawing
tiny drops of blood. Even as Ash brushed away the splinters, the ice
ceiling dropped.  A blizzard of cold air pumped against her face, and
then the ice ceiling slammed into her chest.  Ice shattered against her
skin with a crack of white light, and a spume of sleet and smoke filled
the air.

Ash screamed.

Suddenly there was nothing below her, and she fell and fell and fell.

Voices whispered to her, coaxed and pleaded like starving men.  Reach,
mistressss.  So cold here, so dark.  Reach.

Ash shook her head.  She tried to move, but her body was numb.  Frozen.

No longer falling, she stood in the center of a cavern of black ice.

All was dark except for the glimmer of smoothly frozen things.  Even the
breath that steamed from the walls was dark and dense, like smoke from a
poorly aired fire.  Fear gnawed at the edges of Ash's thoughts.

When she breathed she took in the smell of cold things.  She was not
alone. Something within the cavern stirred.  It made no move toward her,
but it shifted its weight so that its presence would be known.

We have waited such a long time, mistressss: a thousand years in our
chains of blood.  Dare you make us wait a thousand more?  Ash felt her
knees buckle. The voice pulled.

In the distance, beyond where she could see, beyond even the walls of
the cave, creatures with muzzles howled.  Shadows flickered upon the
surface of the ice, man shapes and beasts and demon horses.  And then
suddenly there was no ice at all, just darkness that stretched toward a
place where Ash knew in the deepest depths of her soul that she did not
want to be.

Reach, mistressss.  Pretty mistressss.  Reach.

At her side, the bones in her wrists twisted.  Saddles of muscle in her
chest and back tensed, ready to pull weight.  Tendons strained.

Fingers uncurled, forcinga closed fist into an open hand as knuckles
cracked like wet sticks.

Reach for us.  Reach for us.  REACH.

Bones glided in their sockets as Ash's arms began to rise.  Kaaw!  A
raven's cry pierced the darkness, jolting Ash's body like a needle in
her spine.

Her eyes sprang open.  The darkness sped away in a long blurred streak.
She was in her chamber.  The embers in the brazier glowed with a faint
orange light.  Both amber lamps were dead.  Knocking.  Ash's head spun
around toward the source of the sound.  Not the door, but the tiny
shuttered window on the opposite side of the room.  She waited.  The
noise didn't come again, but a soft tearing sound, like the flap of
wings beatingair, faded into the distance.  A bird.  Ash shuddered.  A
raven. Suddenly aware of how cold and wet the sheets were, she tugged
them from her body.  Her nightdress was soaking, so she pulled it over
her head and threw it the way of the sheets.  Freezingand naked, she ran
over to the charcoal brazier and knelt in its warm glow.  Using the
little copper tongs that were hooked at its base, she stirred the embers
within.  The oil-soaked felt had long since burned away, taking the odor
of almonds and sandalwood with it. Ash was glad.  She was in no mood to
breathe in rich and sickly scents.

Her hands shook as she replaced the tongs.  A haze of cold sweat covered
her skin, and her knees felt as shaky as if she had run up all the
stairs in the Cask without pausing to rest halfway.  With a small sigh,
she pulled at the corners of the needlepoint rug she was kneeling on,
drawing the soft green wool around her shoulders and making a little
pocket for herself in the center.  She was so tired.

All she wanted to do was sleep.

Feeling a bit better for being wrapped up, she glanced over to the door.
The empty bolt holes stood as a reminder that either Marafice Eye or
Penthero Iss could enter her chamber any time they pleased.

Not that Marafice Eye ever had, but Ash knew he was out there, sitting
on a gray meet bench, big hands testing the give of the leather bindings
on his tunic or pushingagainst the bench's armrests, bringing the entire
weight of his body to bear upon any flaws he found in the stone.  He was
always testing things to see what it took to break them.

Ash pulled the rug closer.  She had tried to avoid Marafice Eye for the
past week, ever since the night he had first blocked her way on the
steps.  The Knife didn't like to be avoided, though, and had now taken
to blocking her way whenever he safely could.  If he met Ash alone in a
corridor or on the stairs, he would step directly in front of her and
wait, forcing her to walk around him.  He never touched her, never
spoke, but his small lips would twist with pleasure and his small eyes
would look beyond her as if she weren't there at all.  Like the armrests
on the bench and the leather of his tunic, she had become yet another
thing to push to breaking.

Ash tugged a hand through her hair.  She was a foundling, alive only
because Penthero Iss had chosen to save her.  She wasn't a noblewoman
and she wasn't a servant, so where did she fit in?  Marafice Eye didn't
know; that was why he was testing her: to see just how far he could go
before Iss stopped him.

"Miss."  A soft voice whispered through the door.

"Can I enter, miss?"

Ash didn't want to see anyone.  Not now, not like this.

"Go away," she mumbled.  Disgusted by how weak her voice sounded, she
tried again.

"I'm tired, Katia.  Let me sleep."

"I've brought some hot milk and rose cakes."

So Iss had sent her.  Ash stood, allowing the rug to drop flat on the
floor.

"Wait a moment while I dress."  There was no point in sending Katia
away, not when she was under orders from Iss; the girl would just stand
outside the door all night, calling every few minutes for permission to
enter until she wore Ash down.  Penthero Iss never raised his voice,
never threatened violence, but he had a way of getting people to do
exactly as he wished.

Wrappinga fresh linen robe around her shoulders.  Ash took a few deep
breaths and tried to settle herself back to normal.  More and more these
days it was harder to remember what normal was, though.  She never felt
like herself, she was always tired and sweatingand cold.

Then there was her body .  .  .  Ash glanced down.  That definitely
wasn't normal anymore.  Breasts had come from nowhere in just two
months.

"You can come in now."  Ash stepped into the corner as she spoke.  She
didn't want Marafice Eye to see her as Katia opened the door.  Katia was
small and olive skinned, with dark eyes and dark lips and black curls
that spat out pins.  Ash could never look at the girl without feeling a
stab of envy.  Katia made her feel pale and bony and straight.
Everything of Katia's curved: her lips, her cheeks, her hips, her hair.
Ash's own hair fell as sheer as water, pale and silver blond, down past
her waist.  Ash had tried hot irons, damp rags, pins, and nightly
braiding, yet her hair would have none of it, defying her every time by
unraveling straight.

"Put the tray on the stand, Katia."

Katia jumped at the sound of Ash's voice.

"There you are, miss.  Gave me such a fright hiding behind the door."

Ash ignored Katia's statement.  The girl was always claiming fright over
something.

Having placed the copper tray on the stand, Katia moved over to the
mantel to relight the lamps.  Briefly Ash considered speaking up to stop
her, then decided against it.  Penthero Iss had doubtless given Katia
orders to take a good look at her mistress, and the fastest way to get
the whole thing over and done with was to let her go right ahead.  As
Katia refilled the lamp with the small pieces of amber that she kept in
a cloth bag around her waist.  Ash took the opportunity to smooth down
her hair and rub her face.  She wished she didn't feel so shaky.  But
there was nothing to be done about that.

"One should be enough," Ash said after the wick thrust into the
oil-and-amber mixture took the spark.

"Come here, and let's have it over and done with."

"Have what done with, miss?"

Ash smiled.  Katia was a terrible liar.

"Well, my foster father obviously sent you to check up on me, so go
right ahead and check."

She held out her arms, letting her robe fall open around her breasts.

"Should I strip naked, or will this be enough?"

Katia shook her head, black curls bouncing.

"Why, you're wicked, miss!  Plain wicked.  His Lordship never said such
a thing.  I came here to bring you a late supper out of the goodness of
my own heart, and this is what I get for my trouble!"  She nodded in the
direction of Ash s silver-banded dressing table, where an untidy stack
of books and folded manuscripts looked set to topple over.

"Been reading too much for your own good, if you ask me.  A hot supper's
just a hot supper, you know.  Nothing's attached but the skin on the
milk."

Suddenly glad Katia was there, Ash pulled her robe together.  Katia had
been with her for fourteen months now--longer than any other maid she'd
ever had--and it felt good to know someone well enough to tease them.

"I'm sorry, Katia.  But the rose cakes always give Iss away.  They're
quite tasteless, smell like old roses, and cost a small fortune to
prepare."

Katia snorted, but quietly.

"Well, if you don't want them .  .."

"Take them.   In future, if you must interrupt me in the middle of the
night, bring me fresh bread, salt butter and lots of it, and beer
instead of milk.   A dark brew, mind.   One that's thick enough to float
a spoon and has to be sieved through a cheesecloth to remove the hops."
Ash tried to keep her face straight as she spoke, but the word
cheesecloth proved too much, and she burst out laughing.

"Oh, miss!  You are wicked."

Katia's laugh was just a little too loud to be considered feminine, and
Ash loved to hear it.  Sometime.  s it was hard to remember that Katia
was a full year younger than she was.  Katia was so grownup, so .  well.
.  rounded, yet whenever she laughed she became a child again.

Abruptly, the smile slid from Ash's face.

"Katia."  "Yes, miss?"  Ash struggled to find words.

"Are you still" --seeing the servant girl's large dark eyes looking
straight into hers.  Ash hesitated, wishing she had never
started"friendly with Marafice Eye?"  Katia's expression changed.

"And if I am?

"Taint nothing to do with you."  Ash took a breath, decided not to say
any more, then went right ahead and spoke anyway.

"He's such a big and powerful man.  Like an ox.  You should be careful,
that's all."

With a forceful shake of her head, Katia said,

"What I do in my own good time is my business.  Unlike some around here,
I'm a full- grown woman, and those that aren't and hain't ever so much
as kissed a man should keep their opinions to themselves."

Blood flushed Ash's cheeks.  She didn't speak.  Stupidly, ridiculously.

she felt her eyes stinging.

After a moment Katia's expression changed right back again, and she
crossed the room and put her hand on Ash's arm.

"I'm sorry, miss.

Truly I am.  You made me speak a stock of nonsense that I surely didn't
mean. You'll come to your blood any day now, I'm certain of that.  " She
drew Ash over to the bed as she spoke.

"And as soon as that happens you'll have fine, proper dresses, a ladies'
maid to preen your hair, and suitors lining up' from Hoargate to the Red
Forge, all begging for the priv'lege of your hand."

Katia placed a hand on Ash's shoulder, gently pressing her to sit.  A
second hand flitted to her brow.

"Why, you're shaking, miss.  And hot and cold all in one."

"I'm fine, Katia, really.  Carry on telling me what will happen when my
blood comes."  Ash didn't much care for the idea of suitors lining up
from one end of the city to the other, and she knew that any ladies'
maid worth her salt would end up storming off in frustration within a
week, muttering to herself about hair that refused to take a curl.  Yet
she liked to hear about them anyway.  When Katia spoke of such things,
Ash could almost believe that everything was normal and would continue
to be normal, and that the strange, almost hungry look she saw in her
foster father's eyes when he studied her these past few months was
nothing more than a trick of the light.

Katia reached for a brush and started working on Ash's hair.

"Well, miss, let me see.  There'll be new shoes, of course, a dozen of
them: lamb's hide for day and embroidered silk and stiff lace for night.

You'll have to have a new riding habit--trimmed with black fox, no
matter what His Lordship says--and you'll need a proper lady's filly,
not that old cob Master Haysticks lets you ride around the quad.  His
Lordship might even bring in some old cloistress t'elp with your manners
and table 'port.  Though there's no need to teach you how to read and
write, His Lordship's done that himself.  .  .  "

Ash nodded, enjoying the sensation of Katia's capable hands brushing her
hair and letting her mind slip away as the little maid chattered on.

Too much had changed this last year.  There had been a time when her
foster father was different, when he sent for her each day and spent his
own time teaching her how to read and write.  Any number of priests and
scribes could have done the work for him, yet Penthero Iss had chosen to
do it himself. And it wasn't just because he liked to keep her away from
anyone who might befriend herthough Ash had recognized that
possessiveness in him early on, as time after time maidservants and
fortress children whom she became close to were routinely sent away. No.
Her foster father had genuinely enjoyed instructing her.  Knowledge was
one of his joys. "... and of course there'll be a new chamber, one with
proper isinglass windows and" -- Ash blinked back, suddenly interested
in what Katia was saying.

"A

new chamber?  "

"Why, yes, miss.  That much is certain as ice on the Splinter."

 "I don t understand.   Why?"

Katia put down her brush.  Eyes darting in quick glances as if she
suspected people could be hidingand listening, she lowered her voice and
said,

"Oh yes.  There's been talk of it already.  Just the other day when I
was... er ... visiting with the Knife in the Forge, His Lordship came in
and told him that he needs to be ready to move you on his say.

"Course when old Vealskin saw me he stopped dead, gave me one of his
looks--you know the sort, all pale and scary like a frosted-over
corpse--and sent me running out of the room without so much as a spoken
word."  Katia beamed.  She loved telling secrets.  Ash swallowed.  She
was glad she was sitting.

"Move me on his say?"

Nodding, Katia crossed to the dresser and popped one of the precious
rose cakes in her mouth.  Chewing, she spoke.

"That's what was said.

If you ask me, it'll be to one of those fancy upper chambers in the
Bight, with all the black marble and dark glass cut into the floors.

Might even have a private entrance and a staircase all your own.  "

Katia took a second rose cake, looked at it, then set it down.

"You must swear to take me with you, miss.  Wherever you go.  I couldn't
stand going back to the kitchens and scrubbing pots again.  Couldn't
stand being made to" -- "Hush, Katia."  The servant girl's chatter was
beginning to irritate Ash.

Katia's mouth closed with a squeak.  Skirts whippingair, she moved
around the chamber and began checking shutters, stirring the brazier and
making preparations for the night.

Ash barely noticed.  A move away from the Cask?  It was unthinkable.

This chamber had been her home for as long as she could remember.  Of
all the four towers in Mask Fortress, the Cask was the only one she
knew.  She had broken her arm here, climbing the outer battlements when
she was six; when she was eight she had been confined to her room for
two months because of blood fever, and her foster father had visited her
every day, bringing iced honey and yellow pears; and when she was eleven
her caged bird had grown sick in this very chamber and had started
pulling out its own flight feathers and chewing on its claws, and to
please her Iss had performed a little ceremony by the door before
sending it to Caydis for a mercy killing.  All her life was here.  All
of it.

Distressed, Ash drew her feet off the floor and hugged her knees to her
chest.  No one had mentioned a move to her.  Nothing had been planned;
no workmen or carpenters called.  Surely someone should have told her
something? She rubbed her bare shins.  The sheets beneath her feet were
damp with sweat.  Icy.

No.  Ash shook her head.  She wouldn't think about the dream.  It was
nothing.  Nothing.

Katia popped the remaining two rose cakes into her amber pouch.

"Will you be wantinganything else, miss, 'fore I go?"

"No."  Something about the sight of Katia walking toward the door made
Ash change her mind.

"I mean yes.  One more thing."

"What?"  Katia's full lips were made more so by an exaggerated pout.

"I know you're going to see my foster father now" -- Seeing Katia ready
to protest, Ash held out her hand.

"No, don't deny it.  I don't blame you.  It's what you have to do to
keep out of the kitchen.  I'd do the same if I were you."  Katia
remained sullen, yet Ash carried on.

"I don't mind you telling him that I don't feel well and don't look
well, and even that the bed is messed.  But please don't tell him that I
know he's planning to move me.  Please."

Katia looked at her mistress.  Ash knew that the servant girl was
envious of her and coveted all the clothes and pretty things in her
chamber like silver brushes and tortoiseshell combs.  Yet she also knew
that Katia could be kind when it suited her.  She had once walked all
the way to Almsgate and back to purchase a bolt and plate for the door.

Sighing with exaggerated force, Katia sent her curls dancing.

"All right.  I'll do my best--but only for my own sake, mind.  If old
Vealskin finds I've been blabbingabout things I overheard and wasn't
supposed to, he'll have me downstairs in no time.  And it won't be in
the kitchens scrubbing pots."

"Thank you, Katia."

Katia harrumphed as she stepped toward the door.

"I still have to tell him how you are, though.  There's no getting round
that.  You know how he is."

Ash nodded as she snuffed out the lamp.  She knew exactly how Iss was.

                                    T T T

The caul flies hummed within their netting, black translucent wings
beating faster than the eye could see.  Four winged, lean bodied, and
with the long, double-jointed legs of flesh settlers, the creatures flew
slowly despite their efforts, swinging clumsily from side to side. These
were females, of course.  The shiny green black sacs around their
abdomens were bloated with hundreds of eggs.  Penthero Iss, Surlord of
Spire Vanis, Lord Commander of the Rive Watch, Keeper of Mask Fortress,
and Master of the Four Gates, preferred not to hold the netting too
close.  The caul flies were past due and were desperate to lay, and
their serrated chitinous mouthparts were quite capable of breaking
through gauze.  Especially if the females smelled blood.

Iss watched with fascination as one female flew to where his pale hand
gripped the netting.  The skin was clean and unbroken, not what the
creature wanted at all, but Iss had seen some caul flies capable of
causing the wounds they needed.  This one, however, would not get that
chance.  With his free hand, Iss pulled a cloth of blue felt from around
his waist and laid it over the top portion of the netting.  He would
arrive at his destination within the quarter, and a short period of
darkness would not make the females drowsy.  Iss had made a study of
their weaknesses.

It was the cold, not the dark, that slowed them.

As he walked through the deserted east gallery toward the Splinter, Iss
counted days.  Six.  He kept records, of course, but he trusted the
thoroughness of his own mind more than any scribbles on a page.  He
didn't want to risk weakening the Bound One too soon after the previous
drawing. Thoroughness in all things, most especially the use of power.

Six was enough, though.  Six was well and good.

Winter came early to the mountains and the city of Spire Vanis, and the
temperature in the east gallery was currently just below freezing.  Iss
fought the desire to shiver.  He had grown up hating the cold.  Cold
meant too little wood on the fire and not enough blankets for the bed,
and Iss knew all about that.  As a child he had dreamed of glowing
hearths and crackling flames and layer upon layer of goose down piled
high upon his chest.  Forty years later he had all that, yet he could
not say it was enough.

He was surlord, not king, and although he might rule for twenty years or
more, a violent death would be his in the end.  It was the way of things
in Spire Vanis.  Historians might speak the names of Uron the Pure and
Rhees Gryphon and a handful of other men who had ruled the city and died
in their sleep.  Yet Iss had stood in the shadows and watched as five
sworn brothers cut Borhis Horgo to strips.  Old he was, dry and
shriveled; Iss could hardly believe how much he bled.

Sometimes he saw the blood in his dreams.  Sometimes the blood was his.

So many surlords.  Borhis Horgo, Rannock Hews, Theric Hews, Connad Hews,
Lewick Crieff, who was called the Halfking, Garath Lors, Stornoway the
Bold . .  .  and so the list went on, back and back, to Theron Pengaron,
who was slain by his nephew's hide clads on ground where the Splinter
lay today.  All had died a surlord's death: knifed in the back, shot at
distance, poisoned, bludgeoned, betrayed.  The only law of succession in
Spire Vanis was the law of superior might.

Once a rival smelled weakness, he drew his conspirators about him and
plotted his surlord's death.  Iss knew his likely fate.  He knew and
refused to accept it.

It wasn't enough to be surlord.  He must make himself something else.

Cold air settled in Iss' lungs as he neared the Splinter.  Limestone as
pale and smooth as lake ice stole the warmth from the soles of his feet.
Heavy things swung from his belt, nestlingagainst the double-woven silk
of his robes.  The little stone lamp so ingeniously Grafted by the
barbarians who lived in the north along the coast, with its baleen
guards and shaved horn covering, gave off heat and light more safely
than any other lamp.  It could be knocked over, and still the flame
would stay inside the central chamber. Even now, bumping lightly against
his thigh, it was a benign and pleasing warmth to enjoy.  As for the
other two packages that hung from the belt, Mistress Wence had better
hope she'd wrapped them securely.

Pan-heated honey and mashed then strained yellow beans could both leak
juices that a man wearing silk had no use for.

Iss had found the caul flies liked to feed after they had laid their
eggs. It was a common misconception that mature females fed off blood.
Iss had observed them and knew they did not.  Honey was what they liked
best, preferably warm.  The flies had been fortress bred in the cold
climes of the Northern Territories, yet they still retained memories of
the Far South where they belonged.

As for the yellow beans they were to feed the Bound One.  Iss had asked
Mistress Wence to enrich them with butter and egg yolks and salt them as
mildly as she would food for a child.

Holding the partially covered netting out before him, Iss approached the
Splinter.  As always, the temperature dropped the nearer one drew to the
door.  In just the past few days water weeping from the stonework had
quickened to form a skin of blue ice above the arch.

Iss took out the key.  Impaled beasts with many heads and the thick
muscular tails of serpents watched the lock turn from their position at
the spire's base.  The oil lamp flickered, making the relief carvings
dance upon their poles.  Iss adjusted the lamp, the light dimmed, and
the creatures stilled to stone.

The door opened with a small hiss.  Frost smoke writhed through the
opening, like the tissue of a newly risen ghost.  Within the netting,
the caul flies drew in their wings and dropped to the bottom of the
makeshift bag.  First frost was always the worst in the Splinter.  The
outer stonework ran with moisture year-round, and every arch, ledge, and
cornerstone let in rain.  The interior walls bled.  Rivulets ran in thin
lines, following the curves of bias-cut stone and the edges of steps.
Drips gained mass on overhangs, pools collected in ruts and trenches,
and entire walls glistened with damp.  First frost turned it all to
freezing mist.  As the weeks passed and the days shortened and rime ice
formed on the exterior walls, the water would cool, then freeze.

Expandingas it quickened, the ice split rock as surely as a mason with a
mallet.  Each mild spell and subsequent thawing pushed the Splinter one
step closer to collapse.  The entire structure was flawed, crumbling,
broken.  The only thing that kept it standing was the precision cut and
placement of each stone.

And the foundations, of course, Iss thought with a quick humorless
smile.  No building in the Northern Territories had foundations to
compare with the Splinter.

The light from the stone lamp did little but reflect back in Iss' face
as he stepped through the smoke into the tower's lower rotunda.

Cracked tiles rocked beneath his feet as he moved.  Whole sections of
the original flooring were missing, either torn up by greedy workmen or
destroyed by frosts and falling stones.  Iss didn't care.  The
Splinter's staircase spiraled through the tower's heart, stopping off at
thirty-nine successive stories before reaching its apex in the spire
that pierced storms, yet Iss had little but a passing interest in any of
it.  Aboveground the Splinter's stone was as dead and worthless as a
foot black with frostbite.  It was below ground in the Inverted Spire,
that the stone became a vital, living thing. Iss crossed to the base of
the spiral stair, to the dark shadows and awkwardly shaped space that
lay beneath the first flight of steps.

Bending his back as needed, he followed the crook of the stairs until
his body was tucked against the end wall

Tensing his jaw and his fists, he spoke a word.  It weakened him more
severely than he anticipated, and drops of urine splashed against his
thigh. The pain was sharp but fleeting, and a powerful contraction of
his stomach wall flooded his mouth with the taste of salt.

Even before he could spit it away, the stairwell rumbled and began to
swing inward like a gate.  The grinding of iron wheels and chains was
muffled by walls three feet thick.  Above Iss' head, the great stone
staircase shuddered, its blocks shifting minutely in their beds of
rotten mortar. Limestone dust sifted onto his shoulders as the wall
completed its movement, revealinga cavity not much larger than the size
of a crouching man.

This was the part Iss hated.  Still shaken from the drawing, his knee
joints as weak as green timber, and urine still wet upon his thigh, he
forced himself through the breach.  No frost smoke rose from the void to
greet him. The coldness here had a different, more permanent quality,
and all mist had long since settled and froze.  Deep down at the apex of
the Inverted Spire the air was different, warmer, but ice seams remained
year-round at the rim.

Like the cold, the darkness was also more concentrated, and Iss was
forced to unhook the stone lamp from his belt and adjust the baleen
fibers to let in greater amounts of air.  He didn't care much for
darkness, though he was willing to allow it had its uses.  Things kept
within it usually broke down given time.

Spitting to clean the last traces of metal from his mouth, he edged
forward in small, toe-size movements until his feet found the lip of the
first stair. Unlike the tower above, the Inverted Spire did not boast a
central staircase; rather the steps ran along the outer wall, gradually
spiraling downward in a great windingarc.  A gaping many-storied trough
lay in its center.  Black as night, colder than pack ice, fed by
self-generating winds, and subject to each shift and roll of the
mountain it bored down through, the Inverted Spire was a force unto
itself.  As deep as the Splinter was tall, narrowing to a nail-hard
point, it pierced the bedrock of Mount Slain like a stake in its heart.

Its frost-riven walls glittered in the light of Iss' lamp.  The farther
the Surlord descended, the clearer and harder the ice became.  Ground to
lenses by the weight and compression of Mount Slain, the ice found
colors in the lamplight that no eye could see.  Not for the first time,
Iss resisted the urge to reach out and touch it.  Once, nearly eight
years ago now, he had lost the skin on his middle finger that way.

The mountain fought the Inverted Spire, chewing through whole sections
of granite facing like oak roots through earth.  Even breached as they
were by the white knuckles and bones of Mount Slain, the walls remained
intact.  The facing had been mined from the Towerlode at Linn, and there
were said to be blood spells and sorcerers' curses set deep into the
stone.  Robb Claw, great-grandson of Glamis Claw and builder of Mask
Fortress, had once claimed that it would take an act of God to break the
Spire.

Shivering, Iss drew the netting to his chest.  The cold had made the
caul flies torpid, and not one of me dozen females now moved.  A few
would die; he was prepared for that.  Once, several years earlier, in
the middle of one of the coldest winters Spire Vanis had ever known, all
of the laying females had died.  It had been messy, but he had managed
to extricate their eggs.  Though regrettably a much smaller portion than
normal had gone on to hatch and survive.

With one hand holding the lamp and the other clutching the netting, he
found the descent slow and difficult.  Iss had long since mastered the
art of not looking down, yet the knowledge of the deep chasm below lay
like clothing next to his skin.  Each stair was three feet wide--a
goodly length--yet the steps began in pressure-formed granite as slick
as glass and ended in fresh air, and a man couldn't be too careful where
he stepped.  Iss kept to dead center and turned his mind to matters he
found pleasing.

Take the servant girl Katia, for instance.  Such a sly, bright girl.

Too good by far to be penetrated by the Knife.  Iss had no interest in
bedding her himself, though it would be interesting to see just how far
she would go, just what she would do to free herself from the threat of
the kitchens.

Iss smiled with all the satisfaction of a jeweler settinga gem.  That
was Katia's weakness: her fear of ending up in the kitchens, broken
veined and red faced, her once high breasts resting like drained
waterskins upon her belly, her once bright hair turned to gray.

Fortress born and bred, Katia had grown up seeing the exact same thing
happen to every other woman who worked there: Mask Fortress took and
took but seldom gave.  Now the sharp little minx was afraid that the
same thing would happen to her.  Once Iss discovered a person's fears
they were his.  Katia was his now.  The girl loved Asarhia March,
admired and protected her.  Yet she was also envious of Asarhia.  Deeply
so.  Envy and love warred within her heart, yet the fear of returning to
the kitchens always won the day.  Take tonight.  The girl had clearly
not wanted to tell him that her mistress's chamber, bedclothes, and hair
were in disarray; that Asarhia's skin was hot, yet the sweat that lay
upon it was as cold as water wept from ice.  Yet Katia had told all that
and more.  Her mistress wasn't the one who could save her from a life in
the kitchens.  Iss made sure the girl knew that.

As for the other matter--the possibility that the girl had told Asarhia
what she had overhead the other day in the Red Forge-- well, that really
didn't matter at all.  The Knife watched Asarhia day and night, even
when she left her chambers and didn't realize she was being watched.
Iss' steps slowed for just a moment.  He did not relish taking such
measures against his almost-daughter.  Asarhia was normally such a sweet
and trusting girl, yet she was beginning to get frightened.  And Iss
knew from experience that people who were frightened did foolish things.

Feeling a gust of warmer air puff against his cheeks, Iss made his final
adjustment of the lamp.  The first chamber couldn't be much farther down
now. The Inverted Spire had only three chambers, all lying close to or
just above apex.  By the time one descended to the first of them, the
spire had narrowed to the width ofabullpen.  The second chamber was
smaller still, and the final chamber was barely the size of a well
shaft.  Cupped within a seam of black rock, its base ended in a
needlepoint of steel.

Not for the first time, Penthero Iss found himself wishing the stone
lamp could better light his way.  The curve of the stairs was more
pronounced lower down and the gradient sharper.  Stepping from one worn
and sloping step to another was a danger of the worst kind.  Iss knew he
could use sorcery to draw forth light, yet he also knew it wasn't a cost
he cared to pay.  The speck of frozen urine currently thawingagainst his
thigh was reminder enough of that.  He was not a man of great ability,
like some.  He had enough.  Only enough.  His strengths lay elsewhere .
as in his ability to choose men.

Marafice Eye was one of his chosen.  The Protector General of the Rive
Watch was dangerous; he could inspire loyalty in fighting men.  Iss had
realized this early on, in the days when Marafice Eye was a lowly
brother-in-the-watch, with a new-made sword at his thigh and the muck of
Hoargate still caked upon his boots.  Iss had been protector general
then, always on the watch for rivals.  Another man might have made it
his business to destroy Marafice Eye, slay him before he grew into a
threat.  Iss had made it his business to draw him close.  He saw a man
who could be useful to him, one who had qualities of dominance and
brutality he lacked.  When the time came to storm the fortress and
overthrow the agingand sickly Borhis Horgo, it had been Marafice Eye who
had commanded the Rive Watch; Marafice Eye who'd slain a dozen grange
lords and Forsworn on the Horn's icy steps.

It had been a bloody ten days.  The Forsworn had been expelled from the
city; and their walled keeps, which they called Shrine- holds, had been
stormed and broken.  When it was done, Penthero Iss, kinsman to lord of
the Sundered Granges, had taken the title of surlord for himself.
Marafice Eye has stood at his side, his protector general and Knife.

Fifteen years later, and they were still surlord and Knife.  Iss had
little cause to regret his choice.  With Marafice Eye at his back,
keeping the Rive Watch loyal, his hands were free to deal with the
grange lords

The great houses of Spire Vanis were a thorn in his side, braying
constantly for land and titles and gold.  Thirteen years ago a bargain
had been struck, and the grange lords never let Iss forget it.

"You promised us the chance to win land and glory," the Whitehog had
said just six days ago in Iss' private chamber.

"That's the only reason why you're surlord today.  Forget that, and we
just might forget that we spoke oaths in the Blackvault to protect you."

Iss had almost smiled as the Whitehog spoke.  Threats from
seventeen-year-old boys had that effect on him.  Still, he had seen
enough to realize that the young and ambitious grange ling who stood
before him, wearing the white and gold of Hews and carrying a five-foot
great sword on his back, might one day make a bid for his place.  The
boy had already taken to calling himself the Whitehog, in honor of his
great-grandfather who had led the Rive Watch to victory at High Rood. It
didn't take a seer to know that he held similar dreams of glory for
himself.

Well, Iss thought, peering into the darkness below, perhaps the Whitehog
might get the chance to lead a force sooner than he thinks.

Perhaps he just might find a clansman's ax thrust into his porcine
heart.

Spying the top of the first stone ceiling beneath him, Iss allowed
himself to relax a little.  Now if he fell, he wouldn't break his neck.

The ceiling stretched across the Inverted Spire like a great stone valve
across a pipe.  Over the centuries debris had collected on the topside,
shaken down from the walls above.  Rock fragments, facing tiles, and odd
pieces of masonry lay in disjointed heaps amid the yellowing bones of
rats, pigeons, and bats that had gained entry to the spire by means Iss
couldn't guess.  Human bones were down there, too.  Two rib cages could
clearly be seen peeking through mounds of rock dust like spiders hiding
in sand.  Iss had made it his business to search once, yet he'd only
ever found one skull.

Bits of food, strips of netting, and a few other scraps had fallen from
the Surlord's own hands.  Last summer during Almsfest, he had brought a
basket of soft strawberries with him, only to find they had slipped from
his hand halfway through the descent.  They were still there now, spread
across the stonework like spattered blood.  Red and glistening and
smelling like perfume on a filthy whore, they were only just beginning
to turn.  This deep within the mountain's core, things took years to
decay.

Ahead, the staircase ducked below the stone platform and into the
chamber below.  Iss minded his head.  The air stilled immediately, no
longer subject to the chasm's winds.  Increased warmth came with the
calm.  The flame within the stone lamp shivered and darted, lightinga
circular chamber with polished walls.  Dog hooks and metal rings had
been hammered into the stone.  Chains ran through a series of loops and
then ended abruptly, hacked off run mid link If one looked closely, one
could see scraps of brown fabric caught within the chains.  Untanned
leather, it might be, yet if Iss had to put money on it he'd guess human
skin.  Descending on a curving slant along the perimeter of the chamber,
he barely spared a passing glance for the chamber's contents.  Soon,
very soon, he would have Caydis remove the wire cage and the weight
stone and the cracked and greasy wheel.  Pretty things would be brought
in their place: plump cushions, silk wood chests, and tapestries woven
with blue and gold thread.  Things that would please a girl. Descending
into the apex chamber, Iss shrugged away all thoughts but those he
needed.  The air down here was as thick and heavy as still water at the
bottom of a lake.  No matter how many times he neared the final chamber,
the sudden change always took him by surprise.  His lungs had difficulty
expelling air, and deep within his ears two sharp points of pain pushed
inward.  The Surlord swallowed hard, prayed that his ears wouldn't pick
this time to bleed.

The stone facing here was thicker than anywhere else in the Spire.

Pressure-formed granite, whorly and knotted like the bark of a tree,
defied breaking by all but the most violent convulsions of Mount Slain.
Flecks of bastard's gold shone within the stone.  Unhooking the packs
containing honey and yellow beans from his belt, Iss took the final
seventeen steps and descended into the apex chamber.  The Bound One
waited there: hungry, broken, desperate for light, perfectly insulated
from the outside world by the structure and peculiar properties of the
Inverted Spire.

Iss took out his silver tweezers and uncovered the caul flies.  He would
draw power beyond his means tonight.

CHAPTER SEVEN.

The Great Hearth the, you know what you said the other day when Drey and
I came home, when we first met you outside the roundhouse?  " Raif
waited until his sister nodded.

"Remember what you said?"

"Yes.   I said I knew you and Drey would come back."   Effie Sevrance
regarded her older brother with serious blue eyes,

"I tried to tell the others, but no one would listen."

Raif shifted his weight from one leg to another.  He was crouching in
the shadow of the clan guide stone in the dark and smoke-filled
structure of the guide house A full twelve tapers were lit, but the
guide stone soaked up light and heat like a black body of trees at the
center of a snow melt The stone's granite surface was rough and
unfinished, and only jagged edges shone.  Sometimes the chiseled edges
looked like ears, sometimes like chips of bone and teeth.  Veins of
graphite formed bruises around the newer chisel marks, forcing beads of
greasy ink to the surface.  No guide stone liked to be cut.  No matter
what time of day he came to the guide house Raif always thought it felt
like night.  Built adjacent to the roundhouse, the guide house was not
as well protected or insulated from the cold.  Some clans kept their
guide stones inside the main building, fearing that raiding clans might
make off with them under cover of darkness.

Looking up at the massive slab of folded granite that was the size of a
one-room cottage, Raif couldn't see how any but a band of giants
equipped with rollers, pulleys, and levers could ever hope to steal it
away within the space of a single night.  And Blackhail's stone was only
half the size of some.

Still, thirty-six years earlier Clan Bludd had managed to steal phoone's
guide stone forcing the mightiest of the clans to send their guide south
to the stone fields of Trance Vor in search of a replacement.  Raifhad
heard many of his own clansmen speak about the incident, talking in the
hushed voices they normally used around bloodshed.  All of them held
that Clan Dhoone had never been the same since.

Clan Bludd had broken the Dhoonestone down into rocks and built an
outhouse from it.  The entire operation--the raid, the movement of the
stone, and its subsequent breakingand rebuilding--had been planned by
the Dog Lord, Vaylo Bludd.  A year man at the time, Vaylo Bludd had been
a bastard son of the clan chief, Gullit Bludd.  Within that same year
Vaylo killed his two half- brothers, married his half-sister, and
usurped his father's place.  To this day it was said that Vaylo Bludd
made it his business to use the outhouse every night before he slept.

Raif frowned.  Sometimes he didn't know what to make of all the stories
surrounding the Dog Lord.  Mace Blackhail came up with new ones by the
day.

Feeling a hot sting of anger in his chest, Raif pushed aside all
thoughts of Mace Blackhail.  Now wasn't the time for them.  Effie was
sitting cross-legged before him, her pale face made old by shadows, her
lovely auburn hair tangled, her skirt damp from sitting beneath the
stone bench where he had found her.  In her hands and littered across
her lap were her collection of rocks and stones.  She played with them
while she waited for him to speak, moving one piece and then another in
sequence.  For some reason Raif found himself wishing he could brush
away the entire collection.

"What made you so sure Drey and I would come back, Effie?"  he asked
softly.

"Did you feel something bad" --Raif jabbed his stomach"--here, inside?"

Effie thought about the question.  She pushed out her bottom lip, fixed
her gaze in midair, then slowly shook her head.

"No, Raif."

Raif looked at Effie a long moment, then breathed a sigh of relief.

Effie hadn't felt anything similar to the sensation he'd experienced the
day of the raid.  That was good.  One outsider in the family was enough.
Effie's words had been on Raifs mind for days.  He had been meaning to
talk to her about them ever since he'd returned from the badlands, but
the first night hadn't been a good time, as the clan wanted nothing more
than to hear the story of what he and Drey had done to the bodies of
their kin.  The day after was given over to mourning.  Inigar Stoop had
split a heart-size chunk from the guide stone cracked it into twelve
pieces--one for each man who had died at the camp--and then laid them
upon the earth in place of bodies.

It had gone hard on everyone.  When Corbie Meese and Shor Gormalin had
sung death songs in their fine low voices, and all the women who had
lost husbands, including Merritt Ganlow and Raina Blackhail, cut widow's
weals around their wrists, Raif had not been able to think of anyone
except Tern. The only time the silence was broken that night was by Mace
Blackhail swearing vengeance against Clan Bludd.  The following day Raif
had looked for Effie but found her only when it was too late for
anything except sleep. Now, finally, he had her here.  Shor Gormalin had
told him how he often saw Effie slipping out to play in the guide house
when it wasn't in use.  And sure enough Effie had been here, sitting in
almost-darkness, hiding beneath the bench where Inigar Stoop normally
sat grinding stone, playing with her bits of rock.

Raif looked at Effie.  She had lost a shockingamount of weight while he
and Drey were away.  Her eyes were huge and dark, blue as their mother's
had been before her.  Such a serious little girl, she never smiled,
never played with other children.  It was easy to forget she was only
eight years old.  Raif held out his arms.

"Come here and give your old brother a hug."

Effie thought a moment.

"You won't be wanting to kiss me, will

It was a serious question, and Raif treated it as such.  He thought a
moment.

"No.  Just a hug will do."

"Very well."  With great care Effie laid her collection of rocks on the
packed earth floor, then shuffled over to Raif.

"No kiss, mind,"

she repeated as she let herself be hugged.

Raif grinned as he held her in his arms.  Effie had reached the age when
she didn't care to be kissed by any men, even her brothers.

Still, she made no move to pull away from him and nestled close to his
chest, resting her head on his shoulder.

"Da will never come back," she said.

"I knew that all along."

The grin slid from Raifs face.  Effie spoke with such quiet certainty it
chilled him.  Unconsciously he hugged her closer.  As he did so, he felt
something hard press against his ribs.  Gently he edged Effie back.

"What have you got there?"  he asked, nodding toward her neck.

Effie looked down.

"My lore."  Small hands fished inside the neck of her dress and pulled
out the plum-size stone.  It was gray, featureless, by far the plainest
rock in Effie's collection.  A tiny hole had been bored close to the
edge, and a strand of coarse twine had been threaded through.

"Inigar made a hole for me last spring,"

she said.

"So I could wear it next to my skin like everyone else."

Raif took Erne's lore from her hand.  It wasn't unusually heavy or cool
to the touch.  Just plain stone.  Abruptly he let it go.  Easing Effie
from his lap, he stood.

"I say we go and find ourselves some supper.  Anwyn Bird has been
boiling bacon all day, and unless someone stops her soon we'll never get
rid of the smell."

Effie began gathering her rock collection into a pile.  The bones in her
arms showed through her skin as she reached forward to scoop up a
handful of pebbles.  Raif hated to see them.  He'd make sure she ate
well from now on.

With her rocks in her little rabbit pouch, Effie took Raifs hand and
together they left the guide house It was good to get out of the smoke.
The short tunnel that led through to the roundhouse was lit by a series
of overhead slits.  The sky outside was turning dark.  Noon had passed
less than two hours earlier, yet that never mattered much in winter.
Within a month there would hardly be any daylight at all, and everyone
who lived on the clan hold in crofts, strong walls farms, or woodsmen's
huts would come to the roundhouse to sit out winter's worst.  Numbers
had already begun to swell, yet Raif didn't think it had much to do with
the season.

Even as he and Effie walked through to the main entrance hall, a group
of crofters were being greeted by Anwyn Bird.  The stout- bellied matron
wasted no time in ordering the men to strip down to their soft skins and
felt boots. Raif took note of the snow on the crofters' shoulders and
hoods.  He also noticed that all three men had their bows braced and
ready.  The oldest man, a great red-haired giant who Raif recalled was
named Paille Trotter, had a donkey basket on his back crammed with arrow
and spear shafts and a bucket of neat-foot oil hanging on a rope around
his neck.  It was a point of honor among all tied clansmen that they
never came to the roundhouse empty-handed.

Suddenly uneasy, Raif raised his hand to his neck and searched out the
hard smoothness of his raven lore.  This was the first year he had ever
known a crofter to bring weapons, not food, to pay for his winter keep.

"Now go and warm yi'selves by the small hearth and I'll send a girl in
with some peas and bacon.  There's no blackening left, mind, only meat
and soft lard."  Anwyn Bird's tones dared any of the crofters to find
fault with the offered fare.  None, including Paille Trotter, who was
twice Anwyn's size and had a face fierce enough to scare bears, had the
nerve for it.  Anwyn Bird nodded, well used to cowingall who stood
before her.

"Go on with you, then.  You'll find a skin of good ale warming by the
fire."

The crofters, looking slightly embarrassed in their soft skins and felt
boots, were quick to do Anwyn's bidding.

Anwyn Bird, grand matron of the roundhouse, head cook and brewer, expert
on all things including childbirth and bow making turned the
considerable force of her attention upon Raif and Effie Sevrance.

"And where might you two have been?"

Seldom askinga question that she wasn't prepared to answer for herself,
Anwyn Bird gave neither of them the chance to speak.

"Been dawdling in the guide house I'll swear!"  She nodded at Effie.

"You, my girl, are coming with me.  Everyone else round here might
dither about, 'fraid that you'll run off again and never be found.

But I for one intend to see that you get a good hot supper, some
oatcakes, and a sop full of butter.  If you get any thinner, I swear
Longhead'11 mistake you for a saplingand plant you in the graze.  "

"Longhead plants the saplings in the rise, not the graze," Effie said
matter-of-factly.

"And it isn't the season for them anyway."  The loose skin under Anwyn
Bird's chin wobbled in indignation.  Raifbit his lip to stop himself
from smiling. Raina Blackhail and Effie Sevrance were the only two
people in the guide house who could render Anwyn speechless.

Muttering to herself about young girls today, Anwyn Bird grabbed Effie
by the collar and marched her toward the kitchen.  Effie's rock
collection knocked together as she moved, and just before Anwyn passed
out of earshot, Raif caught the phrases "lot of nonsense" and "fuss
about old rocks" puffing from her lips.

Glad that Effie had fallen into the hands of someone who would see her
fed, Raif let out a breath of relief.  At least for tonight that was one
less thing to worry about.

Spinningaround, he took a moment to think where Mace Blackhail would
likely be at this hour.  Despite the eleven-day mourning set by Inigar
Stoop, events were moving fast.  Crofters were coming early to the
roundhouse, bringingarms and bow grease, the guide house windows had
been boarded up and barricaded with pull stones and just this morning
Raif had woken to the clang and shudder of the clan forge--and it hadn't
even been dawn.  Clan Blackhail was preparing for war, and they were
doing so under Mace Blackhail's orders and supervision.  Raif pressed
his lips into a white line.  The man was worse than a murderer.  He had
ridden home from a killing field with his mouth full of lies.  Even
before he had made a decision where to go, Raif exited the entrance
hall.  He had to find Mace Blackhail, see for himself what the man who
would be clan chief planned next.

The interior of the roundhouse was a vast warren of stone.

Tunnels, ramps, and dug steps led down to windowless chambers, grain
cells, root cellars, arms locks, and vaults where enemy bones had once
been laid facing north to rot.  Way down, two full stories below ground
Longhead kept a wet cell and grew mushrooms year-round.

All chambers were stone walled and barrel ceilinged, supported by
massive blood wood stangs sealed with pitch.

Nothing was locked, not even the strongroom.  A clansman who stole from
his own was considered as good as a traitor and promptly staved and skin
hung. Raif had seen it happen only once, to a soft- spoken luntman named
Wennil Drook.  Wennil's job as luntman was to keep all torches lit in
the roundhouse.  He had access to all chambers, could go wherever he
chose, unnoticed and unquestioned.  When Corbie Meese's fine silver hand
knife went missing one night after supper, the entire roundhouse was
searched.  Mace Blackhail found the knife a week later wrapped in dock
leaves at the bottom of the luntman's pack.  Raif forced his teeth
together as he ran down a series of short ramps.

Early the next morning Wennil Drook was taken onto the court and laid
facedown upon the clay.  One sharp pole was inserted under his skin from
shoulder to shoulder and a second from hip to hip.  Wennil Drook was
then lifted by the staves and suspended between two horses.  The horses
were ridden by their riders over the fell fields and onto the Wedge.
Wennil Drook only made it halfway.  The skin on his back tore off in a
single piece, and he fell to the ground and was dead before dark.

Corbie Meese was given the skin off Wennil Drook's back.  He had used it
once to clean his hammer, then thrown it away.

Frowning, Raif took the steps down to the fold, the great chamber that
lay directly beneath the entrance, where all horses and livestock were
held during hard frosts and sieges.  It was empty.  Not one clansman
stood in the center, training his dogs, not one clans- woman leaned
against the enclosure wall, letting her children run and play.

Raif halted by the entrance.  The fold was the largest cleared space in
the roundhouse.  On days as cold as this it was usually heavily used.

Raif punched the stonework with the heel of his hand.  It was time he
paid a visit to the Great Hearth.

How long had he been in the guide house with Effie?  Less than an hour?

The tunnels and ramps of the roundhouse were built narrow and winding so
they could be easily defended if the main gate was breached.  Raif found
himself cursing every twist and curve as he ran.  A man could get
nowhere fast. Passingalongside the kitchen wall, he heard children's
laughter bubblingagainst the other side.  The sound did little to settle
his mind. Children playing in Anwyn Bird's kitchen?

Wasn't the deepest spiraling hell supposed to freeze over first?  The
Great Hearth was the roundhouse's primary chamber aboveground.

Yearmen, visitors, and all male children old enough to find food and
beds for themselves slept there each night around the fire.  Most clans
folk ate supper at the curved stone benches lining the chamber's east
wall.  In the evenings everyone gathered about the fire to keep warm,
tell tales, sample one another's home- brew, smoke pipes packed with
dried heather, court, sing, dice, and dance swords.  It was the Heart of
Clan; all decisions of weight were made there.

Even as he rounded the last of the steps, Raif knew something was wrong.
The Great Hearth's oak doors were closed.  Not pausing to smooth his
hair or brush down his coat, he pushed against the oak planking, forcing
his way through.

Five hundred faces turned to look at him.  Corbie Meese, Shor Gormalin,
Will Hawk, Orwin Shank, and dozens of other full clansmen were gathered
around the vast sandstone hearth.  Raina Blackhail, Merritt Ganlow, and
a score of other women with due respect also had places close to the
fire.  Sittingaround the edge of the room on curved benches were the
year men the two middle Shank brothers, the Lyes, Bullhammer, Craw
Bannering, Rob Ure, who was fostered from Clan Dregg, and dozens of
others.

Raif felt a hard lump rise to his throat.  Drey was there too, sitting
beside blue-eyed Rory Cleet, his hands resting upon the newly scored
hammer in his lap.  Raif looked and looked, but his brother wouldn't
meet his eyes.

"You weren't called to this meeting, boy."  Mace Blackhail stepped out
from behind a blood wood stang and walked five paces forward before
coming to a halt.

"You won't be made year man till next spring."

Raif didn't care for the tone of Mace Blackhail's voice.  He also didn't
care for the fact that Mace Blackball was wearing his foster father's
Clansword. Steel skinned, black as midnight, and hilted with human bone
packed with lead, it was kept in the roundhouse at all times and worn
only by the clan chief when he was called upon to pass judgments of
death and war.

Glancingaround the Great Hearth, Raif took full count of the group.

More clansmen than he had seen together in one place since spring
Godsfest had gathered for a meet.  Even a few tied clansmen--crofters,
pig farmers, and woodsmen--had been given places near the door.  The
only full-sworn clansmen who weren't present were those manning the
strong walls and border holds the hundred or so standing night watch and
those away on long hunts in the far northern reaches of the clan.

Raif's eyes narrowed.

"If you have met to speak of war," he said, glancing from face to face
and ignoring Mace Blackhail completely, "then I demand to be present.
Before the first battle is joined, Inigar Stoop will hear my oath."

Corbie Meese's large head, with its hammer dent, scar, and bald spot,
was the first to nod.

"He's right, you know.  We're gonna need to bind as many year men as we
can, as soon as we can.  And that's no mistake."

Ballic the Red and several others nodded right along with him.  Mace
Blackhail cut the nodding short before it had chance to spread.

"We must decide upon a clan chief before we speak of war."  Raif shot
Drey a hard glance, boring through his brother's skull until Drey was
forced to look up.  Mace Blackhail had called a meeting to decide on the
next clan chief, and his own brother hadn't even told him.  Raif scowled
at Drey.  Didn't he realize he was playing right into Mace Blackhail's
hands?

"So," Mace Blackhail said, taking the last few steps toward the door and
pausing before he opened it.

"As war isn't our main purpose here, I say we let this boy go."  He
smiled almost sweetly.

"Delicate matters such as these would more than likely bore him."  Raif
stared at Drey's bent head.  This time his brother refused to look up.

Mace held open the door.  With his back turned to the clan, he sent Raif
a look filled with malice.  Go, he mouthed, his eyes shrinking to two
black-and-yellow strips.

"I say he stays."  It was Raina Blackhail, standingas she spoke.

"Despite what you say, Mace Blackhail, Raif Sevrance is hardly a boy.

If he wants to have his say along with the rest, I for one won't stop
him.  " She looked her foster son straight in the eyes.

"Would you?"  In the seconds it took Raina to speak.  Mace Blackhail's
face changed twice.  By the time he had turned back to the clan, the
only trace of the anger her words had caused him was the rapidly
diminishing lines around his mouth.  He let the door fall closed.

"Very well.  Let the boy find a place at the back."

Raif held his position a moment longer, then edged sideways, joininga
group of crofters behind the door.  His gaze did not leave Mace
Blackhail for a moment.

"I warn you, boy," Mace said softly, weighing his words.

"We're not here to rake over what happened at the badlands camp.  You're
upset about the loss of your da--we all saw that the other day.  But
we're in mourning for others besides Tern Sevrance, and you'd do well to
remember that.  You weren't the only one who lost kin."  Mace made a
swallowing motion with his throat.

"Others did, too.  And every time you speak up rashly without thinking,
you injure their memories and wound the grieving."

Mace Blackhail's words stilled the clan.  Many looked down, at the
floor, at their hands, at their laps.  Several of the older clansmen,
including Orwin Shank and Will Hawk, nodded.  The tied clansman by
Raif's side, a pig farmer named Hissip Gluff, edged minutely away.

"Let's get back to the matter in hand."  Shor Gormalin spoke in an even
tone. He was standing by the hearth, his fair hair and beard smoothly
cut and tended, his sword arm resting on the mantel.

"I daresay the lad knows himself when's right and proper to speak."  As
always when the small swordsman spoke, people agreed.

And those men and women who had given Raif sharp glances seconds earlier
now found other things to look at.  Raif said nothing.  He was beginning
to realize just how clever Mace Blackhail was with words.

"Well," Ballic the Red said, stepping forward into the cleared space in
the center of the room.

"Mace is right.  We must decide upon a clan chief and quickly.  Dhoone
is weak, and its sworn clans are suffering from want of protection.  We
all know the Dog Lord's been sniffingaround the Dhoonehouse like the
hound that he is-- the man has seven sons, and each one of them craves a
clan hold of his own.  Yet now it seems to me as if the Bludd chief
craves more.  I think the man has each and every one of us in his
sights.  I think he has a fancy to call himself Lord of the Clans.  And
if we sit on arses and do nothing, then it'll only be a matter of time
before his Bluddsmen come calling with swords."

Shouts of

"Aye!"  chorused around the Great Hearth.  Corbie Meese took his hammer
from his back and pounded the wooden butt against the floor.  Several
year men Drey included, began pummeling their fists against the bench.
Many clansmen stamped their feet or hammered ale jugs against the walls.
Mace Blackball waited until the noise was at its greatest before
speaking.

Raisingan open hand, he shouted over the clamor,

"Aye!  Ballic has the right of it!  The Dog Lord would have our land,
our women, and our roundhouse.  And when he's done he'd turn around and
shatter our guide stone to dust.  He slaughtered our chief in cold
blood, in the no-man's-land of the camp.  What worse will he do when he
comes west to raid our clan?"

Mace Blackhail curled his hand to a fist.  The noise had died now, and
the only person moving was the luntwoman Nellie Moss, who was busy
carrying shredded spruce bark from torch to torch.  The fire in the
Great Hearth roared like wind from the north, and all around the room
blood wood beams creaked and shuddered like timbers in a storm.

Raif felt the heat leave his face.  The world was shifting beneath
everyone's feet on the word of just one man.  He couldn't believe how
quickly it was happening.  It was like watchinga dog round up a herd.

"My father died at Vaylo Bludd's hand," Mace Blackhail said, letting his
voice tremble along with his fist, "killed by a hell-forged sword, left
to rot on frozen earth.  I say the Dog Lord must pay long and hard for
what he did.  We are not Clan Dhoone to stand by and let someone steal
our guide stone while we lie in bed with our women atop us.  We are Clan
Blackhail, the first of all clans.  We do not hide and we do not cower.
And we will have our revenge."

The clan thundered to life.  Everyone stood.  Axmen and ham- mermen
pounded their weapons against the stone floor, year men began chanting
"Kill Bludd! Kill Bludd!"  and those standing by tables took out their
hand swords and thrust the blades into the wood.  The women tore the
sleeves from their dresses, baring their widow's weals for all to see.
Corbie Meese hefted a skin of hard liquor over his head and sent it
crashing into the fire.  The skin exploded in a ball of pure white
flame, scorching the hair of all who stood close and sending out a wave
of heat that hit everyone in the room.

As smoke rolled from the hearth in black storm clouds, Ballic the Red
aimed his bow.  Shaped from a single piece of heartwood yew,
strengthened with plates of horn, then curve-dried over sinew, the
longbow drew as smoothly as the setting sun.  Ballic held the string to
his cheek, kissed his arrow's fletchings, and let it fly.  The arrow
parted smoke like a knife slitting throats.  Shooting into the red heart
of the fire, it severed the tops of flames and shattered the glowing
embers like a rock smashed into ice.  Hot coals rained onto the
hearthstone, dark and ashy, their red eyes flashing.

"That's for the Dog Lord," Ballic the Red shouted above the uproar,
tapping imagined dust from his bow.

Even as Raif found himself envying the sheer force of Ballic's shot, his
gaze was drawn away to the opposite end of the chamber, where Drey stood
chantingat the top of his voice.  He and smooth- cheeked Rory Cleet were
shoulderingand pushing each other, seeing who could shout the loudest.
Drey had his hammer in his hand and kept turning to pound the bench
behind him.  Briefly he met Raifs gaze, then quickly looked away. A
muscle twisted in Raifs gut.  That wasn't Drey.  His face was so red, it
didn't even look like him.  Kill Bludd'.  Kill Bludd!

Edging back against the door frame for support, Raif looked away.  He
felt physically sick.  Noises pushed against his face like blows.  We
don't know Clan Bludd did it, he wanted to shout.  But Mace Blackhail
had ensured that anything he said would be dismissed as the immature
rantings of a boy who had lost his da.  Raif scored his fist along the
door frame, daring the splinters to draw blood.  Why couldn't anyone see
Mace Blackhail for the wolf that he was?

As he raised his knuckles from the wood, he was aware of some- one's
gaze upon his back.  Assuming it was Mace Blackhail, he spun around to
face him. But it wasn't Mace; it was his foster mother, Raina.  Raif let
his fist fall to his side.  In a roomful of people straining, shouting,
and clamoring to be heard, Raina Blackhail was an island of quiet calm.
The bandages around her widow's weals had been torn away, revealing the
fierce red flesh of new wounds.  No scabs would be allowed to form over
the cuts as they healed. Instead her skin would be held together by
tightly bound sinew, until bands of hard flesh had been raised around
her wrists.  These she would carry with her until death.

For the first time, Raif realized what Raina was wearing over her
shoulders: the black bear pelt that Dagro Blackhail had died scraping.

Yet the pelt looked clean and newly washed, and the flesh side was
creamy and bloodless.  Raif felt the ground shift beneath his feet one
more time.  Drey must have carried it back.  He must have bundled it
into his pack, brought it home from the badlands, finished scraping the
flesh, then lime-washed and softened the inner hide.  All done quietly
and without fuss, so Raina Blackhail could have her husband's last
token.

Sobered, Raif unclenched his fist.  Sometimes he hardly knew his brother
at all.

As if aware of Raifs thoughts, Raina Blackhail pulled the bear pelt
close around her shoulders.  Tears shone in her eyes. She made no motion
to speak, made no gestures with her hand or head, simply held Raifs gaze
as surely as if she were holding his arm.  Her husband was dead, and she
meant for him to remember that fact.

Kill Bludd!  Kill Bludd!

"Hold your cries!"  Mace Blackhail cried, raising the Clansword above
his head as he stepped upon a table close to the center of the room.

His black dogs king pants and tunic had been slashed by his own hand,
and his wolf lore lay on the outside for all to see.  With his dark
hair, dark clothes, and yellow wolf tooth shiningagainst his skin, he
looked fierce and full of rage.  The Clansword fit his grip perfectly,
and already he had its weight and balance judged.  The clan quieted.
Thanks to Ballic the Red's arrow, the fire now gave off a flickering
uneven light.  Dark smoke vented from the cooling embers in thin plumes.
Around the walls of the Great Hearth, torches burned with the crackle
and putter of things just lit.

Mace Blackhail waited for perfect silence.  The Clansword gleamed like
black ice as he spoke.

"We must make raids and make war--we know that now.  Our warriors must
ride east and meet the Bluddsmen full on.  Now more than ever we need a
strong man to lead us.  War is never solely about battle.  We must make
alliances, mass ourselves, know our weaknesses and use our strengths. We
can never replace Dagro Blackhail, and I for one will fight anyone here
and now who claims otherwise."  Mace brought the Clansword down and
swept it in a half circle around his chest.  For a fraction of a second
his gaze rested on Raif, then his lips twisted minutely and he looked
away.  Finding none who would speak up against the dead, he continued.

"Yet choose a leader we must.  All here have the right to draw the
Clansword and claim the Blackhail name.  As a Blackhail by fosterage, I
have more rights than some, but that's not what I called you here to
say.  What I mean to state here, before all clansmen and year men and
women with due respect, is that I will pledge myself to any man who is
named clan chief and follow him until I die."

Mace Blackhail's words stunned the clan.  Mouths fell open, breath was
inhaled.  Old Turby Flapp lost his grip on his spear, and it went
clattering to the floor.  The crofter to Raifs side pulled up his chin
and whispered to his companion that it was "a fine thing for Mace
Blackhail to do."  Raif waited.  Like everyone else he was surprised by
Mace Blackhail's words, yet he knew it wasn't the end.  Even as Mace
Blackhail lowered the sword, the chorus began.

"A Blackhail is as a Blackhail does."  Corbie Meese stepped into the
center of the room, the boiled hide of his coat armor embellished only
by his ham merman chains.

"Mace has shown himself to be a true clansman like his father before
him, and I for one would be proud to follow his banns into battle." With
that, Corbie laid his great iron-headed hammer on the ground beneath
Mace Blackhail's feet.

"I'll second that."  It was Ballic the Red, stepping forward with his
braced yew wood bow.

"The moment the badlands raid happened, Mace Blackhail's first thoughts
were for those who were left at home.  Now I don't mean to speak ill of
the two Sevrance lads--all here agree that what they did was right and
fitting--but to my mind Mace Blackhail acted like a clan chief from the
start."

Raif closed his eyes as calls of

"Aye!"  circled the room.  He heard Ballic the Red lay his bow by Corbie
Meese's hammer, and when he opened his eyes again Orwin Shank and
thin-bearded Will Hawk were doing likewise with their axes and swords.
Along the east wall, year men shifted restlessly against their benches.
It wasn't their place to move before full clansmen and women with due
respect.  Other clansmen came and laid their weapons by Mace Black-
hail's feet.  The twins Cull and Arlec Byce crossed their matching lime
wood axes on top of the growing pile.  Still, some men held back.  Shor
Gormalin was the most notable.  Standing close to Raina Blackhail, he
watched the proceedings with glinting eyes, not a muscle on his lean
face moving.

Others, many older clansmen like Gat Murdock and the fierce little
bowman whom everyone called the Lowdraw, took his lead and did the same.
Raif noticed several clansmen and most of the clanswomen looking to
Raina Blackhail.

When it was obvious that all the full clansmen who were prepared to come
forward had done so, Mace Blackhail pressed the flat edge of the
Clansword to his heart.  His black hair and close trimmed beard made his
skin look as pale as ice formed around a window at night.  His teeth
were strong and white.  A few had the sharp-edged look of fangs.

Turning, he addressed his words to Raina alone.

"What say you, Foster Mother?  I did not ask for this, and in truth I am
not sure that I want it.  And no matter how much my fellow clansmen's
support stirs my heart, what you think matters more."

Raif ground his teeth together to stop himself from crying out.  Mace
Blackhail wasn't even a full clansman!  He was a year man like Drey,
pledging himself one year at a time to his clan, until he married or
settled and was ready to commit himself wholly and for life.  Most year
men pledged to their birth clans but some married elsewhere, or fostered
elsewhere, or found themselves better needed and more valued at a
foreign roundhouse far from home.

Raif sucked in breath.  His gaze flicked to Raina Blackhail, who stood
in her own space, slightly apart from the other women.  Mace Blackhail
had put her in a difficult position; to speak against blood or foster
king in front of clan was unthinkable.  Most especially against a foster
son who had just paid his foster mother a compliment far greater than
due respect.

Spent air burned as it left Raifs lungs.  Mace Blackhail maneuvered like
the wolf he was: isolating his target, then forcing it to run alone.

Raina Blackhail was not the sort of woman to be hurried, though, and
with a slow shrug of her shoulders she let the black bear pelt fall to
the floor. Everyone in the Great Hearth watched as she deliberately
stepped upon it. Her lips and cheeks were pale, her dress of house spun
wool dyed a subtle shade of gray.  The only bright spots on her entire
body were the blood seeping from her widow's weals and the film of
unshed tears across her eyes.

"Foster son," she said, placing a slight but unmistakable emphasis on
the word foster.

"Like my husband before me I am a person rarely given to hasty judgment.
You have spoken well, and humbly, and have gained the support of many of
the clansmen who lie above you in rank."  A pause followed, where Raina
let the clansmen remember for themselves that her foster son was but a
year man

For the first time since he had entered the chamber Raif felt a spark of
hope.  No one in the clan was respected as highly as Raina Blackhail.

"I believe you are a strong man, Mace Blackhail," Raina continued, "with
a strong will and a strong arm and the ability to make others do your
bidding. I have seen you on the practice court and know you wield both
the ax and the great sword deftly.  You are clever with words--as the
men from Clan Scarpe so often are--and I suspect you will be clever at
battle as well.  Given these qualities, you may indeed make an excellent
clan chief.  However, I am Dagro Blackhail's widow, and his respect is
my due, and as such I demand that no decision be made tonight."

As the last words left Raina Blackhail's lips and the clan responded to
the mettle in her voice, Raif heard the pounding of footsteps on the
outer stairs.  Even as he gave silent thanks for Raina Blackhail's
caution and saw for himself that no man or woman present would dare defy
her on this matter, the double doors of the Great Hearth burst open.

A clansman, his forehead and cheeks red with sudden exposure to heat,
his nose and eyes running, and his oilskins shedding snow, dashed into
the room, stumbling forward in his haste.  Breathless, his hair damp
with sweat and his boots lip high in mud, he stood a moment, gulping
great mouthfuls of air to still himself, Raif recognized him after a
moment as Will Hawk's son, Bron. A year man fostered to Dhoone.

Raif felt his skin cool as surely as if Bron Hawk had brought the cold
from outside with him.  His stomach knotted, and beneath his buckskin
tunic and wool shirt, his raven lore burned cold like ice.

All gathered held their breath as they waited for Bron Hawk to speak.

Mace Blackhail and the pile of pledged weapons standing below him were
forgotten.  Raina Blackhail's words and her husband's final token lying
beneath her feet slid from the clan's minds like runoff down a slope.
Five hundred pairs of eyes focused with blind intent toward the door.

Bron Hawk pushed the fair hair from his face.  After a brief glance
around the chamber, his gaze finally rested upon Raina Blackball and the
small swordsman Shor Cormalin, who stood at her back.

"Clan Bludd has taken the Dhoonehouse," he said.

"Five nights ago.  They slaughtered three hundred Dhoonesmen with
weapons that drew no blood."

A single hiss of shock and anger united the room.  Raiffelt the knot in
his stomach unfold with soft liquid slowness.  No one would ever
question Mace Blackhail's story about the badlands raid again.

Trapping in the Oldwood rome on.  Put on your coat and oilskin. You're
coming ^ with me." Raina Blackball grabbed the corner of Effie's blanket
and heaved it from the pallet.  Effie Sevrance blinked.  The lamplight
hurt her eyes, and she didn't much like the idea of going outside. The
land beyond the roundhouse was big and open and cold.  A person could
get lost on the fell fields and never be found.

"Please, Raina, I don't want" -- "No, my girl," Raina said, cutting her
short.

"I don't care what you say.  You need some fresh air on that pale face
of yours, and sure as the Stone Gods created the clan holds I'm going to
see you get it."

She patted Erne's thigh.

"Come on now.  We're going to the Old- wood to check my traps, and I
want to be there and back before morning's end."

Movingaround the small cell where Erne slept alone, Raina Blackhail
plucked oilskin, dog mitts, and a wool coat from the chair and the dog
hook where they had been neatly hung or folded.  Effie told herself she
didn't mind Raina being here, not really.  She wasn't like some people
who just wanted to be nosy and make fun.  Letty Shank was always here,
stealing stones, scattering them around the chamber, snatching the lore
from Effie's neck and wearing it herself.

"Look at me," she'd call to Mog Wiley and all the others.

"As dim as the rock the clan guide gave me."

Effie bit her lip.  Everyone would laugh as if it were the runniest
thine they'd ever heard.  Crowdingaround Letty Shank, they would try to
take the lore from her, anxious to wear it themselves.  Rising from the
box pallet, Effie frowned at Raina.  Raina wanted to put on the coat and
mitts for her, but Effie preferred to do it herself.

This made Raina smile.

"There's some good rocks out on the west side ofOldwood, you know, by
Hissip GlufPs place.  You might be able to find something new for your
collection." "They're sandstone," Effie said.

"Like the roundhouse."

"Oh, I don't know about that, Effie Sevrance.   When I was up there last
I could swear I saw something shining beneath my fox trap."

"You did?"  Effie was instantly interested.  She knew Raina Black- hail
wasn't the sort of woman to lie about anything, most especially rocks.

Raina bent and kissed the top ofEffie's head.

"Yes.  Hurry now.  If your oilskins and boots aren't on in the next
minute, I'll have Longhead come down here and plant mushrooms over your
bed.  I swear it's wet enough to grow them here."  She shivered.

"I really do."  Effie almost laughed at the idea of mushrooms growing on
her bed, but she didn't like the way Raina had turned up her pitch lamp
and was now lookingaround the little stone cell with a disapprovingair.
Effie spoke to head her off.

"I don't want to go and sleep with the other girls.  Please.  Anwyn has
given me her best goats wool blanket.  And I keep a torch burning most
of the night."

The worried look that always made Effie feel bad appeared on Raina's
face.

"Bind your mitts tightly," was all she said.

"It's white weather outside."

Effie liked the roundhouse best in early morning.  Few people were
around, mouthwatering smells of bacon and scorched onions wafted up from
the kitchen, and light pouring through the high windows promised good
things to come.  It was as if whatever had gone on the day before was
completely canceled out. As they walked up the ramp to the entrance
hall, the only person they encountered was the luntwoman Nellie Moss.
The skin on Nellie's hands was red and shiny with old scars from torch
burns, and all the

CHAPTER EIGHT.

Trapping in the Oldwood ome on.  Put on your coat and oilskin.  You're
coming with me.  " Raina Blackball grabbed the corner of Erne's blanket
and heaved it from the pallet.

Effie Sevrance blinked.  The lamplight hurt her eyes, and she didn't
much like the idea of going outside.  The land beyond the roundhouse was
big and open and cold.  A person could get lost on the fell fields and
never be found.

"Please, Raina, I don't want" -- "No, my girl," Raina said, cutting her
short.

"I don't care what you say.  You need some fresh air on that pale face
of yours, and sure as the Stone Gods created the clan holds I'm going to
see you get it."

She patted Erne's thigh.

"Come on now.  We're going to the Old- wood to check my traps, and I
want to be there and back before morning's end."

Movingaround the small cell where Effie slept alone, Raina Blackball
plucked oilskin, dog mitts, and a wool coat from the chair and the dog
hook where they had been neatly hung or folded.  Effie told herself she
didn't mind Raina being here, not really.  She wasn't like some people
who just wanted to be nosy and make fun.  Letty Shank was always here,
stealing stones, scattering them arozmd the chamber, snatching the lore
from Effie's neck and wearing it herself.

"Look at me," she'd call to Mog Wiley and all the others.

"As dim as the rock the clan guide gave me."

EfRe bit her lip.  Everyone would laugh as if it were the funniest thing
they'd ever heard.  Crowdingaround Letty Shank, they would try to take
the lore from her, anxious to wear it themselves.  Rising from the box
pallet, Effie frowned at Raina.  Raina wanted to put on the coat and
mitts for her, but Effie preferred to do it herself.

This made Raina smile.

"There's some good rocks out on the west side ofOldwood, you know, by
Hissip Gluffs place.  You might be able to find something new for your
collection."

"They're sandstone," Effie said.

"Like the roundhouse."

"Oh, I don't know about that, Effie Sevrance.   When I was up there last
I could swear I saw something shining beneath my fox trap."   "You did?"
Effie was instantly interested.   She knew Raina Black- hail wasn't the
sort of woman to lie about anything, most especially rocks.

Raina bent and kissed the top ofEffie's head.

"Yes.  Hurry now.  If your oilskins and boots aren't on in the next
minute, I'll have Longhead come down here and plant mushrooms over your
bed.  I swear it's wet enough to grow them here."  She shivered.

"I really do."  Effie almost laughed at the idea of mushrooms growing on
her bed, but she didn't like the way Raina had turned up her pitch lamp
and was now lookingaround the little stone cell with a disapprovingair.
Effie spoke to head her off.

"I don't want to go and sleep with the other girls.  Please.  Anwyn has
given me her best goats wool blanket.  And I keep a torch burning most
of the night."

The worried look that always made Effie feel bad appeared on Raina's
face.

"Bind your mitts tightly," was all she said.

"It's white weather outside."

Effie liked the roundhouse best in early morning.  Few people were
around, mouthwatering smells of bacon and scorched onions wafted up from
the kitchen, and light pouring through the high windows promised good
things to come.  It was as if whatever had gone on the day before was
completely canceled out. As they walked up the ramp to the entrance
hall, the only person they encountered was the luntwoman Nellie Moss.
The skin on Nellie's hands was red and shiny with old scars from torch
burns, and all the other children including Letty Shank and Mog Wiley
were afraid of her. Effie wasn't.  .  .  not quite.  Nellie Moss got to
move about the roundhouse unheeded and did most of her work in the dark.
Effie rather liked the idea of that.

Raina Blackhail stopped Nellie from walking straight past by puttinga
hand on the luntwoman's arm.

"Any sign of their return?"  Nellie shook her head.

"Nay.  None's come back this night."  Raina nodded.  The worried look
crossed her face again.

"If they do come back, be sure to let them know I'm in the Oldwood with
my traps.  I'll be back before noon."

"In the Oldwood with yer traps," repeated Nellie in her low mannish
voice.

Effie thought she saw something unpleasant in Nellie Moss' face, but
when she blinked it was gone.  Briefly EfHe remembered the little
luntman Wennil Drook, who had lit the torches before Nellie.  Effie
didn't believe what anyone said about him stealing Corbie Meese's knife.
Wennil had known things about rocks.  Hardly a week went by in summer
when he didn't bring her some new bit of stone for her collection.

"EfFie.  Pull up your hood."

Effie did as Raina said, and together they left the roundhouse by the
side door that led out past the guide house to the stables.  Everything,
the stables, the graze, the clay court, and the gray stone roof of the
guide house was covered in a thick layer of snow.  Even the little
stream that ran behind the birches--the one Orwin Shank called the Leak
on account of its yellowy green water--was now running beneath a sheet
of snow-covered ice.  It had been snowing on and off for seven days now,
ever since Bron Hawk had returned from Dhoone.  The clan had split up
the following morning.  Mace Blackhail and his pledged men had ridden
east to scout the Dhoonehouse.  Drey was in the party .  .  .

Effie worried about that.  Raif had gone with Shor Gornnalin and others
to Clan Gnash, to learn what they could from the Gnash chief, who shared
borders with Blackhail and Dhoone.  More men still had been put on east-
and south watch and all tied clansmen had been ordered to the roundhouse
to defend it in case of raids.

Mace's and Shor's parties were due back any day.  Then there would be a
big meet where only the sworn clansmen were allowed.

Effie supposed they would make Mace Blackhail chief.  Finally.

"Don't just stand there, Effie Sevrance," Raina said, following the much
trodden path toward the stables.

"You must help me kit and saddle Mercy."

Glancing over the graze to the low sandstone ridge that lay beyond,
Effie chewed on her lip.  The snow made everything seem wide open.

Vast.  The countryside stopped being identifiable parts, like the sheep
graze and the cow graze and Longhead's apple orchard and the Wedge, and
became one whole thing instead.

Inside her chest, Erne's heart began to beat a little faster.  The land
was a big white nothingness, like the spaces in dreams that stretched on
and on and on .  "Oh no you don't, Effie Sevrance," Raina said, tugging
on her arm.

"You're not bolting on me this time.  There's nothing to be afraid of,
only fresh air and snow.  I won't leave you.  I promise."  Effie let
herself be dragged into the stables.  She liked the stables, but not as
much as the dog cotes.  The stables were enclosed by thick stone walls,
but they were large and high roofed, and there was too much space above
a person's head.  Not like the cotes.  The little dog cote was so low
that no grown man could stand in it.  Effie grinned at the memory of
Shor Gormalin's bent back as he'd come to drag her from it two weeks
ago.  He was nice, Shor Gormalin.  He'd understood when she'd told him
that she hadn't really run away at all.

"Just finding a fair spot to think," he had said with a thoughtful nod
of his head.

"I can see that.  Do it myself from time to time.  Though I daresay I'm
inclined to pick somewhere warmer and less chancy than the dog cotes.

Those shanks hounds could tear off a man's head.  " Shankshounds.

Effie's grin widened.  Orwin Shank's dogs were as soft as puppies around
her.

Seeing Effie smile, Raina smiled.

"It'll be nice, you know.  I've grilled us some apple slices wrapped in
bacon."

Suddenly feeling a lot better, Effie began buckling Mercy's bridle.

She loved it when Raina smiled.

When the filly was saddled and two empty leather saddlebags were laid
over her docks, Raina trotted her onto the court.  The Old- wood lay to
the west of the roundhouse, past the graze and up over the north ridge.
Tall spires of paper birch and black spruce broke the skyline, and high
overhead a line of geese flew south.  Fresh snow crackled beneath Erne's
boots, its surface hardened by overnight frost.  It was bitterly cold,
and Effie could feel her cheeks burning beneath her fox hood.  Ice
crystals glittered on the branches of Longhead's saplings.

Effie crossed her arms over her chest and walked with her mitted hands
thrust under her armpits.  Winter always came fast to Clan Blackball. Da
said it was because .  .  .

Effie stopped dead.

There was no Da.

Da had gone.

"Effie."  Raina spoke softly, her voice sounding very far away.

"It's all right, little one.  You'll be safe with me.  I swear it."
Something hurt at the back of Effie's eyes.  She blinked, but it
wouldn't go away.  Raina said things and squeezed her shoulder, but
Effie barely felt or heard.  Her lore pressed against her collarbone
like a poking finger.  Da was gone.  And she had known something wasn't
right from the very first morning he'd ridden away.  Her lore had told
her so.

"Come on, Effie Sevrance.  Up on Mercy."  Effie felt Raina's hands slip
under her arms and lift her clear off the ground.  She saw the sky come
closer, white and choked with snow clouds, then felt her bottom come
down on the hard leather saddle.

"There.  Take the reins.  Mercy will treat you well.  Won't you, Mercy?"
Raina patted her filly's neck.

Effie took the reins and let Raina adjust the stirrups to her feet.

Beneath her oilskins and wool coat, Effie was aware of her lore pushing,
pushing" against her skin.  It wanted to tell her something .

.  like the day Da had ridden north to the badlands.  Effie shook her
head. She didn't want to know.  Her lore told bad things.  It made her
feel queasy inside.

Cluthing the reins in her left hand, she reached down inside her oilskin
and pulled out the little rock given to her by the clan guide at birth.
One sharp tug was all it took to snap the twine.  Even through her dogs
king mitts the rock felt alive.  It wasn't warm and it didn't move, but
somehow it pushed.

"What's the matter, Effie?  Has the rock scratched your skin?"  Raina
was walkingalongside Mercy, looking up at Effie, her face all creased
and pale.

Leaning back in the saddle, Effie reached back with her hand to feel for
one of the saddlebags.  When her mitt slipped under the leather lid, she
released her grip on the lore and let it fall to the bottom of the bag.
A tight itchiness prickled through her stomach as it dropped.  She took
a breath, told herself it was silly to be afraid of a rock no bigger
than her nose.

"I'm fine, Raina.  Just.  .  .  cold.  The rock felt cold against my
skin."

Raina nodded her head in a way that made Effie feel bad.  She hated to
lie.

They walked in silence after that.  Raina led Mercy over the ridge and
into the bottom lands beyond.  Old elms, basswoods, oaks, and dog
birches began to spike the path, their bare limbs clutchingat the sky
with every gust of wind. Gobs of frozen sap shone like eyes in the
places where branches split into twigs, and deep within their
hollowed-out boles, wet ice glittered like teeth.

Effie shivered.  Normally she liked old trees, yet today she found
herself seeing only the bad things: the wood ear fungus eating into the
bark, the slimy green moss growing on south-facing trunks, and the tubes
of root wood poking through the earth around the bases of the old oaks.
Surely roots weren't meant to be seen?  Just looking at them made Effie
feel queer, as if she were catchinga glimpse of hidden things, like the
pale wingless insects that lived under the roundhouse floorboards and
deep within its walls.

Feeling her heart begin to patter again, Effie looked away.  Fixing her
gaze on the space between Mercy's ears, she tried not to think of her
lore lying at the bottom of Raina's saddlebag or the roots of the old
oaks.  She wished she didn't have her mitts on and could touch Mercy's
neck.  She knew it would be warm and soft and nice.

"Good girl," she whispered, needing to hear the plain sound of her own
voice.

"Good Mercy."

The Oldwood crept up on one slowly.  First there was just a softening of
the ground underfoot, a few bushy birches and alders, and a string of
old elms. Then the ground snow thinned, revealing the broad leaves of
winter ferns and stripped shoots of milkweed.  A little later there were
rounded boulders speckled white with bird lime and yellow with withered
moss.  Then every time you took a step, years of dead and frozen matter
crackled beneath your feet. The light dropped, then later the wind.  The
smell of damp earth and slowly decaying things sharpened.  And finally,
after you walked a while longer past rotten stumps and needle-thin
streams, you were there, surrounded by a shuddering, creaking forest of
basswood, elm, and oak.  The Oldwood.

Effie was glad to get out of the open spaces of the valley, pleased that
she could no longer see more than a short walk ahead.  Still, it was
very quiet and the wind didn't quite blow through the trees: It hissed.
Effie glanced at Raina, wishing she would speak.  Raina was quiet,
though, her face tilted down toward the path.  There was a ring of mud
and snow melt around the hem other woolen skirt, and ice crystals had
formed along the breath line other hood.

Effie dearly wanted to say something to Raina, something funny or
interesting or clever, but she wasn't very good at talking.  Not like
Letty Shank and Mog Wiley.

In silence, Raina led them through the north corner of the Old- wood and
onto the west fringe.  The temperature had risen slightly, and the snow
underfoot was no longer as brittle as it had been.  A few winter birds,
mostly robins and grouse, called to each other from places Effie
couldn't see.  Every now and then she felt something push against the
base of her spine.  It was a metal buckle or a hard lump of leather in
the saddle.  It had to be.  Her lore couldn't push right through the
saddlebags and Mercy's rump.  It couldn't.

The west fringe of the Oldwood was best for traps.  Many clans- women
trapped animals here, and all had their own territories and secret
places.  Effie knew Raina's places well.  Raina had exclusive rights to
the stream between the two sister willows and the bluff, and to the
bluff itself, where bear berries and blackberries grew high atop the
ridge. Effie didn't know much about trapping game, but she knew that the
berry bushes were a good thing.  All sorts of creatures came to eat the
fruit. They arrived at Raina's trapping ground while the sun was still
rising.

Effie slid down from the filly's back as Raina hiked up the bluff.

Reaching the top of the bank, Raina ducked beneath a bear- berry bush to
inspect one of her traps.  After a moment she made a pleased sound.

"I've got one, Effie.  A fox.  A big one with a beautiful coat.  It's
still warm."

Effie walked a little way up the ridge, deliberately putting some
distance between herself and the saddlebag containing her lore.  She
wished the fox hadn't been warm.  That meant Raina would stop and skin
it before it froze. You couldn't skin a frozen fox.

Raina emerged from the bush holdinga blue fox by the scruff of its neck.
Its yellow eyes were still open, but there was no fox cunning spilling
out.

"Effie.  Fetch the skinning knife from my left saddlebag."

Effie wasn't very good at her left and rights.  She needed to have both
her hands in front of her to work it out.  Making a little weighing
movement with her mitted fingers, she frowned.  The left bag was the one
containing her lore.  Heart beating just a little bit quicker than
moments earlier, she weighed her left and rights again.

"Effie!  Hurry now!  I want to be back by noon."

Raina's voice was sharper than normal, and Effie ran the short distance
back to Mercy.  Eyes closed, lips pressed firmly together, she thrust a
mitted hand into the saddlebag.  Even as her fingers found and closed
around the cool metal of the skinning knife, her lore pushed against the
back of her hand.  Effie jumped.  Her lore wanted to be picked up and
held .  .  .  like the time in the small dog cote just before Shor
Gormalin came.

"No," Effie whispered.

"Please.  I don't want to know."  "Effie, the knife!"

Crabbing tight hold of the knife, Effie yanked her arm free of the
saddlebag. She spent the next moment standing perfectly still, her face
all scrunched, the knife held out at arm's length, waiting to see if
anything terrible would happen.  Only nothing did.  Trees creaked.  An
owl that didn't know what time of day it was hooted.  Breathinga sigh of
relief, Effie ran up the slope and joined Raina.  Raina had already cut
the trap wire from the fox's snout and was busy brushingaway bits of
leaves and snow from its coat.  Etfie handed her the knife, but as she
did so the temptation to lean in close and hug Raina was overpowering,
and she wrapped her arms around Raina's waist.

"Little one.  Little one."  Raina pulled down Erne's hood and stroked
her hair.

"I shouldn't have brought you all this way.  It was wrong of me."

Effie didn't much care that Raina had misunderstood things.  The sound
of Raina's voice, gentle, good, and completely familiar, was all that
counted. Just to hear it made Effie feel better.  She hugged her for a
bit longer and then pulled away.  Raina let her go.  The fox hung by its
brush from her free hand, and Effie could tell she was eager to skin it
and be gone.

"I know," Raina said, making a small gesture indicating that Effie
should pull up her hood against the cold, "why don't you go and check on
the other side of the bushes for those shiny stones we were talking
about?  Right between the two oaks, under the bear- berry."  As Effie
nodded, snow and earth crackled in the bushes below.  Branches moved.  A
jackdaw took to the air, screamingat the sky as it flew.

Metal jingled softly.

Raina beckoned Effie to her.  She had already made the first incision
along the fox's snout, and there was a film of blood on her blade.  As
Effie came forward, she let the fox drop to the ground.

Mace Blackhail emerged from the bushes below them, leading his blue roan
by the reins.  The gelding was lathered, its coat steaming in the cold
air and its nostrils frothing with mucus.  Mud was sprayed over its
belly and legs, and the skin around its saddle was patchy and chaffed.
Mace Blackhail looked lime better.  His fox hood was matted with muck
and ice, and his cheeks were burned red by snow glare.

"Foster Mother!"  he called.

"I arrived back at the roundhouse a quarter after you left."

Raina made no reply.  Her fingers dug into Effie's shoulders.  Mace
Blackhail shrugged.  Coming to a halt, he tied the roan's reins to a
whip-thin birch. Effie heard metal things--weapons, she supposed--clink
beneath his oilskins.

"We need to talk, you and I, Foster Mother."  Mace shot a glance Effie's
way.

"Alone and in private."

Not releasing her grip on Effie's shoulder or the skinning knife, Raina
began to descend the slope.

"Effie's but a child.  She won't" -- "She's a Sevrance," cut in Mace
Blackhail.

"She'll go running back to that dark-eyed brother of hers, sniveling and
telling tales."

"You mean Raif?"   Raina's voice had a catch to it that Effie didn't
understand.

"As you and Drey seem to get along well enough.  He seemed eager enough
to pledge his hammer to you the same night Bron came from Dhoone."

Mace Blackhail pulled down his hood.  His face was dark, thin from long
days in the saddle.

"Get rid of the child, Raina."  Effie kept herself still.  She imagined
she could still feel her lore pressingagainst her mitted hand.

Raina took a small breath and patted Effie's shoulder.  Lowering her
head, she spoke words for Effie's ears alone.

"Run along and find those stones behind the bushes like we talked about.
I'll keep watch.

I won't leave without you.  I promise.  "

Effie twisted her head around so she could look at Raina's face.  What
she saw frightened her.

"Raina?"

"Go, Effie."  Raina patted her shoulder--harder this time.

"Go.

Everything will be fine here.  There's nothing to worry about.  It's
just me and Mace.  "

Effie scrambled down the slope.  Mace Blackhail watched her descend.

When she drew level with the horses.  Mercy whickered, and Effie reached
out to touch her neck.

Push.

Snapping her hand back, Effie bit hard on her lip to stop any noise from
leaving her mouth.  It couldn't be her lore.  It couldn't.  Turning on
her heel, she found herself face-to-face with Mace Blackball.  Before
she could move away, Mace grabbed her chin with a gloved hand.

His hair dripped snow melt onto his cheeks as he angled her face one way
and then the other.  He smelled of skinned animals.  His voice when it
came was as smooth and cold as ice.

"As it is you'll be no great beauty.  Though you're liable to end up
worse if you go telling tales."

"Leave her alone!"  It was Raina, coming down the slope.  Effle noticed
she still had the skinning knife in her hand.

Mace Blackball smacked Erne's buttocks.

"Don't come back until I'm gone."

Effle dashed away into the bushes, hardly caring where she was headed.
She heard Raina call out to her, some sort of warningabout not going too
far, yet Effie could barely hear it over the fast beating of her heart.
A finger of oak scraped along her cheek.  Ferns slapped at her boots and
skirt, and snow and twigs crackled beneath her feet.  She hardly knew if
she was running from Mace Blackhail or her lore.

When the ground finally steepened, Effie slowed.  Her hood was down, but
her face didn't feel cold at all.  Breath fogged as it left her mouth.
She glanced over her shoulder, but all she saw were oaks and elms
barricading the way.  Oak roots peeped out above the snow line, pale and
fat like worms.

Effie looked away.  Up the slope and off to the left lay the backs of
the bearberry bushes where Raina kept her traps.  Effie frowned.  Going
that way would almost be the same as going back to the clearing.  But
Raina had told her not to go far.  Unsure of what to do, she hesitated;
her hand stole up to her neck, searching for the lore that wasn't there.
Funny how she always held it when she had decisions to make.  Laying her
mitted palm flat on her chest, she tried to still her heart instead. She
wished Raina were here.

A light wind blew through the trees and up the slope, making top snow
ruffle like an animal's coat.  Effie chewed on her lip.  She didn't like
Mace Blackhail, and it made her stomach go all right to think of him
alone with Raina.

With a small flick of her head, she started up the slope.  She didn't
need an old piece of rock to make decisions for her. She was old enough
to make them herself.  The back of the bluff was harder to climb than
the front.  Littered with loose rocks and fallen logs all slippery and
green, the south slope was normally used by foxes and Hissip Gluff's
goats.  The snow made everything worse, hiding brambles, sinkholes, and
root wood Effie plucked up her skirt and held it high above her knees.
Somewhere below her she could hear the willow stream running over
sandstone.

She didn't look down.  By the time she reached the top of the slope her
skirt was black with snow and mud.  Ahead she saw the line of bear
berries and the two oaks Raina had mentioned earlier.  Although she
didn't much feel like it, Effie turned her mind to stones.  Shiny ones,
Raina had said.  Beneath the bushes.

"Get away from me!"

Effie stopped dead at the sound of Raina's voice.  She wondered if snow
hadn't worked its way inside her collar, for something liquid and icy
slid down her spine.  Raina.

Thrashing through snow and ferns, Effie dashed to the far side of the
ridge where the bushes grew.  One of Rama's traps could clearly be seen
on the ground beneath the densest cluster of stems, its lip open,
waiting to be sprung.  Swingingaway from it, Effie fell to her knees and
crawled the rest of the way.

No more words came from below, but she could hear twigs snapping and
oilskins creaking.  One of the horses stamped its hooves.  A breath was
sharply taken, then the clear sound of a belt buckle unsnapping chimed
through the air like a bell.

Down on her belly in the snow, Effie pushed herself along by her knees
and feet.  Her heart thumped against the ground.  She was listening so
hard her jaw ached.

More sounds.  Oilskins, mostly, and crunching snow.  Someone or
something grunted: Effie couldn't tell whether it was Mace Blackhail or
one of the horses.

Easing her head into the tangle of stems and leaves that marked the edge
of the ridge, she peered into the clearing below.  She saw Mace
Blackhail's roan first, then Mercy.  Red bear berries cold and almost
frozen, tapped against her cheeks like glass beads.  Tiny little thorns
snagged at her sleeves as she moved closer to the edge.  Hard breaths
sounded, and Effie's gaze found Mace Blackhail's back.  It was moving up
and down.  Effie frowned.  Where was Raina?  That was when she noticed
Mace Blackhail's hand; it was pressed hard against Rama's mouth.  Raina
was beneath him.  On the ground.  In the snow.  Her oilskin was spread
open about her.  Erne's chest tightened.  What was he doing to her? Even
as she looked, she saw Mace Blackhail lean forward and kiss Raina's
face.  Raina jerked her head back.  Mace continued moving up and down.
He was breathing very hard now.

A glint of silver on the ground near the horses caught Effie's eye.

Raina's knife.  From where she lay, Effie could just make out three
blotches of blood sunk deep into the surrounding snow.  Her gaze was
drawn back to Mace Blackhail.  He shuddered, issued a hard cry like a
cough, then slumped onto Raina's chest.  Raina's eyes were closed.

Mace no longer had his hand over her mouth, but she made no move to cry
out, simply lay there with her eyes closed, perfectly still.  Mace said
something to her that Effie didn't catch, then he rolled to the side and
picked himself off the ground.  Still Raina did not move.  Her skirt was
hitched up about her waist and her tunic was open, revealing her linen
under bodice beneath. Effie averted her eyes: like the oak roots, they
were things not meant to be seen.

Mace Blackball belted and fastened himself up.  His sword swung at his
waist, held in place by a doeskin scabbard dyed black.  As he returned
to his horse, Effie saw a line of bright blood on his cheek and a second
on his neck.  When he approached Raina's skinning knife, he kicked it
hard, sending the silver blade shooting into a tangle of snowy gorse. He
spat, smoothed back his hair, and then mounted the blue roan.  The
gelding shook its mane and switched its tail, but Mace pulled hard on
the bit, taking command of its head.

Turning the gelding, Mace Blackhail took a moment to regard Raina as she
lay on the ground.  Raina still had not moved.  Effie could just see the
rise and fall of her chest.  Her eyes were closed, but as Mace looked on
she opened them.

Mace's mouth twisted.

"Tidy yourself before you return," he said.

"If we are to be wed--as this surely means we must--then I will not have
my wife arrayed like a coarse house wench for all to see."  With that,
he kicked the roan into a trot and rode from the clearing.  Effie
watched him go.  The left side of her face was numb, and her entire body
was colder than she could ever remember it being before.  Even her heart
felt cold.  For a reason she didn't understand, she began naming the
Stone Gods.  Inigar Stoop said they were hard gods and they answered no
small prayers.  Never ask anything for yourself, Effie Sevrance, Inigar
s hard old voice reminded her.  Ask only that they watch over the clan.
To Effie, Raina Blackhail was the clan, so she spoke the nine sacred
names of the gods.

As she named Behathmus, who was called the Dark God and was said to have
eyes of black iron, Raina began to stir in the clearing below.

Her legs came upward and her arms slid inward and her chin came down to
her chest.  She shrank as Effie watched, her body closingaround itself
like a dead and curling leaf.  No noise left her lips, no tears spilled
from her eyes, she just drew herself smaller and smaller until Effie
thought her back would break.

Effie cried for her.  She didn't know that she was crying until the
wetness reached her mouth and she tasted salt.  Something bad had
happened.  And Effie wasn't sure what it was, but she knew two things
without question: Raina was hurt.

And she, Effie Sevrance, could have stopped it.

Her lore had known.  It had wanted to tell her.  It had tried to tell
her. It had pushed and pushed, but she'd refused to listen.

Scrambling free of the bushes, she brushed snow and ice from her
oilskin, hood, and skirt.  She didn't know if she was still crying; her
cheeks were too numb to feel tears.

She could have stopped Mace Blackhail from hurting Raina.  She could
have taken the lore in her fist and held it until she saw the bad thing.
It had happened like that with Da .  almost frozen, tapped against her
cheeks like glass beads.  Tiny little thorns snagged at her sleeves as
she moved closer to the edge.  Hard breaths sounded, and Effle's gaze
found Mace Blackhail's back.  It was moving up and down.  Effie frowned.
Where was Raina?  That was when she noticed Mace Blackhail's hand; it
was pressed hard against Raina's mouth.  Raina was beneath him.  On the
ground. In the snow.  Her oilskin was spread open about her.  Erne's
chest tightened. What was he doing to her?  Even as she looked, she saw
Mace Blackhail lean forward and kiss Raina's face.  Raina jerked her
head back.  Mace continued moving up and down.  He was breathing very
hard now.

A glint of silver on the ground near the horses caught Erne's eye.

Raina's knife.  From where she lay, Effie could just make out three
blotches of blood sunk deep into the surrounding snow.  Her gaze was
drawn back to Mace Blackhail.  He shuddered, issued a hard cry like a
cough, then slumped onto Raina's chest.  Raina's eyes were closed.

Mace no longer had his hand over her mouth, but she made no move to cry
out, simply lay there with her eyes closed, perfectly still.  Mace said
something to her that Effie didn't catch, then he rolled to the side and
picked himself off the ground.  Still Raina did not move.  Her skirt was
hitched up about her waist and her tunic was open, revealing her linen
under bodice beneath. Effie averted her eyes: like the oak roots, they
were things not meant to be seen.

Mace Blackhail belted and fastened himself up.  His sword swung at his
waist, held in place by a doeskin scabbard dyed black.  As he returned
to his horse, Effie saw a line of bright blood on his cheek and a second
on his neck.  When he approached Raina's skinning knife, he kicked it
hard, sending the silver blade shooting into a tangle of snowy gorse. He
spat, smoothed back his hair, and then mounted the blue roan.  The
gelding shook its mane and switched its tail, but Mace pulled hard on
the bit, taking command of its head.

Turning the gelding, Mace Blackhail took a moment to regard Raina as she
lay on the ground.  Raina still had not moved.  Effie could just see the
rise and fall of her chest.  Her eyes were closed, but as Mace looked on
she opened them.

Mace's mouth twisted.

"Tidy yourself before you return," he said.

"If we are to be wed--as this surely means we must--then I will not have
my wife arrayed like a coarse house wench for all to see."  With that,
he kicked the roan into a trot and rode from the clearing.  Effie
watched him go.  The left side of her face was numb, and her entire body
was colder than she could ever remember it being before.  Even her heart
felt cold.  For a reason she didn't understand, she began naming the
Stone Gods.  Inigar Stoop said they were hard eods and they answered no
small prayers.  Never ask anything for yourself, Effie Sevrance,
Inigar's hard old voice reminded her.  Ask only that they watch over the
clan.  To Erne, Raina Blackhail was the clan, so she spoke the nine
sacred names of the gods.

As she named Behathmus, who was called the Dark God and was said to have
eyes of black iron, Raina began to stir in the clearing below.

Her legs came upward and her arms slid inward and her chin came down to
her chest.  She shrank as EfFie watched, her body closingaround itself
like a dead and curling leaf.  No noise left her lips, no tears spilled
from her eyes, she just drew herself smaller and smaller until Effie
thought her back would break.

Effie cried for her.  She didn't know that she was crying until the
wetness reached her mouth and she tasted salt.  Something bad had
happened.  And Effie wasn't sure what it was, but she knew two things
without question: Raina was hurt.

And she, Effie Sevrance, could have stopped it.

Her lore had known.  It had wanted to tell her.  It had tried to tell
her. It had pushed and pushed, but she'd refused to listen.

Scrambling free of the bushes, she brushed snow and ice from her
oilskin, hood, and skirt.  She didn't know if she was still crying; her
cheeks were too numb to feel tears.

She could have stopped Mace Blackhail from hurting Raina.  She could
have taken the lore in her fist and held it until she saw the bad thing.
It had happened like that with Da .  almost frozen, tapped against her
cheeks like glass beads.  Tiny little thorns snagged at her sleeves as
she moved closer to the edge.  Hard breaths sounded, and Effie's gaze
found Mace Blackhail's back.  It was moving up and down.  Effie frowned.
Where was Raina?  That was when she noticed Mace Blackhail's hand; it
was pressed hard against Rama's mouth.  Raina was beneath him.  On the
ground. In the snow.  Her oilskin was spread open about her.

Effie's chest tightened.  What was he doing to her?  Even as she looked,
she saw Mace Blackhail lean forward and kiss Raina's face.

Raina jerked her head back.  Mace continued moving up and down.  He was
breathing very hard now.

A glint of silver on the ground near the horses caught Effie's eye.

Raina's knife.  From where she lay, Effie could just make out three
blotches of blood sunk deep into the surrounding snow.  Her gaze was
drawn back to Mace Blackhail.  He shuddered, issued a hard cry like a
cough, then slumped onto Raina's chest.  Raina's eyes were closed.

Mace no longer had his hand over her mouth, but she made no move to cry
out, simply lay there with her eyes closed, perfectly still.  Mace said
something to her that Effie didn't catch, then he rolled to the side and
picked himself off the ground.  Still Raina did not move.  Her skirt was
hitched up about her waist and her tunic was open, revealing her linen
under bodice beneath. Effie averted her eyes: like the oak roots, they
were things not meant to be seen.

Mace Blackhail belted and fastened himself up.  His sword swung at his
waist, held in place by a doeskin scabbard dyed black.  As he returned
to his horse, Effie saw a line of bright blood on his cheek and a second
on his neck.  When he approached Raina's skinning knife, he kicked it
hard, sending the silver blade shooting into a tangle of snowy gorse. He
spat, smoothed back his hair, and then mounted the blue roan.  The
gelding shook its mane and switched its tail, but Mace pulled hard on
the bit, taking command of its head.

Turning the gelding.  Mace Blackhail took a moment to regard Raina as
she lay on the ground.  Raina still had not moved.  Effie could just see
the rise and fall of her chest.  Her eyes were closed, but as Mace
looked on she opened them.

Mace's mouth twisted.

"Tidy yourself before you return," he said.

"If we are to be wed--as this surely means we must--then I will not have
my wife arrayed like a coarse house wench for all to see."  With that,
he kicked the roan into a trot and rode from the clearing.  Effie
watched him go.  The left side of her face was numb, and her entire body
was colder than she could ever remember it being before.  Even her heart
felt cold.  For a reason she didn't understand, she began naming the
Stone Gods.  Inigar Stoop said they were hard gods and they answered no
small prayers.  Never ask anything for yourself, Effie Sevrance, Inigar
s hard old voice reminded her.  Ask only that they watch over the clan.
To Effie, Raina Blackball was the clan, so she spoke the nine sacred
names of the gods.

As she named Behathmus, who was called the Dark God and was said to have
eyes of black iron, Raina began to stir in the clearing below.

Her legs came upward and her arms slid inward and her chin came down to
her chest.  She shrank as Effie watched, her body closingaround itself
like a dead and curling leaf.  No noise left her lips, no tears spilled
from her eyes, she just drew herself smaller and smaller until Effie
thought her back would break.

Effie cried for her.  She didn't know that she was crying until the
wetness reached her mouth and she tasted salt.  Something bad had
happened.  And Effie wasn't sure what it was, but she knew two things
without question: Raina was hurt.

And she, Effie Sevrance, could have stopped it.

Her lore had known.  It had wanted to tell her.  It had tried to tell
her. It had pushed and pushed, but she'd refused to listen.

Scrambling free of the bushes, she brushed snow and ice from her
oilskin, hood, and skirt.  She didn't know if she was still crying; her
cheeks were too numb to feel tears.

She could have stopped Mace Blackhail from hurting Raina.  She could
have taken the lore in her fist and held it until she saw the bad thing.
It had happened like that with Da .  A deep shiver worked its way up her
spine.  Suddenly anxious to be away, back inside the small enclosed
space of her cell, she ran along the ridge and down the slope.

She didn't know how long it took her to get back to Raina--a quarter,
perhaps; no longer--but by the time she reached the clearing Raina had
become herself.  Her hair was newly smoothed, her skirt free of ice, and
her oilskin fastened tightly all the way down to her knees.  She smiled
briefly as Effie approached.

"I was just about to come looking for you.  It's time we were home.

Come on.  I'll put you on Mercy's back.  " Her voice was level with just
a slight strain to it.  Her eyes were dead.

Effie didn't speak.  A lump had come to her throat.

CHAPTER NINE.

The Dhooneseat Vaylo Bludd spat at his dog.  He would have preferred to
spit at his second son, but he didn't.  The dog, a hunter and wolf mix
with a neck as wide as a door, bared its teeth and snarled at his
master.  Other dogs leashed behind it made low growling noises in the
backs of their throats. The wad of black curd spat by Vaylo Bludd landed
on the first dog's foreleg, and the dog chewed at its own fur and skin
to get it off.  Vaylo didn't smile, but he was pleased.  That one
definitely owed more to the wolf.

"So, son," he said, still looking at the dog, "what would you have me do
next, seems you ill like the plans made by your father?"  Vaylo Bludd's
second son, Pengo Bludd, grunted.  He was standing too close to the
fire, and his already red face now glowed like something baked in an
oven.  His spiked hammer trailed on the floor behind him like a dog on a
leash.

"We must attack Blackhail while the win is still upon us.  If we sit on
our arses now, we miss our chance to take the clan holds in a single
strike."

Sitting back on the great stone Dhooneseat that formed the center of the
mightiest and best fortified roundhouse in the clan holds Vaylo Bludd
considered spittingagain.  With no black curd in his mouth, he worked up
a dose of saliva by jabbing his tongue against his teeth.

Stone Gods!  But his teeth ached!  One of these days he was going to
find a man to pull them out.  Find a man, then kill him.  Vaylo Bludd
swallowed the spit.  He took a moment to look at his second son.  Pengo
Bludd had not shaved back his hairline in days, and a bristling band of
hair framed his face.  The longer hair at the back, with its braids and
twists, was similarly ill tended.  Bits of goose down and hay were
caught in the matted strands.  Vaylo Bludd made a hard sound in his
throat.  Legitimate offspring were born to complacency and arrogance.
You wouldn't see such sloth on a bastard!  "Son," he said, his voice as
low as a dog growl,

"I have lorded this clan for thirty-five years--a good five of that
before you were born.  Now I daresay you'd think it boastful of me to
point out just how far Bludd has come under my lording, but I say I
don't care.  I am clan chief.  Me, the Dog Lord.  Not you, lord of
nothing but what I choose to give you."

Pengo's eyes narrowed.  The hand that held his leather hammer loop
cracked as it curled to a fist.

"We have Dhoone.  We can have Blackhail as well.  The Bailsmen" -- Vaylo
Bludd kicked out at the wolf dog, making it jump back and yowl.

"The Hailsmen will be expecting us to attack.  They'll have that
roundhouse of theirs sealed as tight as a virgin's arse the minute we
break their bounds.  Hailsmen aren't fools.  They won't be found
slacking like Dhoones."

"But-" "Enough!"  The Dog Lord stood.  All the dogs leashed to the rat
hooks skittered back.

"What advantages we had here will not be easily got again.  They come
with a price, as such things do.  And it will be for me to say when and
if we use such means again.  We have Dhoone.  Make use of it.  Go, take
Drybone and as many of those useless brothers of yours as you can muster
afore noon, and ride out to the Gnash border and secure it.  All the
Dhoonesmen that rode away are likely there, and if an attack is going to
come, then it will more than likely start at Gnash."  Vaylo smiled,
showing black aching teeth.

"While you're out there mayhap you can claim what land you see fit for
your steading.  I heard it said once that a chief should always house
his sons on his borders."

Pengo Bludd snarled.  Tugging on his hammer loop, he raised his hammer
from the floor and weighed its lime wood handle across his chest.  The
spiked hammer head bristled like a basket of knives.  Eyes the same
color as his father's burned coldly like the blue inner tongue of
flames.  Without a word he turned on his heel, his braids and twists
swinging out from his skull as he moved.

When he reached the chamber door, Vaylo stopped him with one word.

"Son."

"What?"  Pengo did not turn around.

"Send the bairns to me afore you leave."

Pengo Bludd snapped his head, then continued his journey from the door.
He slammed it with all his might behind him.

The Dog Lord took a long breath when he was gone.  The dogs, all five of
them including the wolf dog, were quiet.  After a moment Vaylo bent on
one knee and beckoned them as near as their various leashes would allow.
He tousled them and slapped their bellies and tested their speed by
grabbing their tails.  They snarled and snapped and nipped him, wetting
his hands and wrists with their frothy saliva.  They were good dogs, all
of them.

Unlike most hunters and sled dogs, whose fangs were filed to stop them
chewing through leashes and ruining pelts by tearingat game, Vaylo's own
dogs still had fangs of full length and sharpness.  They could rip out a
man's throat on his say.  None of them had names.

Vaylo had long ago stopped keeping track of all the names of those
around him.  A man with seven sons who all had wives and in-laws and
children of their own soon gave up keeping tally on what people were
called.  What they were was the only thing that counted.  Feeling
separate pangs of pain in each of his remaining seventeen teeth, the Dog
Lord stood.  Bones in his knees cracked as they dealt with his weight.
The Dhooneseat, carved from a single slab of bluestone as tall as a
horse, beckoned him back.  Vaylo moved away from it, pickinga plain oak
wood stool close to the hearth.  He was too old for stone thrones and
too wary of growing used to them.  A bastard learned early that he
always had to be ready to give up his place.  Glancing toward the door
that his second son had slammed moments earlier, Vaylo frowned. That was
the problem with all of his sons: None of them knew what it was to give
up their place to another.  They knew only the politics of take.

Behind his back, Vaylo could hear the dogs scrapping among themselves.
He heard the wolf dog's low distinctive growl, and he knew without
turning to look that the dog was beingattacked by the others because of
the favor its master had showed it.  Vaylo made no move to interfere.
Such was the way of life.

So, he thought, stretching out his legs before the fire as he looked
around the room, this is the great Dhoone roundhouse.  Men calling
themselves kings had lived here once.  Now there were only chiefs.  A
smile spread across Vaylo's face as he remembered the last time he was
here.  He had not been invited that time either.  Thirty-six years ago
it was now, in the dead of night while Airy Dhoone, the clan chief at
the time, and his sixty best men were away.  Vaylo slapped his thigh.
That bloody guide stone had been murder to move!  Old Ockish Bull had
ended up with a hernia as big as a fist!  And of the other four dozen
clansmen who had helped pull it free from the guide house only two were
able to move the next day, and none could mount their horses for a week.

Vaylo chuckled.  The whole operation had been without a doubt the most
misguided, ill-planned, fool-stupid thing fifty grown men had ever
conspired to do.  They never did get the guide stone farther than Blue
Dhoone Lake.  It was still there today, at the bottom of the
copper-tinted lake, restingamid the silt and the sandstone, sunk within
three hundred paces of the Dhoonehouse itself.

None but the fifty knew that, of course.  When they returned to the
Bludd roundhouse twenty days later, all swore blind that the collection
of rocks they arrived with, pulled by a team of mules in a war cart, was
none other than the broken-down guide stone itself.  Not some
quarry-purchased rubble and a bucket of ground glass.  And it had made
such an excellent outhouse . Vaylo Bludd leaned forward on his stool.
Those were the days!  Jaw was all that counted.  Jaw had taken him, a
bastard son with only half a name and enemies for brothers, to the chief
ship he held today.  Take, he had.  But it wasn't an assuming,
born-to-expect-it kind of take.  It was take hard learned and hard won.
He hadn't gone to his father for a handout.  Gullit Bludd had said but a
handful of words to his bastard son from the moment he'd acknowledged
him as his own.  And a good half of them were curses.

Knocking.

The Dog Lord looked to the door.  He had been too long alone and his
mind had got thinking, and that was never what a Bludds- man was about.

"Enter."

Expecting his second son's children, who had arrived from the Bluddhouse
that morning, Vaylo had his gaze focused halfway down the door when it
opened.  A man's waist met his eyes.  Seeing the long white robe and
smooth, almost womanish hands, the Dog Lord let out a hard sigh.  If you
dealt with the devil, his helpers always arrived soon enough.

"Sarga Veys.  When did you get here?"

A tall man with a sallow complexion and womanish eyes entered the room.
Although dressed in the plain white robe of a cleric, Sarga Veys was no
man of God.

"In my own small way, Lord Bludd, I have been here all along."

Vaylo hated the man's high voice and the overly fine shape of his lips.
He hated being called Lord Bludd too.  He was nothing but the Dog Lord,
and both he and his enemies knew it.  Suddenly angry, he cried,

"Close the door behind you, man!"

Sarga Veys was quick to do his bidding, moving in the loose- jointed way
of a man possessing little physical strength.  The dogs growled behind
his back. Sarga Veys didn't like the dogs, and when he was finished with
the door, he moved as far away from them as possible.

When he spoke, a tremor that may have been fear, yet Vaylo Bludd
suspected was anger, showed itself in his voice.

"I see you're making yourself at home.  Lord Bludd.  The Dhooneseat
quite suits you."  A small nod on Sarga Veys' part led the Dog Lord's
gaze to the foot of the Dhooneseat, where a thin strip of leather lay on
the stone.

Vaylo's eyes narrowed.  Such a tiny thing, a bit of leather fallen from
his braids, yet the devil's helper had picked up on it straightaway.

Not for the first time, Vaylo reminded himself to be cautious of this
man.

"So," he said, hands patting his belt for his pouch of black curd.

"You've been within the clan holds all along.  Tell me, did you stay in
the safe refuge of a stove house Or did your master want you closer for
the show?"

"I don't think," Sarga Veys said, color rising to his cheeks, "that
where I stay is any business of yours."

The dogs found much to dislike in Sarga Veys' tone of voice.  Snarling
and snapping, they tested their leashes in his direction.  The wolf dog
began worryingat its tether.

Sarga Veys' mouth shrank.  His violet eyes darkened.  "Dogs'" called
Vaylo Bludd.

"Quiet!"

The dogs became silent immediately, dropping their heads and tails and
slumping down onto the cut stone floor.

The Dog Lord watched Sarga Veys closely.  Wondered, for a brief moment,
if he hadn't seen the man's throat workingalong with his violet eyes.
That was another thing to remember about devil's helpers: No matter how
weak they looked they were seldom defenseless.

Sarga Veys was a magic user, Vaylo was sure of it.

"Did you ride here alone, or with a sept?"

"I head a sept as always."

Head?  Vaylo doubted that.  Protected by one, more like it.  Seven fully
trained, fighting-fit swordsmen would hardly allow a man like Sarga Veys
to lead them.  Hard campaigners couldn't stand his type.  "I shall be
riding south to meet my master after I've left here."  Sarga Veys seemed
more at ease now the dogs were quiet.  He took a moment to smooth back
his fine hair.

"I shall tell him, of course, of your great success.  Assure him that
everything went smoothly, and report that you are well on your way to
becoming Lord of the Clans."  Sarga Veys smiled, showing small, white,
but ever so slightly inward-slanting teeth.

"My master will be pleased.  He has done his part.  Now it's up to you
to do" -- Vaylo Bludd spat out the wad of black curd he'd been chewing,
silencing Sarga Veys as effectively as his dogs.

"Your master wasn't the one who planned the raid and took the risks.  He
didn't cut through the darkness and smoke not knowing what each new step
would bring him.  His blade wasn't bloodied. His sons weren't risked.
His balls weren't froze with the waiting."

"Thanks to my master," Sarga Veys said, his voice droppinga tone lower,
"your blades weren't as bloodied as they might have been."

Crack!

The Dog Lord smashed his foot down on the hearth stool, breaking its
carved legs like sticks.  Across the hearth well the dogs shrank back
against the wall.  Sarga Veys flinched.  A muscle in his throat
quivered.

"Try any of your foul magics upon me," Vaylo roared, "and as the dogs
are my witness you will not leave this roundhouse alive."  Hearing their
name spoken, the dogs thrashed their muzzles and snarled, spraying the
surrounding stone with drops of urine.  Unable to take a farther step
back as his heels were already pushingagainst the door, Sarga Veys
pinched in his lips.

"Yes.  I see now why they call you the Dog Lord."

Vaylo nodded.

"That's me."  With the side of his foot, he shoved away the broken
stool.

"Well, Lord of Dogs, or whatever else you choose to call yourself, you
took my master's help quick enough when it suited you.  I don't believe
your anger caused you to break any stools then.  Yet now you stand here
at the very hearth he helped you win, issuing physical threats to his
envoy in the manner of some common stove house brawler."  Sarga Veys
stepped forward.

"Well let me tell you" -- Vaylo cut him short with a fierce shake of his
head.

"Tell me what you came to say.  Then be gone.  Your voice grates on my
dogs. If your master has brought a message, speak it.  If he has named a
price, then name it."  As he spoke, Vaylo watched Sarga Veys' face.  It
wasn't right that a man have violet eyes.

Sarga Veys made a small shrugging motion.  He brought his facial
features under control, yet it took him a long moment to do so.  When he
spoke there was still a residue of anger in his voice.

"Very well.

I bring you no message from my master.  When the deal was struck he
asked for nothing in return, and continues to do so now.  As he said at
the time, he wishes only to see the clan holds under a single firm
leadership, and he believes that you are the man to do it.

I cannot say when and if he will offer his help again.  He is a man with
many claims upon his time and resources.  I do know, however, that he
will be watching your progress with interest.  I should imagine he would
be quite upset if after all the trouble he has taken, you find the
Dhooneseat as comfortable as a padded cot and decide to bed down upon
it.  There are many clan holds yet to be taken.  " The Dog Lord sucked
on his aching teeth. Glancingaround the old Dhoone chiefs chamber with
its huge blue sandstone hearth, its comfortable animal-hide rugs and
wall coverings, and its smoky isinglass windows, he thought hard upon
Sarga Veys' words.  They weren't truthful, Vaylo was sure of that, yet
there was truth in them.  " I have plans of my own for Blackhail and the
rest," he said.

"And will move upon them in my own good time.  I must secure the
Dhoonehold first."

A quick smile flitted across Sarga Veys' face.

"But of course.  My master places great store in your judgment."

Frowning, the Dog Lord crossed toward the door.  He had the satisfaction
of seeing Sarga Veys shrink away from him, but the pleasure was only
fleeting. He really didn't like the man at all.

Veys was dangerous.  He had a temper better suited to a man with the
muscle to use it.

"You'll be on your way now," Vaylo said, reaching for the door.

"Be sure to tell your master that the message you came expressly not to
deliver was heard well and good."

Sarga Veys inclined his head.  As he did so, Vaylo realized that the
skin on the man's face wasn't as smooth and hairless as he had first
thought, just razored with an expert hand.

"I shall tell my master you find the Dhooneseat to your liking," Veys
said.

"And that you have--how should I put it?--long-term plans to take the
Hailhold as well."

Vaylo Bludd came close to hitting Veys then.  His face flushed and his
fist curled and the bones in his jaw and neck cracked all at once.

Smashing the heel of his hand down upon the door handle, he fractured
the oak lintel beneath.

"Leave!"  he cried.

"Take your sly half-truths and your mincing Halfman ways and get your
bony, well- shaved arse off my land."

Sarga Veys' violet eyes darkened to the color of midnight.  His face
twisted and hardened.

"You," he said, his voice risingas he lost control of it, "should watch
that dog-muzzle mouth of yours.  You're not talking to one of your
animal-skinned clansmen now.  I came here as a visitor and envoy, and at
very least should receive due respect."  Veys stepped over the threshold
and then turned to face Vaylo Bludd one last time.

"I wouldn't get too comfortable on the Dhooneseat if I were you.  Dog
Lord. One day you just might turn around and find it gone."

With that Sarga Veys clutched at the sides of his robe, lifting the
fabric clear of his ankles, and stalked away.

The Dog Lord watched him go.  After a length of time he let out a heavy
breath and closed the door.  The last thing to remember about devil's
helpers was that they were often more trouble than the devil himself.

Crossing to his dogs, Vaylo slapped his thigh.

"What do you think, eh?"  he murmured, bending to rub throats and cuff
ears.

"What do you make of the Halfman Sarga Veys?"

The dogs yelped and growled, tussling for attention and nipping his
fingers. Only the wolf dog stood his distance.  Sitting close to the
wall, its massive shoulders twitching in readiness, it watched the door
with orange eyes.

"You're right, my beauty," Vaylo said to it.

"The Halfman has told me nothing I don't already know: Only fools and
children never watch their backs."

"Granda!  Granda!"  Tiny feet pattered against stone, and then the door
burst open once more.

"Granda!"  Two small children appeared in the doorway, smiling,
giggling, and shrieking loudly.

The Dog Lord thrust out his arms toward his grandchildren.

"Come and give your old granda a hug and help him with these uppity
dogs." The dogs managed something close to a collective groan as the two
children raced across the room to Vaylo Bludd.  The eldest child, a
bright beauty with the dark skin and dark eyes of her mother, giggled
madly as she hugged her grandfather with two arms and pestered the huge
pony-size dogs with her feet.

The dogs knew better than to growl at Vaylo Bludd's grandchildren and
allowed themselves to be vigorously petted, teased, and called by
ignoble names.  The children called the wolf dog Fluff!  And he answered
to it!  It was the funniest thing Vaylo Bludd had ever witnessed, and it
never failed to make him laugh out loud.  He loved only two things in
life: his grandchildren and his dogs, and when he had both together in
one room he was as content as a man could be.

Within a month he would have all his grandchildren here, in the
Dhoonehouse safe and sound, where he and his dogs could watch over them.

As he tousled the hair of the youngest grandchild, a fine black haired
boy who Vaylo secretly thought looked much like himself, Sarga Veys'
words prayed upon his mind.  One day you just might turn around and find
it gone.

Vaylo glanced around the chiefs chamber, his eyes picking out the
details of defense: the glint of spiked gratings blocking the chimney
flue, the iron clamps punched into the stonework around the windows, and
the pull stone lying flat against the wall beside the door--all
emblazoned with the Bloody Blue Thistle of Dhoone.  Would his
grandchildren be safe here?  It was the finest roundhouse ever built,
ten times more defendable than the Bluddhouse, yet it was the only thing
the Dog Lord had ever taken without jaw.  There was shame in that, and
Vaylo knew it.  The Stone Gods would rather a man win an oat field with
blood and fury than take a continent with tricks and schemes.

Seventeen teeth ached with a fierce splitting pain as for the first time
in his life Vaylo Bludd found himself wondering if he had done the right
thing.

CHAPTER TEN.

Return aif tended to his horse in the stables before he stepped foot
inside the roundhouse.  Shor Gormalin and the others had gone on ahead
of him, leaving their mounts to the excited crew of children who had
gathered at their return.  Raifs horse was not his own, though.  It had
been lent to him by Orwin Shank.  Orwin bred dogs, horses, and sons, and
now with two of his sons dead, he claimed to have more horses than he
needed.  Chad and Jorry were gone, but whoever had killed them had
stolen their horses as well, so Raif didn't see how Orwin Shank had any
extra to spare.  Yet somehow he had laid his hands upon a pair, and the
day after Bron Hawk returned with news from the Dhoone roundhouse, he
had offered one to Raif.

"Tis nothing," the red-faced axman said.

"I want you to have it.  And if it suits you to call it a loan, then it
suits me also, but I tell you now, Raif Sevrance, I shall not ask for it
back.  You and your brother took care of my boys, you drew a guide
circle for them, and it eases a father's mind at night to think of them
resting within it."

Later, Raif learned that Orwin Shank had lent one to Drey, too.  Raif
scratched the gray gelding's neck.  Orwin Shank was a good man, just
like Corbie Meese and Ballic the Red, yet why did he allow himself to be
led by Mace Blackhail?  Raif let out a long breath, determined not to
get angry. There was no easy answer.  Mace Blackhail was persuasive, he
lied well, his stories fell upon eager ears.

Raif dropped the latch on the horse stall.  What next?  That was the
question that really counted.  Seven days was a long time.  What else
had Mace Blackhail managed to manipulate during his absence from the
roundhouse?  He was back, that much Raif knew.  The children were full
of the tale of how he'd come galloping up to the roundhouse early that
morning, stepped inside for just one moment, and then gone galloping
back out to the Oldwood.  While he was absent the others in his party
returned.

It was dark now, a full four hours past noon.  Mace Blackhail had had
plenty of time to regain charge of the roundhouse.  Raif really didn't
see how rushing from the stables to hear what the self- appointed clan
chief had to say would make one whit of difference to anythingand
anybody.  Whatever new schemes Mace Blackhail had conceived were
doubtless well under way by now.

Kicking hay from his path, Raif walked along the stable's central aisle.
Drey would be inside with Mace Blackhail.  Drey, who, if Raina Blackhail
hadn't spoken up at the meeting before the year- men had had chance to
pledge their weapons, would have gladly laid his hammer at Mace
Blackhail's feet. Raif could still see the eagerness in his older
brother's face.  It sickened him.  It tainted everything they'd gone
through together at the camp.

Raif tasted bitterness in his mouth as he worked the bolts on the stable
door.  Now that Drey had spent the past seven days riding out with Mace
Blackhail, he would be completely under the Wolfs control.

Another member of his pack.  Nothing drew men closer than shared danger.
Mace Blackhail had personally asked Drey to accompany him on the ranging
to Dhoone.

A sound not much like laughter escaped from Raifs throat.  At the same
time he was hand-picking one brother, Mace Blackhail was trying his
damnedest to get the other brother sent away on west- watch.

Westwatch, a hundred leagues west of the roundhouse in the cold blue
shadows of the Coastal Ranges, where old clansmen who wanted nothing
more out of life than to fish, hunt goats, smoke heather weed and sing
the old songs of how Ayan Blackhail killed the last Dhoone King went to
end their days.

Shor Gormalin had stepped in to stop it, though.

"I'll take the Sevrance lad wi' me to Gnash," he had said.

"By all accounts he's handy with a bow, and we canna afford to waste
even one able man in times such as these.  I'll keep my eye on him, make
sure he doesna stray."

No one, not even Mace Blackball, could argue with the most respected
swordsman in the clan, so Raifhad found himself one of a party often
riding out to gather intelligence from Gnash.

It had been a hard seven days.  They had ridden day and night.  One
man's horse had collapsed beneath him, and all mounts had to be changed
at Duff's Stovehouse halfway.  On the return journey they had changed
their horses back.  Shor Gormalin had said nothing about speed or haste,
driven no man into the saddle before he had taken his black beer and
larded bread in the morning, yet somehow he had created in everyone a
burning desire to get back. More than once Raif found himself wondering
if it had been Shor Gormalin's intent to return to the roundhouse before
Mace Blackhail.  Raif shrugged, but not lightly.

If it was, the small fair- haired swordsman had failed by half a day.

Done with the final iron bolt, Raif drew up his fox hood and braced
himself for the short run to the roundhouse.  It could not be put off
any longer; his borrowed horse was brushed down and fed, and it was
getting to the point where his absence would be missed.  It was time to
face Mace Blackhail once more.

The air outside was cold and still.  Raif hardly seemed to be in it a
moment before he was shouting his name through the heavily tarred oak of
the roundhouse great door and gainingaccess to the warmth and the light.

The roundhouse was crowded and noisy.  Tied clans folk stood in groups,
clogging passageways, stairwells, and halls.  Dressed in brain- tanned
hides and rough spun woolens, they worried out loud about their crofts,
their ewes, their children, and their future.  Raifhad never seen so
many farmers and crofters in the roundhouse at one time before, not even
in the heart of winter.  Whoever had been sent out to the far reaches of
the clan hold to bring them in had done a fine job.

Raif couldn't put names to a good third of the people he passed.

Fewer full clansmen and year men crowded the halls, but that didn't mean
anything.  Mace Blackhail probably had them gathered in the Great Hearth
for a meet.

"Raif!  Over here!"

Raif recognized his brother's voice before he saw him.  Hiking himself
up on a luntstone, he peered over the crowd in the entrance hall.

Although he had planned to be distant with his brother, the minute he
saw Drey standing by the far wall, the muck and grease of the road still
upon him and the shadow of a seven-day beard darkening his jaw, he
breathed a sigh of relief.  Drey was home.  He looked tired.  His braid
was matted with fox fur, and the ham merman chains that stretched across
his boiled leather armor looked as if they'd been blackened in a fire.
Apart from a few broken veins across the bridge of his nose, his face
looked unchanged.

Keeping his place across the hall, Drey waited for his brother to join
him.

The two clasped hands.

"Have you seen Effie?"  were Raifs first words.

Drey shook his head.

"No, but others have.  She was out in the Oldwood with Raina.  Anwyn saw
her return.  Said she was as quiet as a mouse and slipped off to her
cell.  Anwyn sent Letty Shank down with some milk and bannock."

Raif nodded.  A long moment of silence passed.

"So," Drey said, speaking to break it, "you and the others returned
safely?"

"Yes.  The Gnash roundhouse is full to bursting with Dhoones- men.  All
those who escaped or were away from the roundhouse when it was taken are
gatheringat the old strong wall there."  As Raif spoke he noticed Drey
glance at the stairs that led up to the Great Hearth.

"Another meeting?"  he said, his voice hardening.

Drey looked down.

Raif breathed before he spoke.  It was hard to keep the anger from his
voice.

"When were you going to tell me, Drey?  Once it was over and done?"

Drey shook his head.

"No.  It's not what you think.  Mace Black- hail wants to marry Raina
and he" -- "Raina?"  Raif inhaled sharply.  He felt as if he'd been
thrown into the middle of a game that made no sense.

"She'd never marry Mace Blackhail.  She's his foster mother .  .  .  she
spoke up against him at the last meet.  .  ."  Raif shook his head
savagely.

"She hates him."  Drey swore.

"Don't start that again, Raif."

"Start what?"  To Raifs ears his voice sounded sullen.  "Twisting the
truth. Making up things.  Embarrassing us."  Drey ran a hand over his
beard.

"You're not the only one who has to live with the consequences of what
you say.  If you don't care about me and my standing in the clan, I
understand that, but at least think about Effie.  She's young.

Now Da's gone she needs the clan to look after her.  And every time you
open your mouth and say something bad about Mace Blackhail, you hurt her
as well as yourself.  " Drey reached out to touch Raifs arm, but Raif
pulled away. With a small, unconvincing shrug, Drey let his hand fall to
his side.

"Mace Blackhail is going to be clan chief, Raif.  And you're going to
have to accept that--for all our sakes."

Raif looked at his brother carefully.  He had a suspicion that Drey had
been practicing his piece about family and clan loyalty for quite some
time.  The words had a stilted, pre prepared feel to them, and they
didn't sound right for Drey.  They sounded more like something Mace
Blackhail would say.  Raifs lips twisted to a smile.

"How long have you been waiting for me, Drey?  Did Mace Blackhail make
you stand watch, here, in the hall?  Did he tell you that I couldn't be
allowed into the Great Hearth until I'd listened to what you had to say,
then nodded like a good brother should?"

The color in Drey's face rose as Raif spoke.

"It wasn't like that, Raif.  I was worried that the clan might turn
against you .  .  .  and Mace said that a man never listens to reason
about himself, but when he's made to think of his family he'll" -- Raif
grabbed his brother by the shoulders.  He needed to make him see.

"Drey.  Listen to me.  I'm not going to do anything to harm you and
Effie. Mace Blackhail's putting words in your mouth.  It was you and me
who were together at the badlands camp.  You and me.  We saw what we
saw, and while we kept to our story, Mace Blackhail kept switching his."

Drey pulled himself free of Raifs grip.

"Stop it, Raif!  Just stop it!

Mace warned me you were too young to listen.  " With a disgusted shake
of his head.  Drey turned and made his way to the stairs. Raif watched
his brother go.  After a time his hand rose to his lore and his fist
closed around the hard piece of horn.  Hate poured out of him, flushing
his skin and stinging the back of his throat.  He'd been back for only
an hour and already Mace Blackhail was turning the knife.

Aware that people were looking at him, Raif let his lore fall to his
chest. He was shaking, and it took an effort to bring his body under
control. Smoothing his hair and clothes, he followed Drey's path to the
Great Hearth. Deliberately, he kept his thoughts away from his brother.
He wouldn't think about Drey now.

The stairs were crowded with people.  Children raced up and down,
shriekingand giggling wildly.  Groups of women sat on steps, talking in
quiet voices, chewing on slices of dried fruit, and mending bits of
cloth and leather harnesses.  Twice as many torches were burningas
normal, and bands of greasy black smoke choked the air.  Raif resisted
the desire to push people out of his way.  Didn't they have anywhere
else to go?  Why hadn't Anwyn Bird moved them to cells of their own?

He came to a halt by the Great Hearth door.  Two clansmen stood guard
before it.  They crossed spears the moment they saw him.

Rory Gleet, golden haired, blue eyed, and the object of much excited
interest on the part of the maidens of Clan Blackhail, was the first to
speak.

"Can't come in, Raif.  Sorry.  Mace Blackhail's orders.  Sworn clansmen
and year men only."

Bev Shank, the youngest of the Shank boys and not even a year- men
himself, nodded.

"Sorry, Raif.  Nothing personal."

"Mace Blackhail isn't chief yet.  He's got no right to give orders."

Raif stepped forward.

"Besides, when was the last time either of you can remember armed guards
being posted outside the Great Hearth?"  Bev and Rory exchanged a
glance.

Rory Gleet sucked in his lips, lowered his black steel spearhead a
fraction.

"Look, Raif.  This is nothing to do with me.  Mace Black- hail says
watch that none but sworn clansmen enter, so that's what I'm doing. It's
only fitting that those who have spoken oaths have the right to speak
clan business in private."  Rory's blue eyes looked straight into Raifs.

"There's talk of Inigar hearing oaths next week, and mayhap you and Bev
can step forward and become year men along with the rest.  Then when you
come to me demanding entry, I'll be more than happy to let you pass."

Raif shook his head.  He liked Rory--he was a friend of Drey's and
wasn't a bit full of himself despite his good looks--but he was in no
mood to have anyone prevent him from entering the Great Hearth.

Shouldering closer to the door, he said,

"Let me pass."

"Can't do it, Raif."   Rory Cleet pressed the flat of his spear against
Raifs arm.

Raif grabbed the spear shaft and pulled forward hard.  As Rory stumbled
forward, Raif smashed his fist into Rory's fingers.  Rory's fingers
sprang apart and he lost his top grip on the spear.  Furious, Rory swung
a punch, clipping Raifs ear and making him fall forward against the
door.  Wood cracked.  Even before Raif could take a breath, he felt the
point of Bev Shank's spear on his kidney.  "Step away, Raif," he said,
his red Shank's cheeks flushed with excitement.

Raif felt the door behind him open.  He stumbled back.  Warm, smokeless
air breathed along the back of his neck.  Someone stepped forward from
inside the room.

"What have we here?"  It was Mace Blackhail.  Fingers tapped against
leather as he spoke.

"The Sevrance lad causing trouble again, I see."

Raif twisted his neck around in time to see Mace Blackball shake his
head at someone in the room.

"I thought you were going to take your brother in hand, Drey?"

Raif winced.  Grabbing the shaft of Bev Shank's spear, he pushed the tip
away from him.  Things were going from bad to worse.  He couldn't hear
all of Drey's reply, but the words Sorry, Mace came through clearly.

"By the weight of the Stone Gods, Mace, what did you expect?  Keepinga
guard outside the door."  Orwin Shank came forward and grabbed RaiFs
arm.

"Got yourself in the middle of it again, eh, lad?"  He winked at his
son.

"Good job wi' that spear, Bev."

Bev grinned at his da.

Rory Gleet stood back, his eyes not leaving Raif for a second.

The fingers on his right hand were already beginning to blacken and
swell.

Raif went to say something to him, but Orwin Shank hauled him through to
the Great Hearth before he had chance to speak.

"No sense in leaving the lad out there," he said, shutting the door
behind them.

"He rode out to Gnash with Shor Gormalin.  His report will be as good as
any."

"Aye," Shor Gormalin said from his place near the fire.

"Bring the lad over to me.  I'll vouch for him."

Raif glanced around the room.  Three hundred clansmen and year men were
gathered, backs bristling with case-hardened arms and strung bows,
boiled hides and blue steel strapped across their chests.  Not one woman
was present.  Not even Raina Blackhail.

Mace Blackhail took a thin breath, clearly displeased.  Raif thought it
highly likely that Bev and Rory had been set outside the door solely to
keep him out.

"This is men's parley tonight," Mace said, extending his arm to block
Raifs path.

"Anyone who doesn't know what it feels like to thrust a hand up a girl's
skirt has no business being present."

Along the east wall of the room, two dozen year men found something
interesting to look at on the floor.  Some coughed nervously, others
blushed. Huge hound-headed Banron Lye, who had turned year man only last
spring but looked a good ten years older than his age, cracked his
knuckles one by one. Raif glanced at Drey, who was standing close to a
blood wood stang.  Although he made a point of not meeting his brother's
eyes, he noticed that Drey wasn't among those who looked down at his
feet while Mace spoke.  Raif ran a hand over his roughly shaved chin. He
knew less about his brother than he thought.  "Mace Blackhail," Shor
Gormalin said softly, turning so the torchlight fell upon the short
unassuming sword at his waist.

"If havinga hand up a girl's skirt is test of a man, then there's a good
fifty in this room tonight who you'll be needing to see to the door."
The room rang with laughter.  Most full clansmen laughed with genuine
amusement. A good portion of the year men laughed with relief.

Without waiting for a reply, Shor Gormalin beckoned to Raif.

"Over here wi' me, lad, and quick about it."

Mace Blackhail did not drop his arm as Raif approached, and Raif was
forced to push past him to join Shor Gormalin by the hearth.  Dirt and
soil were lodged beneath Mace Blackhail's fingertips, and his clothes
carried the damp, rotting leaf odor of the Oldwood.

"Easy with me, boy," he murmured as Raif shoved against him.

"You'll push me too far one of these days, I can tell."

Raif tried to avoid Mace Blackhail's eyes, but somehow he found himself
looking into them.  The irises were dark and shifting like the surface
of a lake by night.  When Mace blinked, the water deposited over them
had a greasy, reflective quality that gave his irises a yellow cast.
Quickly Raif looked away.

Shor Gormalin patted Raifs shoulder as he came to stand beside him.

The heat from the fire was hot on the backs of his legs, and despite the
chimney and several open windows, Raif found it difficult to breathe.
The air seemed thick and poisoned.  Out of the corner of his eye, he was
aware of Drey staringat him from across the room.  He had taken his
hammer from the leather cradle at his back, and his fingers pressed hard
against the varnished lime wood handle.

"So, Mace," Orwin Shank said, dabbing his red and sweating cheeks with a
shammy, "what's this rumor that's spreadingabout you and Raina?"

Mace Blackhail smiled a fraction.  He shrugged and looked down at his
hands. His boiled leather coat was inlaid with disks of sliced and
blackened wolf bone.  The Clansword was couched in a newly worked
scabbard at his thigh.

"Normally I would be reluctant to talk about such things--what's between
a man and woman is their affair and no one else's."  He paused to give
clansmen time to nod.

"But a certain lady and myself find ourselves in a difficult position;
one which, if things aren't explained good and early to as many ears as
possible, could easily be misunderstood."  A pause.

"I will not let that happen.

I will hear no bad words spoken against Raina.  If either of us must
take blame, let it be me.  " With that, Mace Blackhail brought his hand
to rest on the lead-and-bone hilt of the sword.

Raif felt sweat trickle down his neck as flames roared away against his
back.  Where was Nellie Moss or Anwyn Bird?  Couldn't someone dampen the
fire?

"So," Mace Blackhail said with a heavy sigh,

"I must say what I must say.  Early today when I returned to the
roundhouse, I got word that Raina was in the Oldwood tending her traps.
Naturally, as she is first respected in the clan as well as my own
beloved foster kin, I rode out to greet her and give her my news."  Mace
rubbed a gloved hand over the pale skin on his face.  Once again he
looked down.

"This is not easy for me.  A man does not like to talk of such things .
.."

His voice trailed away, inviting someone to speak up and encourage him.

Corbie Meese cleared his throat with a rough hacking sound.  Standing
where he was, directly in front of a brightly burning green- wood torch,
the hammer dent in his head showed up more clearly than ever.

"Tell us your story, Mace.  Tis obvious you are reluctant to speak--no
one here can fault you for that--but if it concerns the clan, we must
know."

Mace Blackhail nodded along with a hundred others.  He took a step
forward, then another back, looking for all intents and purposes like a
man hardly knowing what to say or where to begin.  The lines around
Raifs mouth hardened.  He didn't believe Mace Blackhail capable of
faltering for a moment.  The Wolf knew exactly what he meant to say
right from the start.

Finally Mace looked up.

"Well, I rode to the Oldwood and came upon Raina sitting on a fallen
basswood.  She was in a bad way.  I think everyone here knows just how
much she loved her husband, and when I found her it was obvious she had
come to the Oldwood to be alone with her grief.  She's a proud woman--we
all know that--and she didn't want anyone to know how deeply Dagro's
death had cut her."  Mace Blackhail had nearly everyone in the room with
him.  Raina was proud, even Raif had to admit that.  And it sounded true
enough that she would go off alone before giving in to her grief.  . but
then Drey had said Effie was there with her.  The skin on Raif's face
slowly switched from hot to cold as Mace Blackhail continued speaking.

"Of course I went to comfort her.  We share a man's loss and are close
bound by it, and we wept upon one another's shoulders and swapped our
grief.  Raina was understandingand gentle, and, as women often tend to,
helped me more than I helped her."  Mace made a minute gesture with his
hand.  He swallowed hard.

"I... I must own up to what happened next.  I would not be a man if I
didn't. Our closeness drew us closer, and we fell into each other's arms
and came together as man and woman."

The clan was silent.  Breath hung in three hundred throats.  The light
in the room dimmed as one of the central torches burned out.  At his
side, Raifwas aware of a muscle pumping in Shor Gormalin's cheek.

Mace Blackball continued speaking, his voice low and halting.

"I will make no excuses for my actions.  It was wrong of me to take
advantage of the situation.  As an elder year man and Dagro Blackhail's
foster son, I should have known better.  I should have pushed Raina from
me and walked away.  Yet I didn't.  I let the moment get the better of
me, we both did, and if I could reclaim the past five hours and undo
what has been done, I would. By all the gods watching from their Stone
Havens tonight, I wish I had never ridden to the Oldwood.  " Raina is no
blood kin to me, but she has cared for me as family, and I owe her
respect.  Now I have wronged her--and deeply.  It matters not that she
was willing.  One of the first things my foster father taught me is that
a man should always take responsibility for his actions, most especially
when those actions concern women.  "

Although Raif saw looks of condemnation and disapproval on many faces,
especially those of the older clansmen, he also saw a good few men
noddingand sighingalong with the Wolf.  Ballic the Red had an arrow in
his cracked and callused bow hand and was stroking the flet ching
feathers, noddingalmost continually.  Nearly all the year men showed
small signs of sympathy, pulling on their chins, pressing their lips
together, and exchanging small knowing glances.

Raif couldn't bear to watch them.  How could they stand by and listen to
the lies?

"Second, I want to say before all here and now that I will make amends
for what I have done.  Raina is older than me and her womb has proven
barren, yet I could not live with myself unless I took her for my wife.
We sinned in the eyes of nine gods, and I cannot call myself a man
unless I put it right."  Finished, Mace Blackhail stood in the center of
the room and waited.

All stood or sat without movement.  No matter if they sympathized with
Mace Blackhail or not, they were wary.  Marriage between a clan chiefs
widow and his fostered son was serious business.  Most especially when
it came a mere fourteen days after the chiefs death.  After a long
moment, Orwin Shank made a smacking sound with his lips.

"Well, you've certainly landed in the bloody flux this time.  Mace.
Good and proper.  What were you thinking, lad?  Wi' Raina?"

Mace Blackhail shook his head.

"I wasn't thinking, that was the problem."

"Thinking wi' your balls, more like," said Ballic the Red, slipping the
last of his arrows into his bow case "0' course you'll damn well have to
marry her now.  You're right about that.  You can't have the ladle
without taking the pot.  By the Stone Gods, man!  What a damn fool thing
to do!"

"Aye," cried Corbie Meese.

"You'll feel my hammer up your arse if you don't wed her good and
proper. And prompt at that.  Barren she may have proven in the past, but
there's still a chance a bairn may come from the joining, and I for one
won't stand by and watch as Raina's good name is dragged through the
muck."

"Aye!"  shouted a dozen others.

Raif listened as Will Hawk, Arlec Byce, and even tiny liver- spotted Gat
Murdock agreed vigorously with Corbie Meese.  Fierce and highly specific
threats were issued concerning the future of Mace Blackhail's manhood if
he failed to do his duty by Raina.  Clansmen were always fiercely
protective of their women, and it seemed as if the Wolf had walked
himself straight into a trap.  Raif couldn't shake off the feeling that
the clan was responding exactly how Mace Blackhail wanted them to. There
were lies here, clever ones.  Yet Raif couldn't guess what they were.
Had Mace Blackhail and Raina been planning to marry all along?  Raif
shook his head.  He couldn't believe that.

Looking up, he locked gazes with his brother.  Surprisingly, Drey had
taken no part in demanding that Mace should marry Raina.  Raif
remembered how Drey had carried the black bearskin from the badlands
camp .  all that way without sayinga word.

The stone flag Raif stood upon rocked beneath him as Shor Gormalin
stepped forward to speak.

"Has anyone thought to ask what Raina cares to do?  I for one would like
to hear what she has to say on this matter."  The small swordsman was
not as soft-spoken as normal, and his blue eyes were hard as they
regarded Mace Black- hail.

"It's her future we're discussing here."

Mace nodded so quickly, Raif knew he had been expecting such a demand
all along.

"Drey," he said, his gaze not leaving Shor Gormalin for an instant, "run
down to the under space and fetch Raina.  Tell her all that has happened
so she comes upon us at no disadvantage."  Before Drey could move from
his place near the stang, Gat Murdock spoke up.

The ancient turkey-necked bowman shook his head.

"It isn't right and proper to drag Raina before us just so we can have
the satisfaction of seeing her admit to her mistake.  By the hells! What
sort of men are we if we allow such thing?"

Ballic the Red was quick to back up his fellow bowman.

"Gat's right.

It's not fitting to shame Raina in such a way.  It's one thing for a man
to steal sauce when he can, quite another for a woman.  " Mace looked
regretfully from bowman to bowman.

"Aye, you're right.  But there's some here" --sharp glances at Shor
Gormalin and Raif"--who need to hear the truth of it for themselves.
Drey, fetch Raina and do as I say."

Drey left the room.  Raif listened as he pounded down the stairs, eager
to do Mace's bidding.  Mace Blackball had manipulated another situation,
and Raif was just beginning to work out how he did it.  He had a way of
admitting to his own faults, robbing others of the satisfaction of
pointing them out or using them against him.  And his lies were always
mixed with the truth.

After a few minutes of silence, Mace Blackhail sighed.  The wolf bones
on his coat chimed like shells.

"Gat and Ballic are right.  Bringing Raina here to face the clan is ill
use.

It's a woman's right to pick and choose what she tells of her private
affairs.  I for one wouldn't blame her if she denies the whole thing
ever happened, or even went so far as to claim she'd been taken by
force.  It's her privilege to keep such things to herself, and by
bringing her here before us, we rob that from her.  And who amongst us
can blame her for protecting her modesty by any means she can?  "

Raif frowned.  He didn't understand what Mace was gettingat.  Others
seemed to, though, and many men, mostly full clansmen in their thirties
and older, nodded softly at Mace's words.  One or two muttered Aye, 'tis
so.  Ballic the Red glowered at Shor Gormalin.  More torches went out
during the wait.  Raif wondered where Nellie Moss could be.  She was a
strange woman with the voice and hard chest of a man, yet she never
missed her rounds.

Finally the doors opened.  Raina Blackball walked in wearing a plain
blue dress, thickly stained around the hem and cuffs.  The bandages
covering her widow's weals were not fresh, and dried blood and mud were
caked upon the linen.  Drey came to rest a few paces behind her, and
then a moment later Nellie Moss entered the room, carrying bundles of
greenwood and a skin of wick oil.

Raina stood in the entry space, head held high, not sayinga word.

Raif thought he saw her hands trembling, but she quickly grasped at the
fabric other skirt and he couldn't be sure.

An awkward moment passed, where everyone assumed that someone else would
be the first to speak.  Everyone except Mace Blackball, that was, who
leaned against a blood wood stang, seemingly in no hurry to do or say
anything.

Finally Orwin Shank spoke.

"Thank you for coming before us, Raina."

The red-cheeked axman was clearly unhappy, and the shammy he held in his
hands was dark with sweat.

"Mace has told us ... well... about what happened in the Oldwood ..  .
and we wanted to let you know that no one here blames you for the
incident."

Ignoring Orwin Shank completely, Raina addressed her words to Mace
Blackhail.

"So, you have told all here you took me freely?"

Mace shot a quick glance toward where Corbie Meese, Ballic the Red, and
others were gathered.  He let out the smallest possible sigh.

"I

told them the truth, Raina.  If it saves your pride to present it in a
different light, I for one won't stop you.  I own to knowing little
about women, but I hope I learned enough from Dagro to treat all with
due respect. "

Raina winced at the mention of her husband's name.  Her gray eyes were
dull, and for the first time in all the years he had known her, Raif
thought she looked her age.

"He'll marry you, Raina.  You have my word on it."  It was Ballic the
Red, his normally fierce voice soft enough to calm a frightened child.

"I'd have his balls for my waxing pouch if he didn't."  A tear slid down
Raina's cheek.

"Raina."  Shor Gormalin came forward.  He tried to touch her arm, but
she pulled back.  The swordsman frowned.  Holding up his hands for her
to see, so that she knew he would not touch her again, he said, "Raina,
you know I will stand beside you whatever you decide, but I must know
the truth of it.  Did you join with Mace in the Oldwood?"

Raina made no reply.  The room was quiet except for the sound of Nellie
Moss tending the torches.  Raif watched the expression on Mace
Blackhail's face; the Wolfs eyes were narrow, and inside his mouth he
was sucking on his cheeks.  Slowly Mace turned his head toward Raif.

As his gaze met Raifs, his jaws sprang apart, revealing strands of
saliva quivering between his teeth.  Raif had to stop himself from
stepping back. In the space of an eye blink Mace was himself once more,
and Raif knew without looking that no one else had seen his wolf face.

"Raina?"  Shor Gormalin's voice broke the silence.

"You have nothing to fear by speaking the- " "Yes," Raina snapped,
cutting him short.

"Yes, we joined in the Oldwood, if you can call it that.  Yes.  Yes.
Yes."

The small fair-haired swordsman closed his eyes.  A muscle in his cheek
pumped once, then was still.

"That's settled, then," Orwin Shank said with obvious relief.

"You must marry Mace."

"Aye," cried Ballic the Red, hands slipping beneath his boiled leather
breastplate to find his supply of chewing curd.

"And we'll have an end of this scandal before it has chance to smirch
the clan."

"And if I choose not to marry?"  Raina asked, looking straight at Mace
Blackhail.

Gat Murdock shook his head heavily, blowingair between his toothless
gums. Orwin Shank wrung sweat from his shammy, and Ballic the Red took a
handful of black curd between his callused hands and squeezed them flat.

Mace Blackhail sent a small look their way.  What am I to do with this
woman? it seemed to say.  He sighed.

"Raina, you have been first woman in this clan for ten years.  You know
more than anyone what becomes of a woman who allows herself to be ill
used by a man and then cast aside.  All due respect is lost.  Ofttimes
the woman is shunned or reviled, and judges it best to leave the clan in
order to escape the bad name she has bought herself."  Mace thought a
moment.

"And then there's the question of a woman's possessions and wealth.  All
here have known instances when a woman's own family have stripped the
fine furs and cut stones from her back."

Clansmen nodded gravely.  Raif had heard such stories himself, stories
of women cast from the roundhouse wearing only rough pigskins on their
backs and boasting nothing more than a week's worth of bread and mutton
to their names.

"I'd try to do what I could, of course .  .  ."  Mace Blackhail dragged
his words.

"But even I must bow to clan custom."

Raina smiled in such a way, it made Pair's chest ache.

"You are a Scarpe through and through.  You can take the truth and twist
it into any basket you choose to shape.  If you were to cut me down with
the Clansword here and now, within the hour you'd have everyone
noddingand patting your shoulder and telling you how they'd known all
along such a thing had to be done.  Well I shall marry you, Mace
Blackhail of Clan Scarpe.  I will not give up my due respect and my
position in the clan.  And even though this is what you counted on all
along, it doesn't mean you won't live to regret it in the end."  Shaking
with anger, Raina looked around the room.  No clansman would meet her
eyes.

"You have chosen both your chief and his wife in one night, and I will
leave you well alone now so you can slap each other on the backs and
drink yourselves sodden."  With that she turned and began the short walk
out of the room.  It was Drey who ran ahead of her to open the door.
Drey who closed it gently when she was gone.

Raif, along with dozens of others, stared at the space Raina Blackhail
had just vacated.  The silence she left pressed against his skin.

No one wanted to be the first to speak into it.  After a long moment,
Shor Gormalin hooked his great elk cloak across his chest and walked
from the room.  As he passed close to Mace Blackhail, Raif saw the
swordsman's knuckles whiten upon the hilt of his sword.

Mace Blackhail's thin-cheeked face was pale.  He no longer leaned
casually against a stang, and for once the Wolf was at a loss for words.
After watching him for a minute or so, Raif decided it was time to go.
He had been right from the start: Nothing he could do would make one
whit of difference to anyone or anybody.  Mace Blackhail had it all in
hand.

Even as he strode across the room and Drey moved to open the great
metal-girded door.  Mace Blackball cleared his throat to speak.  Raif
passed from the room and didn't hear what he said, but a few seconds
later the voices of three or four dozen clansmen filtered down along the
stairs.  Raif wasn't surprised when the word they spoke was Aye.

Down Raif went, followinga path cleared by Raina Blackhail and Shor
Gormalin before him.  Crofters and their families were silent as he
passed.  Those who had children with them held them close, and Raif
could only guess what had been showing on Shor Gormalin's face to make
them so afraid.

Raif made good time as he traced his steps back to the stables.  His
chest was tight and his heart was beating fast, and something sour
burned in his throat.  He needed to get away.  He wouldn't sleep
tonight; the memory of Raina Blackhail's face wouldn't let him.  What
had Mace Blackhail done to her?

The raven lore lay like ice against his chest as he picked up his pack
and bow from the horse stall where he'd left them.  Orwin Shank's horse
whickered softly as he saddled it, then sniffed his hands for treats.
Raif found a couple of frost-split apples in his pack and fed them to
the gelding.  It was a good horse, with sturdy legs and a broad back.
Orwin said its name was Moose on account of it being surefooted on snow
and ice.

Raif led his borrowed horse onto the clay court, strung his borrowed
horn and sinew bow, and strapped it to his back.  A pale moon rode low
in the sky. The wind was risingand from the north; it tasted of the
badlands.  Iced-over puddles crunched beneath his boots.  As he mounted
the gelding, he noticed a second horse's tracks freshly stamped on the
court.  Shor Gormalin, he thought, kicking the gelding into a trot.

The land directly surrounding the roundhouse was set aside for grazing
sheep and cattle and was kept free of all game by Longhead and his crew.
If a man wanted to hunt he had to ride northwest to the Wedge or south
to the hemlock woods beyond the ridge.  The Oldwood was closer, but that
was set aside for trapping, not hunting.  And trapping was for women,
not men.

Raif rode south.  Moose was not a swift horse, but he gave a steady
ride. Moonlight reflecting off the snow made it easy to find a path, and
horse and rider made good time.  As soon as he was free of the valley
and onto the wooded slopes, ridges, and grassy draws of the southern
taiga, Raif began to search for game.  Frozen ponds with surface ice
broken, tufts of hair snagged on ground birch, hemlock girdled by wild
boars and goats, and fresh tracks stamped in the snow were signs he
looked for.  He didn't much care what he brought down.

He just needed to turn his mind from the roundhouse and the people in
it.

A hawk owl soared overhead, a mouse or vole twitching in its claws.

Raif watched as the bird flew down into the cavity of a broken top snag.
At the base of the lightning-blasted tree, two eyes glowed golden for a
instant and then winked out, leaving darkness.  Fox.  One hand reining
Moose, another reaching for the bow at his back, Raif held his gaze on
the fox space.  The bowstring was cold and stiff, but he didn't have
time to run a finger over it and warm the wax.  He could no longer see
the fox, but he knew it was there, withdrawing slowly into the tangle of
gorse and dogwood beyond.  Like most clansmen, Raifkept his arrows in a
buckskin case at his side to cut down on the sort of motion that sent
game running, and he slid an arrow from his pack and nocked it against
the plate all with a single movement.  The bow ticked as he drew it.

Raif called the fox to him.  The space separating them condensed, and
almost immediately he felt the heat of the creature's blood against his
cheek.  He tasted its fear.  Everything sloughed away, leaving only him,
the fox, and the still line that lay between them.  The raven lore
itched against his skin.  This was what he wanted.  Here at least he had
some control.

Releasing the string was little more than an afterthought.  Although he
could no longer see the fox, he had its heart in his sights, and when
his fingers lifted and the arrow streaked forward, Raif knew without a
shadow of a doubt that the shot would find its mark.

The fox fell with barely a sound.  A few leaves rustled, fox weight
thudded onto hard snow.  Raif peered into the killing ground beyond the
base of the old snag.  He wanted more.

Heart racing, he slid down from Moose, bow in hand.  Even as he took his
first step upon the ice-crusted snow, his breath crystallizing in the
freezing air, he became aware of another creature hiding far on the
other side of the bluff, fast against a year-old hemlock.  As he raised
his bow and sighted it, Raif couldn't say if he had seen the animal's
eyes, caught a glimpse of its cowering form, or simply heard it move. It
didn't matter.  He sensed it, that was all he knew.  The flight feathers
on the arrow kissed his cheek as he called the creature to him.  It was
a weasel, tick infested and thick jointed with age.  Its heart beat too
fast in its chest.  Raifs hand was steady on the belly of his bow as he
released the string.  By the time the twine came back, Raif was already
looking for something new to kill.  His lore hummed against his chest,
and his bow sang in his hand.  The night was alive, his senses were
sharp, and every pair of eyes shining in the darkness had Mace
Blackhail's name upon them.

CHAPTER ELEVEN.

Oaths and Dreams at cher of the Dead was out tonight.  The Listener knew
because his dreams told him it was so.  The Watcher was a long way away,
how far the Listener did not know.  Dreams could tell a man with no ears
only so much.

"Sadaluk!  Sadaluk!  You must wake and come inside.  An ice storm is on
the way, Nolo says so."

The Listener was not happy at being wakened.  Although his dreams had
gone, he was still listening to the echoes they left behind.  He opened
one eye and then the other.  Bala, Sila's unwed sister, stood before
him.  She was dressed in fitted sealskin pants and an otter coat.  Her
hood was framed with musk ox underfur, warm and golden as the setting
sun.  Very rare.  Bala always dressed nicely.  Young men lined up from
the smoking rack to the dog posts for the privilege of gifting her with
skins.

"Sadaluk.  Nolo says you must join us in our house.  You have sat with
your door open for so long that your own house is too cold for waiting
out a storm."  Bala looked over the Listener's shoulder as she spoke,
peeking into his ground beyond.

Sadaluk knew what she was after.

"Have you brought me a hot drink?"

he asked, knowing well enough she had not, as her hands were empty.

"Bear soup?  Boil-off from the auks Sila caught and fermented?"  Bala
looked down.

"No, Sadaluk.  I am sorry.  I did not think."

Sadaluk made a tsking sound.

"Your sister, Sila, would not have forgotten.  Whenever she comes she
brings me soup."

"Yes, Sadaluk."

Bala looked so pretty looking down that the Listener was inclined toward
forgiveness.  She didn't have Sila's plump, pot-shaped lips, but her
nose was the flattest in the tribe.  A man could run his hand from cheek
to cheek and hardly feel the bump in between.  And Bala's hands were
small as a baby's, made for slipping down a man's pants without him ever
having to unlace a strap.  The Listener sighed.  The man who wedded Bala
would be fortunate indeed.

"Please, Sadaluk," Bala said, tugging on his coat.

"The storm will be here before we have chance to seal the doors."

The Listener knew storms better than he knew dreams, and although one
was indeed on its way, it would not arrive before dawn.

"I shall not move from my seat," he said.

"My dreams call me back.  Now run along and return home, and be sure to
tell Nolo that you did not think to bring me soup."

"Yes, Sadaluk."  Again, Bala glanced over his shoulder into his ground.
She bit her lip.

"Sadaluk.  Nolo also asked me if you could return his wound pin to him.
The seal carcass must be frozen by now."

The Listener tsked.  The black scars where his ears had once been ached
with the kind of hollow pain that only lost ears could.  Nolo's wound
pin was very old.  It had been made by the Old Blood far to the east and
was beautiful beyond imagining.  Nolo was very proud of it, so much so
that he was torn between his desire to use it for what it was made
for--fastening seal wounds closed so blood didn't drain from carcasses
before they were brought home--and keeping it purely for show.  Those
times when he did use it, he was always anxious to have it back.

The Listener stood.  Bones cracked as he moved, and the necklace of owl
beaks he wore at his throat tinkled like breaking ice.  His boots needed
tending, and want of blubber and saliva made them stiff.  They cracked
and flaked like tree bark when he moved.  His ground was lit and heated
by two soapstone lamps, yet as the door had been open for several hours,
it was as cold outside as within.  Frost crystals glistened on the
caribou skin-covered walls and floor.  The young seal Nolo had brought
this morning as tribute for the good luck he had received while hunting
was indeed frozen, and its sleek cat face had lost its oily sheen.

The wound pin was fastened just above its hind flipper, its purpose now
made obsolete by flesh that had frozen fast.  With hands that had not
stretched flat for twenty years and were so black and scarred by
chilblains and hard wear that they seemed more like wood than flesh, the
Listener uhooked the pin.  Made of no animal bone he could identify,
diamond hard and diamond smooth, it belonged to an older time and place.
The Listener sighed as he handed it over to Bala.  It would be a fine
talisman to hold in his hand when he listened to his dreams.

"Now go back to Nolo," he said.

"Tell him I will come and knock on his door just before the ice storm
hits, and no sooner."

Bala opened her mouth to speak, then closed it.  She nodded.  Her small
hands slipped the wound pin into a fold in her otter coat.  Pulling her
hood close around her face against the rising wind, she cut across the
cleared space to Nolo and Sila's house.

The Listener returned to his seat.  Snow swirled like murky water before
him, but it wasn't cold, not really.  Winter had only just begun.  The
bear coat was enough to keep his body warm, and the thick guard hairs at
his collar allowed no drafts.  His head, he chose to leave uncovered.
The Ice God had eaten his ears thirty years ago.  If he'd had a fancy
for his nose and cheeks, he would have taken them by now.

Fishing in his pike pouch, the Listener searched for his talismans: the
narwhal tusk, the silver knife, and the driftwood.  Sea, earth, and that
which grew to the sky.  Now.  Where was I?  Sadaluk shuffled the
talismans in his lap, trying to recapture the images of his last dream.
The two kidney-size scars on either side of his head burned beneath
their bear tallow plugs.  Briefly he thought back to Nolo's wound pin.
He would have dearly liked to hold it in his hands.  The Old Blood knew
much about dreams.  .  . and even more about Watcher of the Dead.

Show me the one who will bear Loss, the Listener asked for the second
time that night.  The one named Watcher of the Dead.

Time passed.  The talismans grew warm in his hands.  Then suddenly,
abruptly, the ground slipped from beneath his feet and he fell into his
dreams. Lootavek had once said dreams were a tunnel to pass through; to
Sadaluk they were a pit.  Always he felt as if he had been swallowed and
was falling down a great bear's throat.  Voices spoke to him as he
descended, so he did what he had been taught: He listened.

The dream place was dark, and there were things within it that knew and
did not fear him, and unless he listened carefully, he might lose his
way. Lootavek had lost his way only once, yet it had been enough to lure
him out of his house and onto the sea ice, to the soft dripping edges
where white floe and black water met.  It was enough to make him take a
step onto the colorless grease ice beyond.

The Listener closed his fist around the narwhal tusk.  All those who
listened to their dreams were eventually led to their deaths.  Each time
he listened, Sadaluk asked himself, Will this time be my last?

As the meat of his thumb pushed against the smooth ivory of the tusk,
the Listener saw Watcher of the Dead.  He was huntingas before, ranging
over a land fat with game, Death running like a hound at his heels; Yet
even as the Listener looked on, Death departed.  There was someone else
close by whom she must attend to this night.  t t t Moose's rump was
awash with blood.  A pair of foxes, a weasel, a marmot, a side of
jackrabbits, three minks, and a snag cat bounced up and down across the
gelding's back.  Moose's heat kept the carcasses warm.  Raif scratched
his horse's neck.  Moose had worked hard tonight, trotting down slopes
thick with new snow and over ponds hard with ice, never once whickering
when game was in sight, always holding steady for those long vital
seconds when a bow was drawn above him.

"Orwin named you well," Raif said as he walked the horse over the graze
toward the roundhouse.

"I swear one morning I'll come to the stables and find two antlers
sprouting behind your ears."

Moose turned his head toward Raif and let out a long disgusted grunt.

Raif grinned.  He liked his borrowed horse a lot.  Riding him, hunting
from his back and at his side had helped the night pass quickly.  And
that was all Raif had wanted.  It was difficult to sleep these days.

More and more he needed to wear himself out before he dropped onto his
bench or bedroll for the night.  Sometimes it was better not to sleep at
all.  His dreams were never good.  Tern was often in them, thrashing in
his hide tent, beatingagainst some invisible enemy, calling out to Raif
to help him.  Tern's skin was burned black, and his fingers had been
chewed on by wolves.  Raif shivered.  Glancing up through the bank of
frost smoke, he set his gaze on the predawn sky.

This was one of those nights when it was better to hunt than sleep.

Few lights could be seen within the roundhouse.  Most windows were
either barred by stone or wood or both.  Many clans folk believed that
Vaylo Bludd would arrive any day now and attempt to take the Hailhold in
the same manner he had taken Dhoone.  Raif wasn't sure about that.

From what he'd seen and heard at Gnash, it looked as if the Dog Lord
would have his work cut out for him just holding on to Dhoone.  Dhoone
was a huge clan hold with more than a dozen war-sworn clans upon its
borders.  A good half of the Dhoonesmen had escaped to Clan Gnash and
Clan Castlemilk, and they were madder than stags in rut.  Raif couldn't
see how even the Dog Lord could lay siege to one roundhouse while trying
to secure another.

Frowning, Raif patted Moose's neck.  Frozen mud cracked beneath his
boots as he walked.  No more snow had fallen during the night, but the
temperature had dropped to the point where Raif had been forced to
slather his cheeks and nose with grease.  Every few minutes he had to
brush ice crystals from his fox hood, where his breath had glaciated in
the fur.

As he stepped onto the clay court, he spied movement to the side of the
roundhouse.  Pulling on Moose's reins, he altered his path and made
toward the figures spilling from the door that faced the stables. Noises
cut through the mist: the crunch of boiled elk skins on snow, the rattle
of arrows in a bow case and the squeak of new leather, straining as it
took its first weight.  Someone yawned.  Raif caught a glimpse of Corbie
Meese's misshapen head, then Ballic the Red's great barrel-shaped chest.
Clansmen, about three dozen in all, heading from the roundhouse to the
stables.

Tugging Moose forward, Raif broke into a run.  Even before he reached
the half-light of the open door, Ballic the Red had his bow drawn and
sighted. Dropping the reins, Raif raised both arms into the air.

"Ballic.  It's me.  RaifSevrance.  Don't shoot."

"Stone balls, lad!"  roared Ballic, lowering his bow.

"What were you thinking?  Running up like that!  I came within a rat's
tail of shooting the teeth right out of your jaw."  The bowman wasn't
smiling, and his words had a hard bite.

"Where've you been?"

Raif patted Moose's flank.  Dried, partially frozen blood had stained
the gelding's back crimson.  The carcasses strung across its rump hung
limp like bags of feed.

"Been out to the southern taiga.  Hunting."  As he spoke, more men
continued to pour from the roundhouse.  All were dressed for hard
riding, wearing oilskins and thick furs over steel.

Weapons and supplies formed jagged lumps on backs and shoulders and
around waists.  Pouches containing neat's-foot oil, powdered guide stone
spare bowstrings, and dried meat hung on dog hooks from their belts.
Raif saw Drey bringing up the rear.  He was wearing Tern's wax-stewed
greatcoat.

"Did you see anything while you were out there, lad?"  Corbie said, his
light brown eyes flickering toward the land far south of the roundhouse.

Raif shook his head.  He didn't like the look on Corbie's face.

"What's happening?  Where are you going?"

Corbie Meese and Ballic the Red exchanged glances.  Corbie made a
rolling motion with his arm, indicating that the other clansmen move on
ahead of him.

"We're riding east past Dhoone, to the Bluddroad.  Mace has had word
that a party of forty ham mermen and spear men will be making the
journey from Bludd to Dhoone three days' hence, and we're planning to
set an ambush and take them."

Raif looked along the lines of men.  He could see no sign of Mace
Blackhail.

"How does Mace know this?"

Corbie Meese ran a gloved hand over the hammer dent on his bare head.

"He came by the information at Gloon's Stovehouse.  Two nights back,
just before we returned to the clan hold he split from the rest of us.
Said he wanted to check what travelers and other such folk had heard
about the Dhoone raid."

"Just as well that he did," Ballic the Red said, cutting in, "else we'd
have nothing but fresh air to go on."

"Aye " Corbie agreed.

"Turns out that more than a few patrons at Gloon's were loose-spoken,
and Mace heard tell that the Dog Lord means to make the Dhoonehouse his
chief hold.  Everything-- arms, furnishings, animals, even women and
bairns--has to be moved from the Bluddhouse to Dhoone.  The Dog Lord
means to leave his eldest son, Quarro, to watch over the Bluddhold in
his stead."

Raif nodded.  It made sense.  The Dhoone roundhouse was the strongest
keep in all the clan holds with walls sixteen feet thick and a roof made
of ironstone.  So how had he managed to take it?  Against his will the
memory of the badlands raid came back to him .  .  .  the stench of hot
smelted metal in the air.

"Are you coming wi' us, lad?"  Ballic said, his great broom of a beard
catching his breath and then turning it to ice.

"Tern was always telling me how good you are wi' that bent stick of
yours. We could do wi' an extra bowman.  Eh, Corbie?"

Corbie Meese hesitated before answering, tugging on his dogs king gloves
to make them sit right on his hands.

"I'm not sure he should come Bal.  Mace said only year men and full
clansmen. With the dangers involved, 'tis only right and fitting."

"Aye.  You speak the truth."  Ballic the Red set his fierce gray eyes ^
+ (. V.  I 0 N E S A CAVERN OF BLACK I C E f 167 upon Raif for a moment
before turning his gaze to the animal carcasses riding Moose's back.
Raif could see him counting.  When he spoke it was to Corbie, not Raif.

"Twelve skins in half a night, eh?  Heart kills, too.  And one of them's
a snag cat Quite a cache, and that's no mistaking."

"Lad's trouble, Bal," Corbie said.  Then to Raif: "Nothing personal,
lad. You've just reached that age when you're as much harm as help to
have around. And Mace Blackhail has no love of you, that's for sure."

Ballic chuckled.

"Aye, but try as he might he can't keep the lad from his meetings!"  The
bowman slapped Raif on the back with a hand that was gloved then mitted.
No one took as much care of his bow finger than Ballic the Red.

"So, lad.  Tell me the truth.  Are you as fine a shot as Shor Gormalin
and your da would have me believe?"  Raif looked down.  How could he
answer?

"I'm better at some things than others.

I'm no good at hitting targets, but game .  .  " He shrugged.

"I do well with game."  As he spoke, clansmen began to emerge from the
stables with their mounts.  Drey was one of the first to trot his horse
onto the court.  Orwin Shank had given him a fine black stallion with
strong legs and a wide back.  Dawn light had started to shine across the
snow, and Raif could clearly see the expression on his brother's face.
It made something in his chest tighten.  Drey did not want him along.

"How old are you, lad?"  Ballic the Red's question seemed to come from a
very great distance.

"Sixteen."

"So you're due for your yea ring this spring?"  Raifnodded.

"Well, I say we call Inigar Stoop out here and now, and let him take
your oath where you stand.  Couple o' months will make no difference
either way."

Corbie Meese sucked in a good deal of air.  The cold had turned his lips
gray.  His wedge-shaped chest and ham arms strained against his elks
king coat as he stamped his booted feet upon the snow.

"Stone Gods, Ball Mace'll have a frothing fit if he learns you're
planning on taking the lad's oath.  Why, just last night" -- "Where is
Mace?"  Raif interrupted.

"Is he riding with the ambush party?"

"He'll be holding back a day to stand vigil afore Inigar anoints him as
chief."

Raif kept his features still, but he felt his pupils shrinkingas they
cut out a portion of the light.  So Mace Blackhail would stand Chief
Watch in the guide house lashed to the north-facing plain of the guide
stone through twelve hours of darkness, alone, un speaking eyes open to
see the faces of nine gods.  His spine would touch granite in three
places, and the chiefs mantle that he wore would soak up graphite oil
and fluids from the guide stone Afterward, when Inigar cut him free with
the Clansword, chief blood would be let and nine drops of Mace's blood
would be allowed to fall into the Gods Bowl hewn within the stone. Later
Mace would speak terrible oaths and pledges before the clan, renouncing
his birth clan and giving himself wholly to Blackhail for life.  Later
still, he would draw a guide circle with his own hand and step within it
and ask the Stone Gods to smite him down if they judged him unfit to be
chief.

Aware of Corbie Meese's eyes upon him, Raif did not let his anger show.
But it was there, hot and twisted like a piece of black iron in his
chest.  He hoped the Stone Gods sent Mace Blackhail to hell.  "Mace will
ride to catch up with us when he can," Corbie said.

"He sat up all night overseeing clan defenses."  The ham merman looked
impatient to be on his way.  He kept glancingat the increasingly wide
circle of clansmen who had trotted their horses from the stables and
were busy buckling bedrolls and feed sacks in place.

"He's heard tell that the Dog Lord has sent cowl men to our borders.  So
none of us can trust our own shadows from now on.  Mace'll catch up wi'
us within a day."

Cowlmen.  All thoughts of Mace Blackhail slid from Raifs mind.  He now
understood what had made Corbie and Ballic so nervous when he had first
approached the court.  Cowlmen were the nearest thing in the clan holds
to assassins.  Named after the long, hooded cloaks they wore, which were
said to switch colors along with the seasons, they traveled into enemy
territory, took up positions near game tracks and trapping runs, and lay
low for days on end, biding their time until someone came along whom
they could kill.  The casualties they caused were few in relation to
raidingand ambush parties--lone hunters usually or, if they were lucky,
small hunt parties--but that wasn't the point.  They created fear. When
cowl- men were thought to be loose within a clan hold no one could leave
the roundhouse and be sure of returning home.  A cowl man could shoot a
woman out tending her traps without once showing his face.  They could
be anywhere: high in the canopy of a purple blue hemlock, hiding in the
fecal-like sludge of a moss bog, or crouching behind the red spine of a
sandstone ridge.  In winter, it was said some cowl men even buried
themselves in snow, lying for hours with their weapons crossed over
their chests, ready to bring cold death.

"Well, Mace Blackhail's gonna have to find my blunts and roast 'em, for
the lad's coming wi' me."  Ballic the Red's gaze was almost wistful as
he studied the kills on Moose's back.

"You know how valuable a good marksman is to an ambush party, Corbie.
Heart kills like these will drop the Bluddsmen where they stand."  Then
to Raif: "Set here, lad, while I fetch Inigar Stoop."  Without waiting
for any response, Ballic made his way back to the roundhouse.

Raif watched him go.  He didn't know if he wanted to ride with the
ambush party or not.  Moose would have to be left behind; the gelding
had been hard ridden these past three days and needed sleep.  Drey
clearly didn't want him to go.  Raif could see his brother now, astride
the black, edging closer so he could keep track on what was happening
between the two senior clansmen and his younger brother.

Then there were the things that niggled away in the back of Raifs mind,
things about Mace Blackball.  It wasn't usual for the head of an armed
party to split from his men on the final leg of the journey.

And from one short visit to a stove house Mace Blackhail had learned an
awful lot, enough to spread fear throughout the clan hold and send an
ambush party east to beset Bludd.

It didn't fit.

Raif glanced at Corbie Meese, wondering if he should speak such things
out loud.  The ham merman had been quick to pledge his arms to Mace
Blackball, yet what had happened last night in the Great Hearth had not
sat well with anyone, and both Corbie and Ballic seemed less inclined to
keep Mace Blackhail's good opinion than they were yesterday.  Still, it
would all be forgotten once Mace and Raina were wed.  Raif pushed back
his hood, suddenly feeling hot and trapped beneath it.  He didn't like
to think of Raina Blackball with Mace.  It was another thing that didn't
fit.

"Here!  Gather round now!"  Ballic the Red's fierce booming voice broke
the silence of the court as the bowman stepped from the roundhouse,
dragging the little white-haired guide behind him.

"Raif Sevrance is about to take First Oath."

A murmur passed through the ambush party.  Bald-headed Toady Walker
muttered,

"He's gone and done it now."  Behind his back, Raif heard Drey swear
softly, not quite to himself.

Inigar Stoop did not look pleased.  He was dressed in a pigskin coat,
dyed black as was clan way.  Disks of slate, sliced so thin they looked
like scales, were attached to the collar and hem.  The cuffs had been
singed at the Great Hearth to mark the onset of war.  Judging from the
flatness of the clan guide's hair and the number of untied lacings on
his coat, Ballic the Red had just pulled him from his bed.

Pieces of slate snapped as he moved.

"Let's get this over and done," he said, frowningat the dawn sky.

"Though I warn you now, 'tis not a fitting time and place."  Almost
without thinking, Raif reached up to touch his raven lore.  The black
horn felt as cold and smooth as a pebble plucked from ice.  He wasn't
sure if he wanted to do this now, before three dozen clansmen, yet even
as he let the lore drop against his chest, Inigar Stoop was takinga
swear stone from the cloth pouch he wore at his waist.

Warming the stone in his fist, Inigar named the Stone Gods.  His voice
was thin and wavering, and the gods' names had a sharpness to them that
Raif had never noticed before.  Ground mist receded.  Light from the
rising sun reflected off the down sides of clouds, washing the courtyard
with a pale silver light.  The wind had lone since died, and the sound
oflnigar's voice carried well beyond the court.

When all nine gods had been named, Inigar uncurled his fist and held out
his hand.  His black eyes never once left Raif as he waited for the
stone to be claimed.  Even though his raven lore was outside his coat,
restingagainst oiled hide and waxed wool, Raif felt it was inside his
skin.  A strong desire to flee came upon him, to knock the swear stone
from Inigar's hand, drive it deep into the snow with the heel of his
boot, and run off across the frozen headlands, never to return.  Things
were moving too fast.

"Take the stone, Raif Sevrance."  Inigar Stoop's eyes were as dark as
volcanic glass.

"Take it and put it in your mouth."  Raif did not move, could not move.
The guide raised his arm a fraction, made a jabbing motion with his
hand.

"Take it."

Over the guide's shoulder, Ballic the Red nodded vigorously at Raif.

He had pulled an arrow from his case and held it in his fist, point
facing down.  Corbie Meese had freed his hammer from his strap and had
it weighed across his chest.  A glance to the side showed that the
entire ambush party had drawn weapons, sliding them from horn couchings
and leather cradles and scabbards lined with wool.  All here had taken
First Oath.  Drawing weapons was a sign of respect.  RaiFs mouth ran
dry.  Inigar Stoop's old brown face, with its beaklike nose and hollow
cheeks, hardened.  A thin breeze gustingacross the court set his slate
medallions tinkling.

"Take it."

Raif raised his hand toward the swear stone As his shadow fell upon
Inigar's open palm, a raven cawed.  A bird, dark and oily as a piece of
meat blackened on the fire, swooped down into the court.

Descending on a cold current, it rolled its body, divingand shrieking,
until a column of warm air gave it lift.  Flapping its knife wings just
once, it came to rest on the weathercock high atop the stable roof.

The raven watched with yellow eyes as Raif's hand closed around the
swear stone Small flecks of white metal dotting the stone's surface
caught and reflected light as Raif brought it to his lips. Under his
tongue it went, tasting of chalk and earth and sweat.  Tiny bits of grit
broke from it, filtering to the bottom of his mouth.  Inigar Stoop
glanced once at the raven, then spoke.

"Do you pledge yourself to the clan, Raif Sevrance, son of Tern?  Your
skills, your weapons, your blood and bones?  Do you pledge to stay with
us, amongst us, for one year and a day?  Will you fight to defend us and
stop at nothing to save us and give your last breath to the Heart of the
Clan?  Will you follow our chief and watch over our children and give
yourself wholly for four seasons?"

Raifnodded.

Kaawl "And do you do this freely, of your own will?  And are you free of
all other oaths, ties, and bonds?"

Kaaw!

The swear stone was like lead in Raifs mouth.  Minerals bled from it,
tainting his saliva with a foul metal taste.  It isn't right, he wanted
to cry.  Can't you feel it?  Yet to do such a thing seemed like madness
of the worst kind.  He'd already gained a name for making trouble--even
his own brother had said so.  Stop First Oath now and he might as well
run south to the taiga and never come back; he would never be able to
show his face at the roundhouse again.  No.  He had to take this oath.
For as long as he could remember he had lived his life expecting to take
it.  Now Inigar Stoop stood before him, the cuffs of his pig coat burned
black for war, his breath rising in a blue line from his lips, waiting
on the sign that would seal it.  Raif steeled himself.  He nodded for a
second time.  Kaaaaa!  Kaaaaa!

Inigar Stoop jerked back as the raven screamed, bendingat the waist as
if he'd taken a blow to the gut.  His eyes closed briefly, and when he
opened them again Raif saw immediately that knowledge lay within them,
like the core of blue ice that slept through summer deep beneath the
badlands' crust. Quickly Raif looked away.  Inigar knew.

He knew.

"You have taken First Oath, Raif Sevrance," the guide said, the words
falling like stones from his mouth.

"Break it and you make yourself a traitor to this clan."

Raif could not meet his eyes.  No one moved or spoke.  The wind nicked
up, and the raven flung itself from the weathercock and onto its mercy,
wings unfurling like pirate's sails, black so they could sail through
enemy waters by night.

Kaaw!  Kaaw!  Kaaw!

Traitor!  Raif heard.  Traitor!  Traitor!

He shuddered.  His lore lay like a dead weight against his chest,
pressing so heavily he could barely breathe.  Unbidden, a vision of the
little blond-haired luntman Wennil Drook came to him: Dagro Blackhail
and liver-spotted Gat Murdock pushing the blood wood staves through the
pink hairless skin on Wennil's back.  Later, when it was all over and
done and Wennil's corpse lay blue and frozen on the barren earth of the
fell fields Inigar Stoop had taken a chisel to the guide stone and cut
his heart from the clan.

"Who will stand second to this year man Inigar said, turning to face the
ambush party.

"Who will vouch for him and guide him and stand at his side for a year
and a day?  Who amongst you will come before me and take a beggar's
share in his oath?"

Shor Gormalin.  Raif fought for a breath and held it.  On the return
journey from Gnash, the fair-haired swordsman had hinted that he would
be willing to stand second to Raifs oath.  Shor was not here, though.
Raif didn't know where he was, couldn't even be sure if he had returned
from his outing last night.  And even if he had returned and was sitting
in the kitchen drinking hearth-warmed beer and crunching on bacon, he
would hardly be in a mood to bother with the yea ring of some untested
youth.  The business with Raina Blackhail had gone hard on him.

Inigar Stoop waited for someone to speak.  His beaklike nose cast a long
shadow across his cheek.  Raif thought he would be well pleased if no
one stepped forward to back the oath.  The raven circled over the court,
silent except for the faint whistle of air through its pinion feathers.
Corbie Meese and Ballic the Red exchanged glances.

Raif saw Ballic the Red thinking hard, mitted hands smoothing the
fletchings of the arrow he held in his fist.  Raif could almost guess
what he was thinking: The lad is a bowman, like me .  .  .

"I will stand second to his oath."  Drey.  Drey kicking Orwin Shank's
black stallion forward and trotting through the snow to stand at Raifs
side.  Drey saying,

"I know I am only a year man myself, but I have sworn two such oaths of
my own and will soon swear a third, and I count myself a steady man who
takes no responsibility lightly.  If the full clansmen will permit it, I
would back my brother's word."  A ripple of relief passed through the
ambush party.  For a moment it had looked as if no one were willing to
step forward.  Inigar Stoop did not look pleased, but it was out of his
hands now.  It was up to the clansmen with greatest due respect to say
whether or not Drey, a mere year man himself, could stand second to his
brother's oath.  Raif glanced at Drey. His brother made a small
shrugging motion.  Tern's elks king coat fitted him well, made him look
older than his eighteen years.

Corbie Meese cleared his throat.  Slapping his iron hammerhead into his
palm, he said,

"You're a good clansman, Drey Sevrance.  There's none here who would say
otherwise.  The past few weeks have been hard on all of us, yet you have
kept your head and done your duty and proven yourself to be an asset to
this clan. I for one can see no reason why you can't back your brother's
oath.  You have the heart for it and the steadiness of purpose, and if
you are willing to stand before this party and swear that you will watch
your charge well and closely, then that's good enough for me."

Ballic the Red and others nodded.  The raven circled, slow and lazy as a
dragonfly in summer.

Inigar Stoop's face showed no emotion.

"Will you do as Corbie asks, Drey Sevrance?"

Drey slid down from his horse.  His brown eyes sought Raif.

"I swear.

Raif felt a tightness come to his throat.  Drey had not wanted him along
on this trip, had warned him only last night about the damage he was
doing to himself and their family, yet here he was, standing before
three dozen clansmen, speaking on his brother's behalf.  Shame burned
Raifs cheeks.  He wished he could take back what had been said between
them last night in the hall.  Words couldn't be unsaid, though. Raifknew
that.

"So be it."  Inigar Stoop sounded as if he were proclaiminga sick man
dead. He turned to face Raif.

"Your oath has been spoken, Raif Sevrance.  You are a year man now in
the eyes of clan and gods.  Let neither party down."  The wind switched
as Inigar spoke, blowing hard against his face.  He should have said
more--Raif had been present at enough yea rings to know that the guide
was supposed to pass blessingand offer words of guidance to the sworn
man--but Inigar just pressed his lips together and turned to face the
wind full on.

In the uncomfortable silence left, Raif spat out the swear stone

Rubbing it dry against the fox fur of his hood, he waited for Drey to
take it from him.  Normally Inigar Stoop would transfer the stone from
one clansman to another, yet Raif could tell from the set of the guide's
profile that he wanted no more to do with this ceremony.  To him it was
already done.

All gathered were silent as Drey took the small dark swear stone and
slipped it into one of the many pouches hanging from his waist.  The
ambush party was eager to be gone.  Drey reached out and cuffed Raifs
shoulder.

"You'd better hurry and get your roll together for the ride .  .  ."  He
grinned.

"Clansman."

Raif nodded.  He couldn't speak.  As he turned to enter the roundhouse,
the raven began shrieking loudly.  Corpse!  Corpse!  Corpse!  Raif
heard.

"Rider approaching!"  Velvet-cheeked Rory Cleet made the call.  Even as
Raifswiveled around, Ballic the Red brought his bow to his chest.  The
massive bowman bellowed for all to get out of his way so he could be
sure of a clear shot if needed.  Raif looked over the graze in the
direction Rory Cleet indicated.  A white gelding walked across the snow,
picking its steps with enormous care, its back held artificially
straight.  Its rider was slumped forward in the saddle.

The man's chest and head were restingagainst the horse's neck, and an
arm trailed down over the gelding's shoulder, gloved fingers still
tangled in the reins.

A muscle in Raifs neck began to pump.  The gelding belonged to Shor
Gormalin.

Slowly, over seconds that stretched like minutes, Ballic slid his arrow
from the string.  Corbie Meese's hammer thudded onto the ground, making
a sound like a broken bell.  Inigar Stoop's lips started moving, and
even though the wind was still high and Raif couldn't hear what he said,
he knew the Stone Gods were being named for the second time that day.

The gelding, long necked and finely cheeked, with large liquid eyes,
slowly picked a path to the court.  Everything within him was focused
upon just one thing: bringing his rider home.  One small misstep, one
slight shake of his neck, and his rider would slide from the saddle into
the snow.  Shor Gormalin was dead.  As the clansmen moved forward
slowly, quietly, so as not to startle the fine white horse, Shor's fair
hair could clearly be seen.  Half the side of his head was blasted away
by two fist-size quarrels shot at close range.  One of the arrow shafts
had broken off, the other jutted out from a mat of blood, tissue, and
raised bone like something growing from Shor's head.

Without a word passing between them, the ambush party halted in a half
circle and allowed the gelding to finish his journey home.

Respect was due to such a horse, and twenty-nine men knew it.  Shor had
fallen slightly to the left, and every muscle in the horse's neck and
shoulders was taut with the strain of holding his rider in place.

Dried and partly frozen blood streaked the gelding's mane pink and
black.  As horse and rider drew close, Raif saw that Shor's small
unpretentious half sword still sat firmly in its scabbard.  The finest
swordsman in the clan had not been allowed chance to draw his weapon.

"Cowlman," whispered someone, perhaps Corbie Meese.

The gelding came to a halt before the clansmen, turned side-on, and then
held his position, offering his rider to the clan.  Cloud.  The horse's
name came to Raif like a gift.  Shor had ridden him for eight years.

A soft tearing sound cut the air as the raven chose that moment to fly
away. Watcher of the Dead, thought Raif with a dull stab of self-hatred.
The raven had known all along.

CHAPTER TWELVE.

A Fistful of Ice to mach cramps pumped in Ash's stomach as she and Katia
descended the stairs, heading toward the quad.  She was sick of feeling
ill all the time, tired of being cooped up in her chamber and tended day
and night.  She hated her dreams, too.  They came every night now. Every
night. She couldn't remember the last time she had closed her eyes and
simply slept. Couldn't recall when she'd last awakened in the morning
feeling rested. Instead she woke in the dead of night, in those dark
standstill hours where no one but thieves and night watchmen were about,
feelingas if she'd been running through the streets.  Always she awoke
drained of strength and shaking.  Sweat poured down her neck, her heart
beat like a mad thing in her chest, and the sheets were twisted so
tightly around her throat, they raised weals that stayed for hours.
Lately there had been bruises.  .  .  Ash shook her head.  Put that
thought aside.

"What's the matter, miss.  Cold already?"

"No.  I mean yes.  That's it.  Cold, just cold."  Ash cursed herself.
She sounded like such a fool.

"Hand me my gloves.  Quick now."  Katia harrumphed.  She might have said
something, only they were approaching the lower rotunda and armed men
dressed in the black leather cloaks of the Rive Watch, carrying blood
steel at their hips and across their backs, were walking through the
hallway on their way to the Red Forge.  No one, not even a sulky maid
like Katia, liked to draw the Rive Watch's attention her way.  The sight
of their blades alone could set maidens and good wives fainting.  The
red pigment fired into the steel of their long knives and great swords
was said to come from a mix of mercury and human blood, Suddenly
nervous, Ash snatched her calfskin gloves from Katia and tugged them on
with a great deal more force than was necessary.

Knuckles cracked.

"It's not snowing, is it?"  she asked, stepping into the hallway.
Perhaps a dozen or so steps above her Marafice Eye, Protector General of
Spire Vanis and Lord of the Rive Watch, followed in her shadow like a
terrible and silent hound.  It really was quite ridiculous.  Didn't he
have something better to do?  Ride down smugglers, burn thieves' hands
black, hack the fingers from prostitutes who were slow in paying
Protector's Trove?

"I said, it's cold and dry outside."

Ash jumped at the sound of Katia's raised voice.

"I heard you the first time," she lied.  Why did she feel so weak?  Why
did every sharp sound and creaking floorboard make her flinch?

Reaching the tall iron-gated door that led from the Cask to the
quadrangle. Ash tied the last few ribbons on her cloak for good measure.
Penthero Iss hadn't allowed her outside in weeks, and the last time she
had ridden in the enclosed space of the quad was late autumn.  Things
had got a lot colder since then.  Bracing herself, she stepped over the
threshold.  An awful lot colder.

The stone-flagged quadrangle formed the protected heart of Mask
P'ortress. Each of its points was occupied by one of the four great
towers, and its walls were formed by fortress ramparts and great halls.
The quad was long enough to race horses and wide enough to raise lists
and stage tourneys each spring.  In summer the grange lords held court
here, and in the dark months leading to winter Penthero Iss oversaw the
trials of high traitors from the obsidian ledge in front of the Bight.

A thin layer of snow covered the entire quad.  Bitter frosts over the
past week had glaciated the top snow making it crackle underfoot.

Every time Ash took a step she felt as if she were breaking something.
Most of the quad was paved, but the horse run along the outer wall had
long since grown over with the tough yellow grasses that lived on Mount
Slain.  Shaggy weeds peeked through cracks in stonework, and oily green
mosses coated flagstones around the bases of three of the four towers.
Nothing grew close to the Splinter, not one spike of grass or cushion of
moss.

Nothing.  The icebound tower had foundations like the roots of a black
walnut, sending its poisons deep into the soil to kill anything that
grew and threatened to rob its light.

Ash shivered.  However did such nonsense get into her head?  The ground
soil was saturated, that was all.  Too much water running down the
walls.  Aware that her thoughts were skirting dangerously close to the
night she had stepped through the iron-plated door and walked along the
abandoned east wing, Ash said the first thing that came into her head.

"You don't have to walk beside me as I ride, Katia.  You can stay in the
stables and keep warm."

Katia grumbled something.  Her dark glossy hair was currently waging war
with a woolen cap, and from the looks of things the hair was winning.
Great springy curls had succeeded in tilting the cap at an angle
guaranteed to catch a passing updraft--one strong gust and it would be
off.  Ash watched the maid out of the corner of her eye.  Even in a
temperature cold enough to freeze the brine in the curing vats, Katia
looked beautiful.  Her skin glowed like buttered toast, and her lips
were fat with blood.  Ash knew her own cheeks and lips would be as pale
and bloodless as day-old bread, and the harsh light of reflected snow
would do the bags under her eyes no favors. The sight of her own face
had begun to frighten her.  She looked half wasted.

Not realizing Ash was watching her, Katia glanced over her shoulder
toward the Knife.  Something passed between them--Ash couldn't tell
what--but a moment later the expression on the little maid's face
changed.  She shivered elaborately.

"Ooh.  But it's cold, miss.  I swear I'll catch my death out here.  I'm
not like you: ice born Mistress Wence says that judging from the color
of my skin and the sum of hair I have to pluck off my legs afore they're
decent, my family must have come from the Far South.  So perhaps I'd
better stay in the stables like you said.  I am feeling a bit middling."

Icebom.  Ash didn't like the sound of that one bit.  Stepping over a
pile of steaming horse dung, she forced her mind back to the subject at
hand.  Katia wanted to be with Marafice Eye, she was sure of it.  The
stables were a common enough place for romantic assignations.  For as
little as a meat pie or a wedge of good cheese, Master Haysticks would
turn a blind eye to what went on in any number of his vacant stalls.
Some held that the eye he turned wasn't nearly as blind as it might be,
and he had actually carved peepholes in the doors, which he rented out
for tidy sums.  Ash thought about the peepholes sometimes before she
fell asleep at night.  It would be interesting to see what people got up
to.

"Rest in the stables, Katia.  I'll be fine on my own out here.  I won't
gallop off, I promise."  Ash glanced at the limestone battlements that
were topped with iron railings, archers roosts, and murder holes.  She
wouldn't be goinganywhere.

Katia pouted prettily.

"I'll stay in the stables if you say so."  Ash glanced over the maid's
shoulder to where Marafice Eye stood watching from the shadows along the
Cask's west wall.  He had found something buried in the snow--a boulder,
or a frozen hare carcass, or a bit of firewood--and was grinding it
beneath the heel of his boot until it broke.  When he noticed Ash
watching him, he smiled.  It was a terrible sight to see, such a small
mouth stretching.  The skin looked as though it might tear and bleed.
Ash turned away.

"What are you waiting for?"  she snapped at the maid.

"Go on, off to the stables.  Tell Master Haysticks to saddle and bring
out Cob."

Something close to anger crossed Katia's face as she turned on her heel
and made for the stables.  Ash regretted her sharpness immediately yet
didn't call the maid back.  Rubbinga mitted hand across her face, she
took a few deep breaths to calm herself.  Coming outside hadn't been a
good idea.  Oddly enough, it had been her foster father who had
suggested it, last night when he'd visited her chamber after dark.

You are so pale, almost-daughter, like a lily trapped beneath the ice.
You must go outside tomorrow.  Take a ride around the quad, stretch your
legs, breathe in some fresh mountain air.  Your room is filled with lamp
smoke and old dust.  I worry so about you.

Ash kicked at the frozen snow.  Iss was always worried about her.

Master Haysticks emerged from the stable block, trotting his old blue
cob behind him.  The stable master wore a coat pieced together from old
horse blankets and bits of harness leather.  His large head was covered
by a half cap woven from horsehair, and his stirrups had once been
horse's bits.  Nothing was wasted in Master Haysticks' stables.

Once a day he sent out grooms to shovel dung in the quad.  "" Day,
miss," he said, inclining his head.

"Old Cob's ready for yer.  Go easy on the bit; her mouth's scratched up
bad. Been chewing on the stall door again."  He shook his head.

"Terrible splinters."  Ash took the reins from him.  Although she didn't
like Master Haysticks much, she did like the plain way in which he
treated her. He had been stable master at Mask Fortress since before she
was born, when Borhis Horgo was surlord and Penthero Iss held the same
position as Marafice Eye did now.  Master Haysticks remembered who she
was.  He knew she was nothing more than a foundling.

"Pass meyer foot, miss."  Master Haysticks cupped his hands and squatted
low to the ground.  Ash gave him her foot, and he heaved her up over the
cob.

When she was settled in the saddle, she glanced back toward the Cask.

Marafice Eye had gone; footprints driven deep into the snow led straight
for the stables.  Ash let out a guarded sigh of relief.  It was good to
be free of the Knife.

"Come on, Cob," she said, kicking the old work mare's flank.

"Let's take a turn or two around the quad."

Master Haysticks watched Ash with a critical eye, satisfying himself
that her rein work wasn't putting undue stress on the mare's mouth,
before spitting in the snow and heading back.

Ash felt free to relax only when he was gone.  Cob was just about the
gentlest horse she had ever known, and in all the years she had been
riding her, Ash had never managed to coax the old mare into anything
faster than a trot.  She didn't have a name.  Master Haysticks called
her Cob because that's what she was.  This past year he had taken to
calling her Old Cob, which meant she didn't have many horse days left.

Turning onto the horse run.  Ash put aside all bad thoughts.  Now she
was higher from the ground, she could see a little of the city over the
northern wall.  Spires, sharply sloped roofs, and cast-iron turrets rose
above the wall like weapons in an arms case.  If she listened very
carefully she could hear the clatter of carts in the street and the roar
and bustle of Hoargate market.

Ash had always wanted to see Hoargate.  Of all the gates in the city,
Hoargate was considered the most beautiful.  Its great arch was carved
from a thousand-year-old blood wood cut and carted all the way from the
Storm Margin on the western coast.  Hoargate faced west; that was the
thing.  Each of the four gates was built from materials that came from
the direction they faced. Vaingate was raised from the plain cream
limestone of Mount Slain; Wrathgate, which faced east, was cut from a
huge slab of granite quarried from the stone fields of Trance Vor; and
north-facing Almsgate was cast from the blue iron that was mined beneath
the clan holds

Hoargate was the only gate made of wood.  Yet according to Katia, who
had seen it several times, it hardly looked like wood at all, more like
shiny black stone.  The masons had forced hardeners and preserves into
the wood, turning its insides to steel.  Even so, its elaborate facing
still managed to attract a thick layer of hoar frost in midwinter, and
it was after this it was named: Hoargate.

Then there was Vaingate, the dead gate, built from plain limestone,
carved with a mated pair of kill hounds and their one silver blue egg.

The gate where she was found.

Abruptly Ash looked away from the city.  It wasn't worth thinking about.
Her foster father had never once allowed her to step outside Mask
Fortress.  The most she had ever seen of Spire Vanis was when she was
small enough to clamber over the battlements in the Cask and wriggle her
way though to the archers gallery at the top.  The entire city could be
seen from up there: steamingand smoking, its snow black with cart oil,
its streets clogged with barrow boys, dog carts, and horses, and its
street corners afire with the red eyes of a thousand charcoal braziers.

Beneath it all, beneath the dark, diseased mass ofAlmstown, the fine
mansions and lodgements of the grange lords and the ever- expanding
marketplaces with their hide-covered awnings and elk-bone struts, the
hands of the original masons could clearly be seen Walls were as wide
and straight as ox backs.  Original stonework was cut as precisely as
clock parts, and roads were flat enough to skate on in midwinter,
weighted down with enough hard stone to prevent even the dead from
rising.

People said Robb Claw had broken the back of a mountain to build Spire
Vanis. Ash wondered if the mountain would ever strike back.

Shifting her gaze forward, she saw that Cob was pickinga path toward the
Splinter.  Even from this distance, wisps of ice smoke steaming from its
walls were clearly visible.  Ash shivered.  Like a belt of blackstone
pines along a timberline, the tallest tower in Mask Fortress created a
climate all its own.  It was so cold.  Icy air slipped inside Ash's
chest, wrapping long blue fingers around her heart.

It's just a tower, she told herself.  Stone and mortar and wood.  Cold
or not, Cob seemed happy enough to go there.  Ash reasserted her grip on
the reins, ready to pull the mare away, then remembered the splinters in
the horse's mouth and let the reins fall slack.  What was the harm in
drawing close?  She glanced at the sky.  It was daylight, she was in
full view of the Red Forge and the Cask, and it was impossible to enter
the tower from outside.  The external door had been sealed shut for
years.

As rational as all that sounded.  Ash still found herself stiffening in
the saddle as she approached.  Her thighs gripped the mare's belly
tightly.

She was hardly surprised when Cob took it upon herself to step from the
horse run and trot over to the path that led behind the tower.

The old mare was bent on going her own way.  Craning her neck.  Ash
risked a glance at the stables.  Still no sign of Katia or the Knife.

Katia had once told Ash that when a man and a woman took a tumble
together, it took longer for them to unlace and unhook their clothes
than to do the actual act.  Ash frowned.  She could have her own dress
stripped off within a minute.

As she puzzled on that, Cob rounded the curve and entered the short run
between the curtain wall and the tower.  Puzzlement slid rrom her face
when she spotted tracks in the snow.  Footsteps, two pairs of them, and
two thick drag lines leading straight to the spire s unused door.  Fresh
tracks, by the looks of them, leading in but not out.

"Easy now," Ash said, as much to herself as the mare.  Looking ahead,
she saw that the footsteps had come from the direction of the south
gate.  Ash knew from experience that if she were to head that way, she'd
be stopped before she reached the end wall The gate was patrolled by a
dozen brothers-in the-watch.

"Whoa," she murmured, pulling briefly on the reins.  The old mare seemed
happy enough to stop and quickly found something to sniff at alongside
the curtain wall.  Ash slid down, booted feet thudding onto hard ground.
Glancing left, then right, she approached the tower door.

Wooden boards had been pried away from the frame, leavingan outline of
bent nails around the door.  Candle ice hung from the lintel in fat
chunks, and Ash felt water drip on her hood.  The keyhole was set in a
brass plate as large as Cob's head, and someone had spent many minutes
scraping rime ice from the lock.  Ash hesitated, took a step back, then
surprised herself by reaching out and pressingagainst the door.  It held
firm.

She should have been relieved, yet the nerves in her hand continued to
register the contact seconds after she withdrew.  Against her will the
memory of the night she had walked along the east gallery came back to
her.  She hardly knew what she'd felt, had tried to convince herself
many times that the whole thing had been a figment of her imagination,
brought on by extreme cold and fear and darkness, yet the feeling of
want returned so sharply that it brought the taste of metal to her
mouth.

Something in the Splinter wanted what she had.

A deep part of her mind had known it all along, from the very first
instant she had felt the thing's presence in the tower, yet she had
thrust it to the back other mind with such force that everything had
become jumbled and unclear.  It was clear now, though.  Perfectly.

Slowly, takinga child's careful steps, Ash backed away from the
Solinter.  She nursed her hand as she retreated; the fingers that had
touched the door felt like ice.

"Come on.  Cob," she said, hating how weak her voice sounded.

"Let's get back to the stables."  Cob paid her no heed, forcing Ash to
spin around and fetch the mare herself.  She didn't like turning her
back on the door, and the desire to run was so strong that she had to
bite down on her lip to fight it.  Yet she couldn't very well leave a
horse in the quad. Master Haysticks would have a few choice words to say
to her if she did.

Cob was still sniffingat the wall, and as Ash dipped down to grab the
bridle, she spied the object of the mare's attention.  All the heat
drained from her face.  A blue ribbon lay embedded within the snow like
a vein beneath a hand. She recognized it at once.  It was a tie from a
nightgown she had given to Katia to mend.  The fabric was wearing thin,
and several of the ribbons were loose.  One or two had fallen off.  Ash
plucked the ribbon from the snow. Katia had asked if she had any clothes
that needed mending before winter, and Ash had handed her an armful of
cloaks, dresses, and nightgowns.  They hadn't been returned, but that
was nothing strange.  Seamstressing was not one of Katia's strong
points.  It took her a whole morning just to pick the hem from a skirt.

The ribbon was cold and limp, a tongue of blue ice.  Turning back to
face the tower door, Ash studied the two drag lines that ran alongside
the footprints. Something large and heavy had been hauled inside.  Like
a bed.  Ash frowned. Where had such a thought come from?

Any number of objects could have left similar tracks in the snow.  In
fact, things were beginning to make more sense now.  The interior door
was only half the size of this one, cut narrow to match the scale of the
east gallery. Nothing wider than a man could be brought through.

So ifiss needed something large brought into the Splinter, this was the
only way he could do it.

Ash rolled the ribbon between her fingers.  What had her old clothes got
to do with anything?

.  .  and of course there'll be a new chamber .  .  .

No.  Ash shook her head, sending Katia's words away.  It was madness.

Her foster father couldn't be planning to move her here.  Not to the
Splinter.  He loved her and worried about her, and just last night he'd
told her how pale she looked and encouraged her to take a ride in the
snow.  Ash crushed the ribbon in her fist.  She needed to get back to
her chamber.  Suddenly nothing felt right.  Walkingalongside Cob, she
made good time.  Marafice Eye and Katia still hadn't emerged from the
stables, and even Master Haysticks hadn't sent out a groom to watch for
the horse.  Ash was out of breath by the time she reached the stable
door.  Her stomach was cramping wildly.  She hardly knew what to do,
didn't know what to think, couldn't believe the ideas that kept shooting
through her head.  "Whoa, lady.  Watcha doing in 'ere?"

Ash wheeled around.  She had walked straight into the stables without
thinking.

A young groom with bad skin and a flat head stepped out from behind a
stack of hay.

"Best step outside, lady.  Haysticks don't like no high collars
struttingabout when he's not around."  The groom moved forward.  "" Ere.
I'll take Old Cob.  "

Feeling like a fool, Ash held out the reins.  What had she been
thinking? Leading her own horse into the stables like a journeyman.

Just as the groom took the reins, a great rumbling noise shook the
building. Already on edge, Ash flinched.  Suddenly the far end of the
stable block was flooded with light as a whole section of the end wall
was wheeled back.  Of course, she thought, relaxing instantly, the
stable has a second entrance to service the trade gate.  Marafice Eye
picked that moment to emerge from the nearest horse stall.  His big dog
hands were busy with the buckle on his belt.  As soon as he saw Ash he
sneered and turned the simple business of belt buckling into something
she couldn't bear to look at.  Feeling her face growing hot, she turned
and ran from the stables.  Laughter followed her.

The moment she was free of the building, Ash threw the ribbon onto the
ground and kicked it into the snow.  She was sick of being out here. She
hated Marafice Eye and the pimply groom and Master Haysticks.  She hated
all the things going on behind her back.  Where was Katia?

"Aaw, miss.  Are we going back so soon?"

Ash spun around.  Katia, her wool cap gone and thick curls disheveled,
leaned against the stable door and smiled lazily at her mistress.

"I've come over all flushed.  I swear I'll need to take a roll in the
snow to cool my blood."

Three steps and Ash was on her.  Grabbing Katia's arm, she marched the
girl from the stables.

Katia fought back.

"You're hurting me!"

Ash wrenched Katia's arm and twisted it behind her back.  She was filled
with fury, angry at everyone and everything, sick to her stomach of
beingafraid.

"I don't care.  Now walk on."

Katia did as she was told, yet it wasn't in her nature to go quietly.

"You told me to go to the stables!  Said you didn't want me around.

Taint my fault if you're jealous of me and the Knife.  Taint my fault
you're flatter than sheet ice and no man would give you a second glance.
What you need"-- " Be quiet!  " Ash twisted Katia's arm another degree.
Her own anger surprised her.  She was shaking, yet for the first time in
months it wasn't with fear.  It felt good to have control over some-
one--even if it was just a servant girl.

"Open the door.  And be quick about it."

In the fourteen months that she had known Katia, Ash had never seen the
girl move so quickly.  She snapped down the door latch faster than she
pocketed rose cakes.  Two brothers-in-the-watch were walkingalong the
great circular corridor of the Cask, their leather cloaks fastened to
their tunics by lead broaches the size of sparrows.  Both men wore
quarter helms that cast shadows across their eyes.  It was telling that
neither man smiled or reacted in any way to what they saw: by now the
whole fortress knew that wherever the Foundling was, the Knife was only
paces behind.  Ash slammed the door shut with her boot heel, then pushed
Katia directly into the path of both brothers, forcing them to step
aside to let mistress and servant pass. Climbing the stairs to her
chamber, Ash was aware other heart racing in her chest.  Just one touch!
One touch and the thing, the presence in the Splinter, had known she was
there.  In all her life she had never felt such need.  It pulled at
something, some part of her she had no name for.

Reach, mistressss.  We smell you.  Smell of blood and skin and light.

"Aargh!  Miss!  You're breaking my arm."

Ash started.  Looking down, she saw where she was holding Katia so
tightly that blood had stopped flowing to her hand.  Abruptly she let
her go.  Katia stumbled forward and immediately began rubbing her arm.

She said things--a whole stream of them--yet Ash cut them away from her
mind. Calmly, as if Katia were perfectly silent, not in the process of
sobbingand issuing threats, she said,

"Follow me."  Ash took the final steps to her room, secure in the
knowledge the maid would follow.  The door was ajar, and when she pushed
it she came face-to-face with Penthero Iss' manservant, Caydis Zerbina.
The tall dark-skinned servant stopped dead on the spot.  His long,
elegant arms cradled an odd assortment of her belongings: the green wool
rug, a thick winter cloak, one of the amber lamps, a silver hairbrush.
Ash supposed she should be surprised at seeing him here, but she wasn't.

The calmness was still upon her.  She made a small bobbing motion with
her chin, indicating the items he held.

"It's all i right, Caydis.

Please continue.  I realize you didn't expect me back | from my ride so
soon. The fault is entirely my own.  My apologies, j Please finish your
business. " ^ Caydis Zerbina bore Far South blood, as Katia did, yet
unlike | Katia, he was soft-spoken and gentle in manner.  He worshiped
with | the priests in the Bone Temple and never wore any fabric heavier
j than linen, even on the coldest day.  Common was not his language ^ of
birth.

"So sorry, mistress.  I stop now.  Cause no more offense."  Hel bowed
deeply, the bone bracelets on his wrist chinking like falling^ rain.
Slowly he began to back away.  i Ash raised her hand.

"No.  I insist you carry on.  Your actions cause me no offense."  And
the strange thing was, they didn't.  Caydis| Zerbina was just carrying
out orders, like Katia and Marafice Eye.  l One person ruled Mask
Fortress, one person had access to the Splinter, one person had
suggested she leave her chamber this morning to eo for a ride in the
quad: Penthero Iss.  Her foster father had wanted her out of the way so
he could collect more things for her move.  Chances were she wouldn't
have missed anything except the rug and the lamp, and both those items
were in need of cleaning or repair, and their absence could be smoothly
explained.

Caydis Zerbina was clearly unhappy at being compelled to finish his
business. His dark eyes, with their almond-colored whites and thick
lids, flicked nervously as he moved about the chamber.  Ash suspected
that he collected things solely to satisfy her wish that he carry on,
rather than from any real need to remove anything further.  She held
open the door for him as he left, inclining her head in a gracious
farewell.

"Caydis," she said after he had taken a handful of steps along the
corridor,

"I won't tell my foster father about our unplanned meeting.  I trust you
will do the same.  There's little benefit in either of us admitting our
mistakes."

Caydis bowed his long gazelle neck.

"Mistress."

Even before he reached the steps.  Ash had turned her attention to
Katia. The servant girl was standingagainst the corridor wall, her face
all red and puffy, rubbing her arm as if she couldn't quite believe it
was hurt.  One step forward was all it took to cower her.

Ash supposed she should feel ashamed about having someone frightened
other, yet a teeny bit other rather liked it.

"Inside.  Now."  Katia's eyes were huge with a mixture of indignation
and suspicion.  She moved, though.  Quick enough to dislodge the last
remaining hairpins from her curls.  The pins struck the stone with
musical notes as Ash shut the door behind her.

"Sit," she said, wagging her head toward the bed.

Katia sat.

Ash turned her back on her.

"Now.  I'm going to ask some questions, and you have two choices.  One,
you can answer them honestly and be away from here within the quarter.
Or two, you can lie and deceive me and get hurt."  She spun back.

"Now which is it going to be?"  'you won't dare hurt me.  I'll scream.
I surely will.  " Bending forward so that her face was only a breath
away from Katia's, Ash said,

"Go ahead.  Scream.  The Knife is out there.  He'll hear if you make
enough noise.  But before you do, think for just one moment.  You may
know and bed him, but it's me he's charged to protect.  Me.  Not some
scrap of a kitchen girl who doesn't know what's good for her.  Me."  Ash
saw hurt in Katia's eyes but forced herself to continue harder than
ever.

"Ask yourself this.  If you cry out and I cry out, which one of us is he
likely to aid first?"  Katia made no answer.  Her teeth pulled at the
skin on her lips.  Ash straightened her spine.

"Right.  Why has my foster father set Marafice Eye to watch me?"

"Don't know."  Katia sounded sulky.

"The Knife his self thinks it's madness.  Says he's sick of the sight of
you, and that he's got better things to do than watch over a thin strip
of bacon wi' no fat."

Ignoring the gibe, Ash said,

"So he doesn't know why?"

"No.   Says it'll be over soon, though.   Vealskin promised any day
now." Ash frowned.   Marafice Eye was Protector General; he would hardly
agree to act as personal guard to a foundling without good reason.   He
knew something, Ash felt sure of that.   And despite what he said to
Katia, he took a cat's pleasure in watchingand taunting her--though he
wouldn't likely admit that to any girl he chose to bed.   Suddenly
uncomfortable with the turn of her thoughts and knowing that if she
dwelled on them further, she would lose her nerve and weaken, Ash
changed the subject.

"What happened to the clothes I gave you to repair last week?"

"Iss took them."

"Where?"

Katia shrugged.

"Don't know.  Said he wanted to start collectinga few things here and
there to make the move easier when it came.  Said he wanted to surprise
you, and to tell you I wanted them for repair."

"What other special instructions did my foster father give you?"  No
reply.

"I said, what else?"

Katia shuffled her feet.

"Nothing."

She was lying.  Ash took a breath, thinking.  After a moment she began
to shake her head.

"You know, Katia, my foster father isn't the only one who has power over
you. I don't have to take you with me when I move to my new lady's
chamber.

I could tell my foster father that I no longer care for your services,
that you bed any man who crosses your path, and that you stole one of
my"-- " Taint never stole nothing!  " Katia stood, fists clenched.

"You'd be lying if you say so.  Lying!"

"Hush, girl," Ash said in a voice she hoped sounded bored.

"I can claim anything I want and get away with it.  Do you really think
my foster father will take your word over mine?  Do you?"

That made Katia stop and think.  All the strength and light in her face
faded, leaving her lookingas young and vulnerable as the girl she really
was. Fifteen, that was all.  Ash felt her determination waver; all she
wanted to do was go to Katia and put her arms round her and assure her
that she'd never say anything bad about her--even if she really had
stolen something.  Katia was younger than her by almost a full year, yet
up until today, until right this minute, Ash had always felt like the
younger one.  Strange, but the very thing that was frightening her was
also making her strong.  She had to know.

And she would do anything, anything, to find out.

Steeling herself, Ash said,

"I think we both know the answer to that question, Katia.  You'd be back
in the kitchens within a day on my say-so, no matter how diligently you
carried out my foster father's orders.  I am Penthero Iss' ward, his
almost-daughter. Now tell me what I need to know, and I swear he'll hear
nothing but good about you from me."

Although she was still standing, Katia seemed smaller than usual; her
shoulders were slumped, and her back was bent.  Even her curls seemed
flatter.

"Promise to take me with you when you go."

Ash closed her eyes.  A pain, like a sore muscle, flared softly in her
chest.

"If I go to a grand chamber with isinglass windows and a fireplace all
my own, then I promise to take you with me."  She felt the lie as she
spoke.  It was the truth, but it was also a lie.

Katia, who was such a terrible liar herself, heard only the truth.

She brightened immediately.

"Well, that's settled, then.  Isn't it?"

Ash nodded.  She didn't know how she managed to stop her cheeks from
burning.

"Well, miss, it's the strangest thing.  Can hardly understand it
myself--'less of course it's to do with your 'tility."  Seeing Ash's
blank look, Katia expanded, her love of sharing secrets now fully
engaged.

"Your fertility.  You know, when you finally come into your blood and
can be married and tumble with men.  Well, ever since His Lordship
engaged me, but most particular these past three months, he's asked that
I check your chamber pot and sheets each morning for blood.  You know,
women's blood.  Says he must be told the minute you come to your menses.
Right fierce on the matter, he is.  Gives me the dox just thinking about
it."

"Sheets?  Chamber pot?"

"Aye, and your nightdress and underthings, too."

Ash exhaled softly, her strength vanishingas quickly as it came.  You
can't stay a child forever, Asarhia.  The old blood will show soon
enough.  Her foster father's words came back to her, each one a drop of
ice against her face.  Iss was waiting for her menses to come.  All his
pinchingand proddingand watching was for just one thing.  Why?

What did he want with her?  What would he do when her blood finally
broke? The thought made cramps jab at Ash's stomach.  Puttinga hand on
the wall to steady herself, she said,

"Leave me, Katia.  I want to be alone."

The little maid brought her lips together, took a step forward,
hesitated, then took one back.

"You won't tell Iss I told you, will you?  He'd be madder than a snag
cat in a trap if he knew.  If mad's the right word for someone who never
raises his voice, just fixes you with a cold stare and- " "I promise I
won't say a word."  Ash cut her short; the last thing she wanted right
now was a reminder of how cold-blooded her foster father could be.  As
Katia swung open the door, she said one last thing.

"I'm sorry about hurting you before.  Truly I am.  It won't happen
again."

Katia turned and smiled.

"Weren't nothing really, miss.  I used to get worse from Mistress Wence.
A lot worse."

Ash tried a smile but failed.  By the time she thought of a reply, Katia
was gone.  Ash stared at the closed door.  Why had she never mentioned
being beaten before?

It seemed like a very long time before she made her way to the bed.

The cramps became stronger, rollingacross her abdomen in sickening
waves, and all she wanted to do was sleep.  Later.  She would decide
what to do later. Her eyes closed, bringing darkness and peace, and
before she could form another thought she fell into a deep numbing
sleep.

So cold, mistressss.  So dark.  Reach.

Ash twisted in her bed, turning her back on her dreams.  They pursued
her, liquid shadows with hands that cracked and bled.  Their shapes
massed and shifted, darkness leaking from them like water weeping from
ice.

Reach, mistressss, pretty mistressss.  Reach.

Ash twisted again, saw the cavern of black ice ahead.  No.  Not there.

She twisted back, felt shadows slide across her face, cold as water from
the deepest darkest well.  Things moved in the periphery, wet and
twitching like skinned beasts.  Ground shifted beneath her feet, and
suddenly the cavern was below her, its entrance a vast hole blasted into
sea ice, an ocean of black tar rolling beneath.  Ash backed away.

She wouldn't go there, wouldn't take that last step.  Reach, mistressss.
Reach.

Wet fingers clawed at her arms, drawing them up and up and up.  Ash
fought to keep them from rising, but it was like trying to bend her
knees backward: the joints would only work one way.  Reach!  Reach!

No.  She shook her head, tried to twist away.  Nothing moved except her
arms, which continued to rise until they drew level with her shoulders.
Shadows pushed from all sides, eyes flickering like serpent's tongues.

REACH.  "

Ash didn't reach, she pushed.  Palms falling flat against something that
shone pale like ice, she thrust herself away from that place.  A
white-hot needle of pain raced along her arms to her heart.  She felt
something deep within her tear, heard a great weight of ice shatter as
it hit hard ground, then staggered back and back and back.  .  .

She opened her eyes to a world dulled by pain.  Belly down upon the bed,
sheets bunched around her waist, she lay for a long moment without
moving. Her hands were stretched high above her head, reaching for the
nearest wall. Even as she worked muscles to pull them in, she knew
something was wrong. The hot, angry pain that came with skin burns
flared in her palms, making her wince.  One palm was open, the finger
and thumb pads red.  Burned.  Ash dragged her other hand into view.  It
was closed, the fingers stiff and set in place.

She opened it slowly, aware of something hard pulling at her skin.

When the fingers had curled halfway, a drop of clear liquid slid along
her wrist.  Shivering, she forced the fingers back all the way.  Ice.  A
chunk of ice slid from her palm onto the bed.

Icebom.  Katia's word was the first thought she had, before shock or
fear or the need for explanations set in.  The burns had been caused by
ice, not fire.

The ice was wedge shaped, blue as frost, and stippled with the kind of
pressure lines that Ash had seen on rocks dug from the base of Mount
Slain. As she watched, the patch of damp beneath it spread.

Abruptly she looked away.  What time was it?  How long had she slept?

Late afternoon light made everything in the chamber seem gray.  No lamps
had been lit, but the little charcoal brazier was still burning, giving
off a puttering last-breath sort of light.  Ash brought her burning
hands to her face and blew on them.  After a moment she braced herself
and began to rise from the bed.

That was when she felt it.  Halting on the spot, halfway up from the
bed, her weight borne by one elbow and one knee, she reached down with
her right hand, pushing through skirt fabric and linen.  Seconds passed
before her fingers found the right place.  Ash tensed.  Wetness, warm
this time, between her legs.  Slowly, as if she were moving through
water, not air, she brought her hand back.  She didn't want to look,
didn't want to see, but matters were too far gone now and of all the
changes that lay ahead, surely this one would be the easiest to bear?

Dark blood rolled across her fingers like treacle.  Menses.  Ash
breathed deeply, trying to recall the calmness she had felt earlier when
confronting Katia and Caydis Zerbina.  She needed it more than ever now.
Time passed and still her hand shook, and she realized that this was as
calm as she was likely to get.

Moving slowly, she brought her thighs together to prevent any more blood
from staining her clothes, held her wet hand clear of the bed, and
shuffled to her feet.  Once she was satisfied there were no bloodstains
on the sheets, she stripped bare, isolating her underskirt and under
drawers, which were the only items stained, then picked up the small
fruit knife from the dresser and began to hack away at the linen.  This
took time.  The knife was almost blunt and her hands persisted in
shaking, and the linen was winter weave, so doubly thick.  All the
while, she pressed her thighs together and held something deep inside
her clenched.

Well before she was satisfied with the smallness of the linen pieces,
she began to feed them into the brazier.  The charcoal took a lot of
stirringand blowing before it produced a decent flame, but eventually
the fire got under way.  The linen pieces burned quickly, cris ping to
nothing within seconds. There was a great deal of smoke, and Ash
supposed she should open the shutters and fan it out, but she had a lot
of other things to do and even more things to think about, and she would
get around to it soon enough.

Tyinga linen strip between her thighs, she crossed back to the bed.

The ice was gone, melted to a dark puddle shaped like an eye.  Within an
hour even that would be gone, and soon there would be nothing left to
prove that it had ever existed.  Ash contemplated the drying stain.

That's what she needed to do: melt away without a trace.

CHAPTER THIRTEEN.

The Bluddroad ed fog surrounded them like the haze rising from a vat of
boiling blood.  The air was bitterly cold and so still that the sound of
lake ice cracking under tension could be heard five leagues away.  It
was dawn, and Raif supposed the sun was somewhere, rising over the tops
of the Copper Hills, casting its strange and bloody light upon the road.
Raif grimaced. He couldn't see anything beyond the two riders directly
ahead of him.

Frost had warped his boiled leather cuirass, making it chaff against his
neck.  He had not slept well.  No one had slept well.  A cold camp
raised along the northeastern edge of the Dhoonehold was no place for a
Hailsman to rest.

"All halt!"  Corbie Meese's hiss blew through the mist like a draft of
cold air.  His voice, which had been formed by the Stone Gods to do the
one thing necessary to all ham mermen as they fought-- bellow at the
tops of their lungs--did not sound right forming whispers.  It was like
listening to a dog meow.

Still, everyone was quick to obey him, reining horses within a space of
twenty paces.  Metal on all bridles had been bandaged to prevent
frostbite to the horses, so there was little noise.  Even the ham mermen
had rubbed oat flour into their chains to prevent them from rattling and
betrayinga position.  Sharp winds two nights earlier had dumped the snow
into drifts, and Raifs borrowed filly was up to her hocks in dry white
powder.

The raid party formed a loose circle on the sparsely wooded slope their
mounts tightly reined, breath venting in white bursts, eyes dark as
coals beneath their fox hoods.

Ballic the Red had freed his bow from its case and was busy warming the
waxed string between his fingers.  Drey and several other ham mermen
adjusted the straps on their hammer slings for ease of draw.

Corbie Meese pulled back his hood so all could see his face.  Jabbing
his chin southeast, he said,

"Road's below us, just beyond those stone pines.  Should be plenty of
cover, but with this piss-thick mist about us it's hard to tell a
molehill from a moose.  We'll know better when Rory gets back.  Last
time I rode here there were trees to either side of the road, but that
was ten years back, and times have changed since then.  The Dog Lord's
no fool--you'd do well to remember that."  A brief glance included Raif
and some of the other younger year men

"And he knows a likely ambush site when he sees one.  According to Mace,
he's ordered the felling of all trees along the Bluddroad.

"Course, unless he's got an army of woodsmen hidden up his dogs king
draws, he won't be reaching here anytime soon.  But that isn't the
point: The Dog Lord knows the dangers.  You can bet your bow fingers
that any man of his traveling this road will be armed to the teeth,
nervous as a wench squatting in a bush, and ready to attack at the first
sound of an arrow knocking wood.

"Now the mist's in our favor, but don't let it make you lazy.

There'll be fore riders in the Bludd party, and when they can't see
their own horses' heads afore 'em, they'll stop lookingand listen
instead.  So keep your horses on tight rein and no moving or drawing
steel once you're in position.  Right?  "

Raif nodded along with the rest.  His mouth was so dry he could feel the
ridges on his teeth.  At some point while Corbie Meese was speaking, the
fact of what they were planning to do had sunk in.  He had never shot a
man before, never set his sights on anything larger than a snag cat But
he knew, in that deep part of himself where the shots came from and the
arrows passed through on their way to their targets, that he would be
good at shooting men.

"Course you'll need to keep an eye to the mist.  If the wind picks up,
it'll be gone afore you've had chance to shift your arses in the
saddle."  Corbie Meese looked grim.  The hammer dent in his head was
filled in with a wedge of red fog.

"More than likely we're in for a wait.  The Bludd party could pass here
any time between noon and nightfall, and we need to be ready when they
come.  So I'll have no man leaving his mount."

"Aye," chipped in Ballic the Red.

"So piss now or hold it in."  When no one in the party moved, Toady
Walker raised an eyebrow and said, "No pissing over the horses' backs,
gentlemen. Riles 'em something rotten."

Everyone laughed in the quick, reflexive way that owed more to tension
than to humor.  While most in the party were busy making last minute
adjustments to their weapons' casings, Drey trotted his black stallion
over to Raif. Keeping his hood up so only those who were directly in
front of him could see his face, Drey leaned close to his brother and
murmured,

"Whatever the split, you come with me."  Before Raif could answer, he
turned away.

Raif stared at the back of his brother's head.  A split?  This was the
first he'd heard that the ambush party would be divided.  Uneasy, he
reached inside his oilskin and felt for his lore.  It was the first time
he had touched it in nearly a week--ever since the day Shor Gormalin's
horse had brought its master home.  Raif took a breath and held it in.
The hurt of Shor's death had not passed.  He could still remember the
dark look in Shor's eyes as he left the Great Hearth, still see him
flinch the moment Raina Blackhail admitted joining with Mace.  Abruptly
Raif dropped the lore.  Watcher of the Dead.  How many deaths would he
watch today?

Snow crunched ahead, somewhere deep within the fog curtain.  Ballic
aimed his bow.  Corbie Meese called softly,

"Rory?"

"Aye!

"Tis me.  Don't shoot, Ballic," came the reply.

Raif couldn't help but smile.  From his position well below them, Rory
Cleet couldn't possibly see Ballic the Red, yet he knew enough about the
red-haired bowman to guess that he'd already drawn his bow.

Seconds passed, and then blue-eyed Rory Cleet rode into view, his hood
pushed back, his sheepskin mitts caked in sap and pine needles, and his
boiled-leather half coat weighted with clods of frozen snow.  He wasted
neither breath nor time.

"Road's clear.  No sign of horse or cartage since last snow.  Five dozen
or more stone nines have been newly felled on the road's south verge,
but whoever was set to the task got bored or cold or sent to another
section before he could finish the job.  As it is, the area around first
choice has been poorly balded, but three hundred paces beyond that
there's an area ofnewgrowth above the road.

The pine crowns are at a height to conceal mounted men, and directly
across from them there's a copse of dogwood and ash.  Between the two,
there's enough cover to conceal thirty men.  "

Corbie Meese nodded.

"Aye.  Well done, lad."

Rory Cleet tried but couldn't quite stop his face from coloring with
pleasure.  Not for the first time, Raif found himself regretting the
incident at the Great Hearth door when he'd forced Rory from his post.

"Right," Corbie said.

"Ballic.  You head the southern party.  I'll take the north.  We'll
count a dozen men apiece, and the remaining five will form a rear guard,
quarter league east of the ambush site, to block Bludd's retreat and
pick off runaways."  Corbie scanned the ambush party, his light brown
eyes hard as flint, a muscle in his right cheek pumping.  After a while
his gaze settled on Drey.

"Do you think you can handle the lead in the rear?"

Drey pushed back his hood.  His hair was plastered against his head,
sweat and six days of grease making it appear darker than the chestnut
brown it normally was.  His face was pale, and Raif was struck by how
much older he looked than the day they had shot ice hares by the lick.
It was never Drey's way to speak without thinking, and when he stripped
off his glove and turned down his elks king collar, Raif guessed he was
reaching for his bear lore. Raif had always envied him the bear.  Tern
had been a bear, like his father before him and his uncle before that.
Every generation of Sevrances produced a bear.

Watchingas he weighed the bear claw in his fist, Raif realized why
Corbie Meese had chosen him.  Drey was solid, dependable, and he
possessed none of the rash cockiness that took most year men five or
more years to overcome. Raif felt his chest ache with envy and pride.
One day, he thought.  One day Drey will make a fine chief.  "I can
handle the rear guard."  Drey's voice was level.  He slipped the bear
lore beneath his soft skins

Corbie Meese and Ballic the Red exchanged a glance, and Raif knew that
Drey had done right in their eyes by taking time to weigh his lore.
Corbie beckoned him closer.

"Right, lad.  Here's the cut.  If all goes to plan, there shouldn't be
much for you to do.  The Bludd party will pass you a good three minutes
afore they reach us, so your job is to stay back from the road, high up
beyond the tree line, and keep your men silent as corpses.  There'll be
no signaling done.  I don't want to hear one clever owl hoot or loon
call.  Nothing.  The only time you move from your positions is after you
hear us attack.  Then your job is to get onto the road as fast as you
can, and take down any Bluddsmen who attempt to retreat.  Understood?"

Hearing Corbie speak, Raif began to understand why the ham- merman had
given the command to Drey when there were full clansmen available to
take it.  The real danger and the real fighting would fall upon the two
attack parties: It would be they who risked their lives, they who fought
at close range.  Corbie Meese wanted all the seasoned clansmen with him.
Raif could not fault him for that.  The retreat party would be there as
a fail-safe to pick off any runners or stragglers.  Drey nodded slowly.

"What makeup?"

"Yourself, another ham merman two bowmen, and a swordsman.  Remember
that everyone in the Bludd party'll be a trained warrior.  More than
likely they'll be spear men or ham mermen They fight fierce and their
weapons are weighted, so unless you fancy a hammer notch to match mine,
give them a wide berth."  Corbie Meese poked his dent with a gloved
finger.

"Keep your bowmen above the road, and have them shoot from cover."

Party members were picked by Corbie and Ballic.  When Ballic suggested
that Raif go with Corbie in the north party, Drey spoke up.

"I want him with me.  Take Banron Lye instead."

Corbie Meese looked at Drey a moment, perhaps waiting for the year man
to explain himself, but when Drey said nothing further, he nodded once.

"It's your party.  The say is yours.  The lad goes with you."

Minutes later they set off.  Winding their way through paper birches as
pale as wax candles, they headed east along the slope, high above the
road.  The horses' mouths had been soft bound with sheepskin to prevent
them from blowingand whickeringas they moved.  Raifhad braced his bow,
and it was now balanced across his cande.  He rode with an arrow in his
fist.

Overhead, the sky was the color of rotting plums.  The fog had begun to
thin, and much to Raifs disgust it had turned from red to pink.

Slowly, gradually, one tree and sandstone crag at a time, the taiga
northeast of Clan Dhoone was beginning to emerge from the mist.  The
land was a mine shaft of drops, cut banks, and jutting rocks.  Pine
roots burrowed deep into the soft blue sandstone, pulverizing bedrock as
they grew, making for treacherous ground.  Small ponds, deep and dark as
wells, beaded the creases between slopes.  All of them should have been
frozen, but they weren't, and Raif could only guess mineral salts or
mineral oil as the reason.

No one spoke.  Raif doubted if there was saliva enough in his mouth to
roll his tongue, let alone utter a word.  All five of them were year men
Bullhammer, Bitty Shank, Craw Bannering, Drey, and himself.

Craw was the second bowman.  Raif hardly knew him; he was older than
Drey, dark skinned, with a clever face and long, tattooed fingers.  He
might have been betrothed to Lansa Tanner, Raif wasn't sure.

Bullhammer was Bullhammer, a great big bear of a man with bristles for
eyebrows and the most frightening smile the clan holds had ever beheld.
Everyone loved him; it was impossible not to love a man who could uproot
a five-year-old foxtail pine with a single mighty hug.

Bitty Shank was the swordsman.  Like all the Shanks, he had a face that
looked cooked.  Although he was the same age as Drey, his fair hair had
already started to thin.  Bitty swung between tarring down his hair to
prevent further loss and vigorously tuggingat what little remained to
show how little he cared.  He was in the devilrnay-care frame of mind at
the moment, but come springand wenching season, there'd be tar in his
waxing pouch again.

When the mist cleared enough to allow snatched glimpses of the
Bluddroad, Drey raised an arm, gesturingall behind to slow.  The path he
chose became more elaborate, involving great doglegs and double-backs as
he worked to bring them down the slope out of view of the road.
Oldgrowth paper birches, with their long branchless trunks and high
crowns, didn't provide the best cover, and bushes and ground birch were
scant.

As Drey guided them toward a cluster of new growth two hundred feet
above the road, Raifs stomach muscles began to clench.  The two main
parties would be in place now, waiting just off the road to ambush Clan
Bludd.  Raifhad grown up listening to tales of Clan Bludd--their
fierceness in battle, their swords cut with a central groove for
channeling their enemies' blood, their terrible deafening war cries, and
their weapons so heavily leaded that no non-Bluddsman could raise
them--yet he had never seen a Bluddsman up close. To him they were the
stuff of legend, like the people who were said to live in whalebone huts
in the frozen North, or the Maimed Men who ranged across in the Want and
were scarred by terrible beasts and crippling frosts.

Drey called halt so softly it was like listening to a thought.  Raif
reined his horse along with the others.  Beckoning everyone close, Drey
positioned the entire party behind a dense growth of yearling pines. The
Bluddroad lay below them, dark and straight like a fault in the earth.
Raif looked west but could see no sign of the other parties.  Ballic and
his team must have doubled back before crossing, to prevent hoofprints
and scent on the road.

As Raif looked up, he caught a glimpse of his brother's face.  Drey's
eyes were two frozen points on his face.  Seeing them, recognizing the
one emotion that lay behind them, Raif felt his bones turn to ice.

Drey wasn't waiting to fight Bluddsmen; he was waiting to slay the men
who killed his da.

There was nothing to do but wait.  Minutes passed, then an hour, then
another, then they had to cut the sheepskin muffles from the horses to
prevent them from becomingagitated.  Then, just as Bullhammer reached
back in the saddle to fetch a feed bag for his restless stallion, a low
rumbling sounded in the east.

Everyone tensed.  Bullhammer straightened his back, took his reins in
both hands.  Bitty Shank stripped the mitts from his sword- hand
revealing finger less gloves beneath.  Craw Bannering pressed thin lips
together and turned his cool archer's eyes to the road.  Drey made no
bid for his hammer.  Glancing back at his men, he sent one word with his
eyes.  Easy.

The sound grew louder and began to separate into recognizable parts.

Horses' hooves, too many to number, thumped down upon the hard surface
of the road.  Bushes and tree limbs cracked like whips, dumping their
loads of snow. Dogs yipped and barked, carts creaked, harness metal
jingled, and above it all something lurched, clattered, and shuddered
like a great and terrible engine of war.  Raif and Drey exchanged a
glance.  The mist was as stringy as rotten cobwebs.  It was hard to get
a clear view of the road, almost impossible to see the bend the Bludd
party would round any moment.

A pair of snow geese took flight from the near side of the bend, their
calls harsh as saws drawn over metal.  Raifs whole being was focused on
controlling his horse.  Her ears were flicking, and she had begun to
pull on the reins. The scent of strange dogs made her nervous.  Raif
found himself wishing he were on Moose, not some flighty filly borrowed
from Longhead at the last moment.

All thoughts evaporated from his mind as a gust of wind shifted the
mist, allowinga clear view of the Bludd party as they rounded the bend
below.  Tiny hooks of fear pierced Raifs chest.  Dark and full of
purpose, the Bludd party took the road as if it were territory to be
claimed like a foreign shore or an enemy camp.  Riding stallions as
thick necked and muscular as wolves, the fore riders held spears of
black steel couched in horn casings that hung from the saddles along
with their stirrups.  Bull-headed dogs raced ahead of them, black and
orange like hell hounds A supply cart came into view, then a second one
loaded with iron-banded kegs.  Raif strained to see more, but mist
poured down the slope, resettling in the lowest points.  Briefly he
snatched a glimpse of a team of horses flanked by a quad of heavily
armed ham mermen

The grinding, shuddering noise became deafening.  White smoke gouted in
the air above the road.  With one single fluid movement, Drey pulled his
hammer from its sling.

Raif noticed the metal had been abraded with steel wire.  As he looked
up, he met eyes with his brother.  Drey looked so much like Tern for a
moment that Raif felt his hand leave his bow and reach out.

Easy, Drey said without speaking.  Easy now.

Feeling foolish and confused, Raif worked to conceal his emotions.  He
returned his hand to his bow and nocked his arrow against the plate.

We are Clan Blackball, the first of all clans.  We do not cower and we
do not hide, and we will have our revenge.  The oldest version of the
Blackhail boast ran through Raifs mind as he sighted his arrow.  Angry
words.  And not for the first time, he wondered what had prompted them.

The Bludd party was directly below them now.  The team of horses pulled
some sort of lurching contraption that was partially obscured by mist.
Raif counted seconds.  The screech of wheel axles turning in their
housings set his nerves on edge.  The cold weighed on his bladder,
making him painfully aware of its fullness.  Looking ahead, he thought
he saw a sliver of steel in the young growth to the far side of the
road.  Ballic's crew.

The Bludd dogs yelped and brayed, running rings around the trotting
horses in their eagerness to be on their way.  As the lead dog found
something to sniff at on the road's north verge, the surrounding mist
switched like a horse's tail, allowing Raif a clear view of the team and
its load.

Breath hissed softly in his throat.  The size of the thing.  A team of
horses pulled a war wagon as big as a house, with iron-spined wheels as
tall as men and whole elm trunks for sides.  The wheels plowed into the
road, churning up mounds of dirt and snow.  Great gasps of smoke vented
from a copper chimney fitted high into the timbered roof, and the entire
structure huffed and shuddered with every rut in the road.

Raif had never seen anything like it in his life.  It was like watching
an entire roundhouse on the move.

"Raif.  Pull out your flint."  Drey's voice was as low and ragged as the
mist.

"Bull.  Hand him the hard liquor from your pack.  Easy now.

All of you.  "

Raif understood at once.  No one had been expecting this thing, this
cart as big as a building.  No one knew what horrors were housed within
it.  The only thing to do was set it alight. Ballic the Red and Corbie
Meese were probably thinking the same thing, but just in case they
weren't, or just in case they missed.  Drey was making plans.  Raif tore
the thumb from his left mitt and used it as a hood for his arrow.
Bullhammer handed him a silver flask, his meaty hands warming the metal
where he touched.

As Raif doused the thumb piece in the clear amber-colored liquor, the
lead dog caught whiff of the ambush party's scent.  Its joyous yelping
turned to a low, dangerous growl.  Raif felt the sound echo in the soft
inner tissue of his bones, then all hell broke loose on the road.

A salvo of arrows cut low through the mist, aimed for the fo renders'
mounts. Animals squealed in terror as metal broad heads barbed for
lightness and snagging flesh, punctured horseflesh.  Rearing up, they
kicked and bucked, thrashing their heads from side to side and
screaming.  Their fear spread through the remaining Bludd animals like
wildfire, yet even as other horses began to whiffle and stamp, their
riders and dray men worked to calm them.  A word spoken softly but
firmly, a steadying hand on a neck or a shoulder, a squeeze with the
thighs, and the Bluddsmen saved their mounts from panic.

The fore riders were quick to abandon their wounded horses, dismounting
with heavy grace.  Thudding onto the snow, they drew their ten-foot
spears from their couching.  All escaped injury, though with four
massive horses kickingand screaming in the confined space of the road,
it hardly seemed possible.  Raif had no time to think on that before
Corbie Meese, Toady Walker, and eight other ham mermen blasted onto the
road.  Screamingat the top of their lungs, they rode wide of the
standing spear men driving for the ham mermen behind.  As soon as they
were clear of the spear men a second salvo of arrows shot north across
the road.  Most hit the panicking horses, spraying horse blood in red
arcs, but one spearman took an arrow to his shoulder, and another lost a
piece of his face.  The injuries caused neither man to break formation,
and as a single unit the four spear men turned to pursue Corbie and his
crew as they met steel with the Bludd ham mermen It was, Raif realized,
the only possible thing they could do.  Standing free like that, they
were a bowman's prayer, but no bowman in the territories would shoot an
arrow into a fray where his own men were fighting.

Raif worked at the alcohol-soaked thumb piece pulling it down so the
metal point of the arrowhead peeked through at the tip.  The screams of
the horses were terrible to hear, and Raif tried to cut them from his
mind.  He had known all along that Ballic and his crew would target
horses first.

"Raif.  Shoot."  Drey.  No mention of what he was to shoot or why, no
caution concerning taking such a shot at such at distance.  Just an
order.  No--Raif positioned the flint and striker in his hand--it was
more than that.  By saying the little that he did, Drey assumed not only
that his younger brother knew his mind, but also that he was capable of
making such a shot without injuring Corbie or one of his men.

It was a sobering thought.  Raif tipped the hooded arrow on an angle to
catch sparks and struck the flint stone The alcohol on the thumb piece
ignited with a soft ripping sound that distressed the filly.  Raif
didn't have to worry about stilling her, as Drey was already at her
head, leaning over to calm her with soft words and gentle scratches.

Raising the flamingarrow to his bow, Raif switched his mind to the
battle below.  The remaining ham mermen and swordsmen from both Corbie's
and Ballic's parties were now fighting on level ground.

Corbie Meese screamed at the top of his lungs as he whirled his hammer
in a liquid circle above his head, his face purple with rage, his stewed
leather gauntlets butcher red with blood.  He was, Raif realized with a
stab of quiet pride, a truly terrifying sight.  It was the hammer dent
on his head that did it.  The Bluddsmen danced around him, reluctant to
go hammer to hammer against a man who had taken such a blow and lived.

With a ghost of a smile on his face, Raif aimed his bow.  The war wagon
was a large and barely moving target.  If it hadn't been for the mist
and the men fightingabout it, it would have been an easy shot.

Raif took a breath, relaxed his grip on the bow, decided upon the upper
quarter of the wagon wall as his target, then felt for the still line
that would lead the arrow home.

He did not reach inside the thing.  The wagon was dead wood, and there
was no question of call- ins it to him--after the day at the lick, he
knew and accepted that now.  To try to find its heart was a mistake that
would cost him both accuracy and time.

Everything slipped away.  The string creaked with strain, a good sound
that brought saliva to Raifs mouth.  The flames from the thumb piece
licked at his cheek.  A second stretched to breaking.  Then, suddenly,
the mist cleared, the riders parted, and the line between the target and
the bow became as broad and invitingas an open road.  Raif lifted his
fingers from the string, and the arrow shot toward its mark.

Hearing the soft thuc of the bowstring, feeling the rough hand of the
recoil snap at his fingers, Raif knew he had been wrong.  There was life
in the wagon, inside it, and for a brief moment as the bowstring whipped
air and his eye held the target, he felt hearts beating from within.
Dozens of them. Racingand skipping with fear.

You can't call an arrow back.  That was the first thing Tern had ever
taught him about shooting, and Raif finally knew what he meant.  A
bowman delivered his blow the moment his fingers left the string, not
seconds later when the arrow sank its barbs into enemy flesh.  The small
distinction had never meant anything to him.  Until now.  The sound of
the impact didn't carry, but the flames blanket- rolled across the wagon
wall, changing color from blue to yellow as they spread.  The shot was
perfectly placed, the alcohol fire hot enough to kindle hardwood, and
the arrowhead sat snug between two elm logs, driving the flames deep.
Even the wind helped, gustingalong the wagon like air from a bellows.
Within a minute the entire upper portion of the wagon was alight. Sheets
of yellow flame rippled over the wood, spilling between cracks like
molten metal and belching black, greasy smoke.

The flaming of the war wagon had a profound effect on the Bluddsmen.

The drayman riding the team worked frantically to turn the horses,
whippingand hollering, standing on his plate and smacking the horses'
rumps.  Bludd ham mermen and spear men moved into position around the
wagon, defending its team and driver with hard focused force.  Toady
Walker fell from his horse as a lead-weighted hammer smacked into his
spine.  Within seconds a Bludd spearman had moved in to spike his guts.

"Raif.  Craw.  Cover us as we go down.  Once we're there, move closer
and shoot as you judge safe."  Drey's voice was rough.  His gloved hands
pressed against the leather mount of his hammer.

"Do not show yourselves.  Bull, Bitty.  You're with me."

Raif barely had time to nod before his brother turned his horse and
cantered down the slope.  Bullhammer and Bitty Shank flanked him.

Bullhammer tore the oilskin from his back as he descended, revealing his
iron-banded breastplate and freeing his arms for the powerful hammer
moves that had earned him his name.

Raif pulled a second arrow from his case.  Below, the war wagon lurched
backward as one of its rear wheels rolled off the road.

Saplings snapped like chair backs as the wagon tumbled into the new
growth sendinga wedge of flames and sparks shooting into the branches.
The drayman worked the team, lashing horseflesh with his whip, but the
wagon was trapped in the ditch.  Raif could see the outline of the wagon
door and the great metal stave that held it shut.

As he watched, he saw the door shake, as if someone inside were pushing
against it.

A bowstring hummed to Raifs left as Craw Bannering let an arrow fly,
shootingat a swordsman who had moved forward to intercept Drey and his
crew. The shot was sound, catching the swordsman high in the neck,
dropping him where he stood.  Bludd ham mermen fought around him, their
sable cloaks fluid as running oil, their hammers breaking up the last of
the mist.  Raif drew his bow, waited for a clear shot at one of them.
His concentration was not good.  Red and black, the angry blaze of the
war wagon kept catching his eye. The door continued to shake, yet still
no one broke out.

forced his sights to focus beyond the door.  It was like staring into
the mist all over again.  His eyes ached.  Seconds of blankness passed,
then just as he was about to drop his bow, he felt the wild thumping of
many hearts.  Terror filled his mouth like blood.

Trapped.  They were trapped inside the war wagon.  Heat had sealed the
iron bolt in place.

Shaking with the force of their terror, Raif let his bow fall slack.

A sour metallic taste ringed his mouth.  Glancingat Craw, he saw the
black-haired bowman braced to take a second shot.  With a furtive,
close-body movement, Raif switched arrows, choosinga thick-bladed hunter
shaped to take down a horse in a single strike.  The weight was wrong
for a bow the size and shape of Raif s--he kept it only to shoot from
Drey's longbow--yet he raised it to the plate all the same.  If he was
careful and he drew enough power into the bow, it just might go where he
planned.

It took him less than a moment to sight the bow.  The last ropes of mist
felt like a noose around his neck as he searched for the line between
the tip of his arrow and the iron bolt of the war wagon.  The belly of
the bow shook along with his hands.  He didn't dare think, didn't dare
question what he was doingand why.  The memory of the hell inside the
wagon was too great.  The line calmed him.  Once it was fixed in his
mind, his hands stilled.  Gentle as a breath taken in sleep, he released
the string.

The arrow split curls of fire and smoke as it raced toward its mark.

Even from where he stood, Raif heard the harsh clang of metal striking
metal. The arrow hit, then dropped.  A moment was lost to smoke, and
when Raif caught sight of the door once more, someone inside was beating
hard against it.  After three blows, the iron bolt gave and the door
blasted open.  Smoke poured out.

Raif tugged a hand across his face.  He had no way of knowing if his
arrow had done the job, yet strangely it did not matter.  The door was
open, and even as he looked on, people began clambering out.  Hands held
to their faces, backs bent, they coughed and screamed and ran.

It took Raif a moment to realize they were women and children.  He
didn't believe it at first.  This was supposed to be a war party--Mace
Blackhail had said so.  What business did children have with war? Yet
even as he groped for a reasonable explanation, he began to realize
there had been a mistake.  This was no war party.  The quad of heavily
armed ham mermen the fore riders with their case-hardened spears, and
the swordsmen with their blades of blue steel were here solely to guard
the wagon.  The Dog Lord wasn't moving troops to the Dhoonehouse, he was
moving women and children.  And Mace Blackhail knew it.

The thought seized his mind so swiftly, it was almost as if someone had
spoken it out loud.  No one had questioned how Mace Blackhail had come
upon the information for this ambush.  Corbie Meese said he'd picked it
up from stove house talk, yet how could anyone other than a Bluddsman
know about the Dog Lord's plans?  Most especially when those plans
concerned the moving of kin?  Raif shook his head.  All possible answers
left him cold.

"Raif!  Children."  Craw Bannering nudged his bow arm.

Raif nodded, feeling a bite of disloyalty as he feigned seeing the open
wagon door for the first time.

"We'd better get down there."  The snow on the road was red and pink
with blood.  Four horses had fallen, two others fled.  Toady Walker's
body had been trampled facedown into the snow.  Banron Lye lay in a
ditch just off the road.  He wasn't moving.  Dogs sank their teeth into
his collar and sleeves, tearingaway great strips of elks king to get at
flesh.  All the remaining Bailsmen, including Ballic and his bowmen,
were now fighting hand to-hand on the open road.  Black blood and
spittle frothed from Corbie Meese's mouth, yet judging from the volume
of his screams and the swift circles he cut with his hammer, he wasn't
badly hurt.  Drey and Bullhammer had wasted no time driving themselves
into the middle of the melee.  They worked well together, their hammers
as dull and ashen as charred logs, as they moved to outflank a Bludd
swordsman who had just lost his mount.  The spear men were the worst
danger.  Fighting in tight formation back- to-back, they made it
impossible for anyone to get near them for a blow.

Reining his horse thirty feet above the road, Raif pulled an arrow from
his case.  The dogs worrying Banron Lye were the first things to fo They
were easy targets; once he had their hearts in his sights he didn't
worry about hitting Banron or any other clansman by mistake. Down the
dogs went, one after another, legs crumpling beneath them in the manner
of all heart-killed beasts.  The Bludd spear men were a more difficult
problem.  Guarding the drayman and his team, they formed a knot of
grizzled steel at the center of the road.  Raif couldn't get a clear
shot at any of them.  Corbie Meese and Rory Cleet were too close.

Sweat slid down Raifs neck.  The war wagon roared with flames, melting
the surrounding snow with snake hisses, dripping yellow fire onto the
undergrowth, and setting whole runs of stone pines alight.  Fire poured
along the team's harness, and the drayman began hackingat the leather
traces with his sword to free the horses.  Raif could no longer see what
was happeningat the back of the wagon.  Out of the corner of his eye, he
was aware of people running to high ground through the trees.

It was hard to focus on the spear men harder still to call them to him
in the split seconds when the way was clear.  He loosed one arrow and it
went wide, glancing off a Bluddsman's hammer guard Cursing, he tried to
control the fast beating of his heart.  Rory Cleet howled as a spear
ripped along his thigh. For a moment Raif saw white lines of bared sinew
and bone, then blood welled over Rory's flesh and everything turned red.
Face pale and shiny with sweat, hand pressed to the wound, Rory wheeled
his horse.

Raif drew his bow, ready to let an arrow loose the moment Rory broke
free and cleared the way.  The spearman who had inflicted the wound
moved forward for a second blow.  He was armed for heavy marching, not
for war, and wore a breast piece of elk hide boiled in wax.  His
leather-bound topnotch swung like a slingas Raif caught his heart in his
sights.  A strong heartbeat slammed against his mind, shocking like a
physical blow, knockingall thoughts clean away.  Raif didn't need them:
His eye knew to hold the target and his fingers knew when to release the
string, and it was over in less than an instant.

Nausea bent him double as the spearman fell.  His vision blurred, and
sour acids from his stomach burned his throat.  He lost his grip on the
bow and let it drop to the snow beneath him, not trusting himself to
rock sideways and catch it as it fell.

He shook his head, concentrated hard on keeping his seat.  Killing men
wasn't the same as game.  He could do it, but it wasn't the same.

"Sevrance!  Pick up your bow and ride down the survivors!  Now!"  Raif
flinched at the harshness of the voice.  It sounded as if it were coming
from behind him, but he knew now wasn't a good time to turn in the
saddle and look.  It took all he had to sit his horse.

A horse and rider bore down through the pines.  Raif saw a hail of
kicked-up snow, then felt something jab against the base of his spine.

"I said, go and run down the survivors."

Mace Blackhail.  The new-made Hail chief.  Here?  Raifs thoughts came in
clumsy lumps.  How had he managed to catch up?

"Craw.  Go and pull Drey and Bitty from the road.  I need all three of
you to ride east through the woods and pick off survivors.  I'll have no
Bludd breeders and bitches walking free from this ambush.  Now go."

Raif spat to clean the metal from his mouth as Craw Bannering headed
down the slope.  Pulling himself to his full saddle height, he turned to
look at the Wolf.  Mace Blackhail's eyes were the color of frozen urine,
his lips a hook of pale flesh.  Wearing a cloak of slate gray fisher fur
over a mail coat inset with wolf teeth, he sat high atop the blue roan,
contemplating Raif. After a moment his jaws sprang apart.

"I am your chief.  You have taken First Oath.  Do my bidding."

Raif flinched.  He wished his thoughts were clearer.  As he reached down
to collect his bow.  Mace Blackhail kicked the roan forward, ramming the
filly's belly and trampling Raifs bow underfoot.  The filly caught the
sharp end of a spur along her shoulder and reared up, squealing in pain.
Raif fought to keep his seat, pulling hard on the horse's mouth.  By the
time he had calmed her, the blue roan had stamped the bow into
splinters.

"I've changed my mind," Mace said, starting down the slope.

"Use your half sword on the runaways instead."

Raif watched him go.  The edges of his vision were blurred, and he could
still feel the spearman's heartbeat rattlingaway inside his skull.

As soon as Mace Blackhail reached the road, he began working to take
control of the battle.  He moved quickly, and although he wasn't a
powerful fighter like Corbie Meese, Bullhammer, or Drey, he was clever
with his sword.  Within a minute he had taken down one of the three
remaining spear men

Drey and Bitty were slow to pull off the road, both clearly unhappy at
the order to hunt down runaways.  Seeing them move into the trees, Raif
kicked the filly after them.  He didn't spare a glance for his ruined
bow.  It was a relief to have it gone.

The war wagon collapsed inward as Raif rode past it, suckingair from his
lungs.  The heat was fierce.  Bits of flaming matter floated through the
stone pines like wasps.  Trees shivered as they passed.

One of the Bludd dogs ran across the filly's path, howlingand frothing
at the mouth, its black-and-orange coat alight.  Raif found its pain
surprisingly easy to ignore.  He hardly knew what he was doing. Thoughts
came and then slipped from his head, and no matter how many times he
swallowed and spat, the copper taint of blood stayed in his mouth.

He nearly rode past the first woman.  Pressed against the trunk of an
old growth pine, she held still until almost the last moment, then lost
her nerve and broke into a run.  If she hadn't moved, he would not have
seen her.  A long braid of golden hair thumped against her back as she
sprinted away from the road.  Her cloak was dark red with gold
stitchingaround the hem, and her leather soft-boots had been sewn and
dyed to match.  She ran fast but straight, failing to take advantage of
the trees, and the filly soon out paced her.  Raif drew Tern's half
sword

"You have it," Drey had said that first evening when they'd returned to
the roundhouse.

"I have his coat and his lore.  It's only fitting you have his sword."

Raif rode the woman down.  The thrill of the chase woke something in
him, and he cut the air with his sword, growing accustomed to its
balance and reach.  A drift of new snow collapsed beneath the woman's
weight as she stepped across a shallow draw, causing her to sink and
lose her footing.  Hearing the filly closing distance, she turned to
face man and horse.  Long strands of golden hair had worked free other
braid, framinga face hot with fright and exertion.

Seeing her, Raif realized she wasn't a woman at all, just a girl, a year
or so younger than he himself.  Her pale eyes widened as he raised his
sword. Shivering in small bursts, she brought a hand to her throat as he
approached. A deer lore was fastened about her neck on a strip of birch
bark.  Her knuckles were black with soot and smoke.

Tern's sword grew heavy in Raifs hand.  Girls at home used birch bark
for their lores.  It was said to bring luck in finding a husband.  The
girl shrank back, closing her fist around her lore.  She had a small
dimpled scar above her lip, the sort of mark that was left by a dog
bite.  When she noticed Raifs gaze upon it, her hand moved to cover it
up.

Raif knew then that he would not kill her.  She was too much like the
girls at home, thinking that whenever someone looked at her it was
always to find fault.  Ridiculously, the scar made him want to kiss her.

Unable to look the girl in the eye any longer, he turned the filly and
rode away.  Bludd breeders and bitches.  Mace had called them.  What
words would he use for the children?

A series of high-pitched screams led Raif to a clearing where Drey,
Bitty Shank, and Craw Bannering had rounded up two dozen women and
children.  All were dressed finely, in thick wool cloaks, sable hoods,
and softskin boots. Some women carried babes at their breasts, others
hid small children behind their skirts.  One woman, a tall matron with a
braid that reached her hips and eyes as blue as ice, stood proud and
stared her attackers down.

Realizing that Drey intended to cause no harm to the women, simply
capture them, Raif exhaled.  He felt light-headed with relief.  The
madness of the day was finally coming to an end.  All he wanted to do
was roll in his blanket and sleep.  He didn't want to think about the
Bludd spearman, or the girl with the dog scar, or Toady Walker's
horse-trampled body.

Chest shaking with exhaustion, head throbbing to a dead man's heartbeat,
Raif trotted over to join his brother.  The Bludd women watched him,
their faces crusted with soot and snow, their hands forming knots
against their skirts.

Drey's face was grim.

"Pull up your sword arm

Before Raif could obey the order, Mace Blackhail broke through the trees
on the roan.  His broadsword rested against his dogs king pants, a thin
line of liver blood bleedingalong the blade.  He looked first at Raif,
then Drey.

"What are you waiting for?  I said slay them."  No muscle on Drey's face
moved.  From the near side of the glade, Bitty looked his way, waiting
to see what Drey would do.  "They killed our chief in cold blood," Mace
Blackhail said, walking the roan forward, his yellow-and-black eyes
fixed solely on Drey.  "They slaughtered your father in his tent.
Bitty's brothers were taken where they stood.  And just five days ago,
they sent cowl- men into our woods to slay our women and children on
home ground.  Yes, they shot Shor Gormalin, but don't be mistaken: If
Raina or Effie had been riding that trail, it would have been they who
rode home dead.  " Bludd broke faith first, Drey.  Not us.  If we let
these bitches and their litters go, then both our fathers' deaths go
unavenged.  " Mace Blackhail wiped his blade clean against his pants as
he spoke.

"We are Blackhail, the first amongst clans, and our chiefs life is worth
a hundred of their women's."

Mace Blackhail stared at Drey with such force, it was as if he were
physically pushingagainst him.  Drey didn't blink or move, but something
in his face changed.  Raif couldn't tell what his brother was thinking,
didn't know what the sudden lack of light in his eyes meant, but words
Drey had spoken on the journey home from the badlands slipped into Raifs
mind like cold poison.

We'll make Clan Bludd pay for what they did, Raif.  I swear it.  Raif
had no way of knowing whether Mace Blackhail saw the answer he wanted in
Drey's face or not, but something made Mace move.  Kicking bronze spurs
into the roan's belly, he began the charge.  Light ran down his newly
cleaned sword like water, gleaming with all the cold colors from white
to blue.  He howled as he rode, baring his teeth and drawing low in the
saddle like something not quite human.  The Bludd women and children
began to run, scramblingawkwardly through knee-deep snow.

Afterward, when he thought back on it, Raif realized that by forcing
them to run.  Mace Blackhail changed them from wives and children and
turned them into game instead.  Drey Sevrance, Bitty Shank, and Craw
Bannering could not have slain the women and children where they
stood--Raif believed that completely.  He had to.  But Mace Blackhail
had all the inborn cunning of his lore.  A wolf hunts nothing that does
not move, and when words failed him, Mace Blackhail fell back on
instinct, changing slaughter to a chase.

Raif felt its pull.  Tired and head sick as he was, part of him wanted
to go after them, run them down, hack them at the knees with his sword,
and bring them to ground.  He wanted it so badly, the saliva in his
mouth ran clean. The children shrieked and cried, herding close to their
mothers as if somehow they could save them.  Clumsy things, they were,
foolishly heading into thicker drifts, bereft of even an animal's sense
to pull out from the snow and head for the shelter of the trees.  The
women were worse, stopping to pull one another up when they stumbled or
fell behind, lifting children too heavy to carry.

They acted like a flock of mindless sheep.  Covered in snow as they
were, they even looked like sheep.

When Bitty Shank rode alongside a thin mewling child whose cheeks were
showing the first yellow blush of frostbite and plowed his blade into
the child's shoulder, forcing him under his horse, Raif felt a hot surge
of excitement take his chest.  The thumping in his head changed to a
drumbeat, and the weariness in his bones shifted into something else. He
wanted to join Bitty and take his share of the game.

The sight of Drey stopped him dead: Drey with his hammer whirlingabove
his head, his eyes sunk deep into their sockets, and his lips pulled
back to his gums.  Drey.  He was chasinga young mother and her two small
children, and every muscle on his face and neck pressed against his skin
like bone.  Raif felt shocked to his core His raven lore cooled against
his skin, quick as red-hot metal plunged into snow.

Sobered as surely as if someone had slapped him in the face, Raif took
an arrow from his case and reached to his saddlebag for his bow.

He was going to bring down Drey's horse, heart-kill the beast, make it
drop from under him.

Gone.  The bow wasn't there.  Raif swore as he remembered what Mace
Blackhail had done to it.  He couldn't understand why he'd just sat by
and let him do it.  What was wrong with him?  Why hadn't he got angry?

Raif shook his head.  It didn't matter.  He was angry now.

Kicking the filly into a gallop, he cut across the glade.  A killing
field of sounds filled his ears: terrible wails and screams and panting,
the crack of severed bones, and the thick liquid gurgle of blades yanked
free of flesh. Children rushed before him, bare hands clutchingat their
hair and faces, hoods and mittens lost in the chase.  Mace Blackhail
rode through them like the shadow of a Stone God, forcing them to move,
flee, run.  Any who didn't were cut down and then trampled, their bodies
driven deep into the snow. "Drey!"

Raif screamed at the top of his voice as he drew close to the cut bank
where his brother had cornered the young mother and her children.

"Stop!"

Drey looked round.  Momentarily his hammer slowed in his hand.  He
looked at Raif a long moment, a trickle of saliva rolling down his chin,
then he turned and drove his hammer into the side of the woman's face. A
sickening crack split the air as the woman's neck broke and her head
twisted to a place where no amount of sideways glances would ever take
it.

The two small children screamed.  Tearingand clutchingat each other,
heads and shoulders knocking together, they tried to squeeze themselves
into one. A shudder worked through Raifs body, rattling his bones like
pebbles in a jar.  Wrapping the reins around his fingers, he bore down
on his brother, setting his filly on a path to smack into Drey's horse.
The filly turned at the last moment to save herself, and Raifs shoulders
slammed into Drey's side.  Drey was knocked forward in the saddle, his
hammer losing momentum and crashing into his thigh.  Furious, Drey
shoved Raifwith all his might.  "Get away from me!  You heard Mace
Blackhail.

We weren't first to break faith.  "

Raif smashed the heel of his hand into Drey's hammer arm.

"Run!"  he called to the children.

"RunI" The oldest child simply stared at him, and the younger one sat
down in the snow and began shaking his mother's arm as if she were
asleep and needed waking.  Raif wheeled the filly around, preparing to
scare the children into running.  As he dug his heels into horseflesh, a
fist of pain exploded in his lower back.  Breath rushed from his lungs
in a harsh gust, leavinga sucking emptiness in his chest.  His vision
shrank to two dots, and he grasped at air and bridle leather as he fell
into a tunnel of spiraling darkness where the snow was as hard as glass.

He came to.  A spasm of pain ripped along his backbone, sharp as if
someone had gouged a rusted nail down his spine.  Rolling over, he
coughed blood into the snow.  Something warm pushed against his ear,
forcing him to twist back and confront whatever it was: the filly, her
great wet nostrils pulling in his breath, testing if he were still
alive.  Raif raised a hand and pushed her nose away.  The effort cost
him.  He lost seconds as he dealt with the pain.  Slowly his eyes grew
accustomed to the glare of snow.  Three dark forms, impacted in the
snowdrift like rocks, broke the line of perfect whiteness.  A pitifully
small amount of blood stained the surrounding snow.

Raif closed his eyes.  His heart grew unbearably light in his chest.

Both children had been younger than Effie.

Sounds far behind him told of a hunt still running.  Those still alive
had little breath to scream, and hoarse cries and sobs were almost
drowned out by the noise of hooves churning snow.  Pushing himself up on
his elbows, Raif caught sight of Corbie Meese and Ballic the Red
entering the clearing from the west.  Blood had turned their horses and
armor black.  When they saw what was happening they exchanged a small,
worried glance.  Hope surged in Raifs chest.  Corbie and Ballic were
good men; they would do what was right.

"Stop her!  She's gettingaway!"  The call came from Mace Black- hail who
rode across the glade toward the two men, chasinga heavyset Bluddswoman
before him.  Mace Blackhail could have taken the woman himself--she was
struggling in the snow less than thirty paces ahead of him--but that
wasn't what he wanted.  Raif knew that at once.  The Wolf needed to
share the responsibility for the killing.  He needed the two senior
clansmen to run with his pack.

Raif watched for a while, long enough to see Corbie and Ballic succumb
to the lure of the chase and move swiftly to head off the enemy that
Mace Blackhail was intent on driving toward them, then turned away.
Softly he called for the filly.  Leaning heavily against her, he rose
and brushed himself clean of snow.  His back burned.  When he probed it
with his fingers, tears filled his eyes.  At the very least he would
have a hammer-size bruise there tomorrow. Not trusting himself to mount,
he took the filly by the reins and led her northwest from the glade.  He
had to get away.  Suddenly he didn't know his brother or his clan.

CHAPTER FOURTEEN.

Escape I may stop by and visit the Knife tonight.  What's it to you?
Katia's words echoed in Ash's mind.  The tiny dark-haired maid had said
them four hours earlier, and Ash stood in the shadows behind her chamber
door and waited to see if they were true.  Her back ached from standing
still for so long, but she didn't dare risk movingaway.

Barring opening the door and checking for herself, listening was the
only way she had of knowing for sure if Marafice Eye had left his post.
She didn't want the Knife catching her peekingaround the door.

It would only make him suspicious.  No.  Better by far to keep her
position and wait.

Katia has been telling me how your charcoal brazier was choked with
ashes the other night, almost-daughter.  You haven't been burning
anything upon it, have you?  I'm sure I don't need to tell you how very
dangerous such a thing would be.

Ash shivered.  Penthero Iss had visited her room late last night, and
although he'd said many different things on many different subjects, she
was sure all he had really come to say was that he knew about the extra
cinders in the brazier.  He was sly like that.  What the whole thing
really meant was that from now on he would be watching her more closely,
as he was now well aware that she was up to something improper.  Ash
cursed Katia under her breath.  Cinders in the brazier?

Was there no secret, no matter how inane, that the girl wouldn't tell?
she turned her attention to the door.  Little mouse steps pattered on
the stone beyond.  Something creaked.  Silence . .  then a bright laugh
quickly muffled.  Katia.  Katia was on the other side of the door,
talking with the Knife.

Please take him to your room, Katia.  Please.  Ash hated herself for
wishing it, hated the thought ofMarafice Eye's massive hands pressing
against Katia's spine, yet she needed the little maid to distract the
Knife.  She had to leave Mask Fortress.  Tonight.  And the only way she
could slip from her chamber undetected was if Katia lured the Knife away
for a bedding.

Bedding.  Ash rubbed a hand over her eyes, trying to dispel the image
the word showed her.  Bedding wasn't the right word for it at all.

Feeling her cheeks grow hot, she risked taking one more step toward the
door. Marafice Eye could speak quietly when he chose to, and she
couldn't hear his voice, though a conversation was taking place.

Katia spoke, her voice low for moments, then high with excitement as she
continually forgot the need for secrecy.  Ash caught the words kiss and
gift. A long silence passed, and when it broke rough breaths could
clearly be heard.

"Witch."  Marafice Eye's voice cut through the wood.  The word had a
nasty edge to it, and Ash felt the flesh on her arms pucker.  Sounds
followed, a whole lot of them, then two sets of footsteps padded along
the hall.  Ash rested her head against the door.  They were gone, but
she didn't like it one bit.  Was it her imagination, or did the lighter
set of footsteps appear to drag?  Knowing such thoughts would only slow
her down, she pushed them aside. This wasn't the first time Katia had
been with the Knife.  The little maid could look after herself.

Ash moved around her chamber, checking the body-shaped lump of cushions
beneath the sheets, pulling on her thickest, plainest cloak, and opening
the shutters so that those who eventually discovered she was gone would
think she had somehow managed to escape by lowering herself down the
Cask's outer wall and so misdirect the search.

Stoppingat the brazier, she raised the brass lid and thrust a mitted
hand into the black, powdery soot.  The soot was hot as she worked it
into her hair, hot and itchy as sin.  It caught in her throat and made
her eyes tear, so she scrunched up her face until she was done.  When
she opened her eyes a minute later by the mirror, she saw a strange girl
staring back.  Matt black hair did not suit her at all, making her face
look like something preserved in wax.  Abruptly she turned away.  It
would have to do.

What to take with her?  What would she need?  She had thought everything
through beforehand, thinking of little else for the past six days, but
for some reason she had avoided thinking about what she would have to
take. Everything in her room belonged to Iss.  Oh, he said it was hers
and made a point of giving her many pretty and inexpensive gifts, but
when it came down to it he took them back at will.  She'd seen the truth
of that herself these past few weeks, as Katia and Caydis Zerbina
plucked objects from her room on his say.

She wasn't Iss' real daughter at all; he never let her forget that.

Almost-daughter was what he called her.  Almost-daughter was what she
was.

Foundling, Ash told herself.  Left outside Vaingate to die.  Angry now,
she felt less inclined to leave empty-handed.  That silver brush on the
dresser would fetch a price at Alms Market, and the pewter cloak pin was
set with some kind of red jewel that might be worth something to
someone.  She snatched them up and bundled them into her cloak lining
before her resolve had chance to turn.  What else?  Spinning, she
examined her chamber.  Horn books bound with pigskin, their library
chains still attached, would be worth a good few coins apiece, but Ash
quickly rejected them.  Too heavy.  Too noisy.  If she tried to sell
them, the chains would surely give her away. Abruptly she turned toward
the door.  She didn't have time to conduct an inventory of her chamber.
It was leave now or lose her chance.  If only I could be sure.

No.  Ash shook her head so hard a cloud of black soot wafted from her
hair. She had to go.  Stay and she would be a fool, and anything that
happened to her would be no one's fault but her own.  She was a
foundling; no one would care for her but herself.  Penthero Iss did not
have her best interests at heart.  Worse than that he planned on taking
her to the Splinter and .  .  .  Ash hesitated took a breath.  Truth
was, she didn't know what her foster father intended to do.  She only
knew that her belongings had been taken to the Splinter, the second most
powerful man in Spire Vanis had been set to watch her door like a common
foot soldier, and every morning while she washed her face and dressed
her hair, her maid rifled through her underclothes, looking for blood.

Ash took a final look around the room.  None of those were the real
reason she had to go, though.  Whatever was trapped inside the Splinter,
aching with hate and need so great that all she had to do was put her
hand against the door to feel it, was what finally forced her into
action.  Just the memory of the thing's desperate, unspeakable misery
was enough to turn her stomach to lead.

It wanted what she had.  And Ash March, Foundlingand almost- daughter,
wasn't prepared to give it one whit.

Steeling herself, she pushed against the door.  Cold bit her like a
snake, and she had to fight the urge to step back.  Weeks of poor sleep
had worn her down, and little things like the constant cold in Mask
Fortress now affected her more than they used to.  Almost as if she were
about to plunge into water, not darkness, Ash took a breath, held it in,
and stepped into the corridor.  It was deathly quiet.  One greenwood
torch smoked above the stairs.  No light at all reached beneath Katia's
door.

Ash moved quickly.  She had already lost minutes to indecision, and she
knew from observation how little time it took Marafice Eye to do his
business.  He might step from Katia's room any moment, hands tuggingat
the leather straps on his pants, small mouth still wet with Katia's
saliva.

Promise to take me with you when you go.

Katia's words made the heat come back to Ash's face.  It was the only
serious promise she had ever made in her life, and although she had
chosen words to deliberately mislead the little maid, she felt no better
for it.  After tonight Katia would find herself back in the kitchens,
and that was the one place in the fortress she didn't want to be.

Better the kitchens than where I go.  Hardening herself against emotion,
Ash rushed down the stairs.  Tonight was Slaining Night, and the Rive
Watch would be out in force, patrolling the city and keeping order.
Brothers-in-the-watch would be thin on the ground within the fortress.

Slaining Night was the oldest of the Gods Days, and people celebrated it
only after dark.  Ash was not really sure what the festival marked.

Her foster father said it was a celebration of the founding of Spire
Vanis, marking the erection of the first strong wall at the base of
Mount Slain by the Bastard Lord Theron Pengaron.  It sounded reasonable
enough, and people did warm rocks from Mount Slain in their hearths or
charcoal burners, yet Ash had heard other things said.  Old servants in
Mask Fortress talked about death and sealing darkness and keeping old
evils in their place.  Ash had even heard that the name Slaining Night
had nothing to do with Mount Slain at all and that in some cities to the
east it was called by its true name instead: Slaying Night.

Ash frowned into the darkness.  What in the Maker's name was she doing?
Tonight was quite frightening enough without digging up a lot of old
nonsense to frighten herself even more.  Sometimes she could be as dim
as a lamp trimmer.  Tonight was her best chance of escaping from Mask
Fortress.  She had spent all day hoping Katia would lure the Knife from
her door, and now that she had gotten her wish and was well under way,
she had to keep her mind to the task in hand.  Setting her jaw in place,
she approached the last run of stairs.  A gray meet bench and its
accompanyingalcove created a trap for shadows on the landing.  Torches
were sparse, as any flame without a Slain Stone at its base was
considered ill luck tonight.  Ash shivered.  Penthero Iss probably hated
that.  He hated the old ways and the old traditions--anything that spoke
of Spire Vanis's barbaric beginnings and past.

Hearing footsteps below, she slipped into the gray meet alcove to wait
until whoever caused them passed.  The limestone wall was as cold as
iron against her back.  The stone bench, with its hard seat and sculpted
back piece couldn't look less inviting to sit on.  Funny to think that
grange lords and their ladies had once sat here and flirted their golden
wine coolingas they stole kisses and slid their hands beneath silk. All
gone now.

Penthero Iss had seen to that.  He claimed to be a man who liked culture
and art and high things, yet although he tore down or put an end to many
things that had been common in the fortress in Borhis Horgo's
day--dances held in the barbaric light of a burning pyre, death duels
fought with broad- blades in the quad, and the yearly slaying of a
thousand beasts to mark winter's end--he seldom introduced anything new
in their place.  Penthero Iss seemed more concerned with destruction
than creation.  Chilled, Ash slipped from the gray meet and took the
last steps down to ground level.  The footsteps faded into the distance,
and she guessed that a single brother-in-the-watch was making his rounds
of the Cask.  That meant she had only a few minutes before he appeared
again.

The black oak door and its gate were open and raised.  Even though Ash
knew brothers-in-the-watch used the gate constantly throughout the night
to move between the Red Forge and the Cask, it didn't stop her from
feeling relieved when her booted feet sank into snow.  Wind ripped the
cloak from her chest, driving the metal fasteningagainst her throat.
Tears stung her eyes as she forced the door closed and stepped into the
shadows close to the wall.  The snow was old and slippery, polished to
ice by the winds of Mount Slain.

It was not dark.  The Red Forge was kept burning through the night, and
the red light from the forge fire combined with lamplight from the three
occupied towers to make the snow glow like human skin.  The Horn was
especially bright.  The most intricately worked of the four towers, with
its iron outwork and lead cladding, was positioned due west of the Cask.
Katia said that the Lord of the Seven Granges was holdinga gathering
there tonight. Wicked it is, miss.  Right wicked!

There'll be prostitutes and shaven women and worse!

Ash edged along the west gallery wall, heading in the direction of the
Horn. The faint, tinny sound of muffled music grazed her ears.

Singing followed, then high tinkling laughter, then the wind blasted it
all away.

Ash fought with her cloak.

"Thirteen," she whispered softly to herself for no reason.  Thirteen
doors and gateways led out onto the quad.  As a child she had sat on the
practice court and counted them.

She could recall a time when twelve of the thirteen had been in use, but
then Penthero Iss had shut down the entire east gallery and sealed off
the Splinter, and now only eight doors were left.  Eight.

And the Rive Watch had keys to them all.

Directly opposite, set deep within the carved limestone facade of the
east gallery, lay the boarded and defaced Shrine Door.  The door, which
led down to a small crypt once used by the Forsworn, was made of wood
that had been ported all the way from the Far South and was gray and
hard as nails.  It had defied defacing by Spire-made chisels and blades
and had been painted with a grotesque likeness of the Killhound instead.
The bird leered at Ash from across the quad, its sexual organs red and
swollen, not like a bird's at all. Ash could not remember a time when
the door was unmarked.  In Borhis Horgo's day the knights who named
themselves the Forsworn because they renounced all prior oaths upon
entering the order had moved freely about Spire Vanis.  They had helped
Horgo defeat Rannock Hews at Hound's Mire; and forty years later Iss had
expelled them for it.  Like everyone else, Ash had heard the tales about
the twelve old and infirm knights who had fled to the crypt during the
expulsions, sending messages to Penthero Iss, begging for asylum.  Iss
had supposedly granted their request, commanding carpenters to seal the
Shrine Door and the crypt's three small windows, interring the men
alive.

Abruptly Ash took her gaze from the door.  Suddenly everything she
looked at seemed to be warning her to turn back, to return to her
chamber by the fastest route and put all thoughts of leaving behind her.
It was unnervingly easy to imagine herself in a room built of stone with
no way out.

No.  No.  No.  Ash fought the fear before it came.  Tonight or never,
she told herself, deliberately increasing her pace.

Ahead a pale slash of light marked the stable door, drawn together but
not yet closed for the night.  Lying halfway between the Cask and the
Horn, the stables were her intended destination.

As she headed for the light source, she heard the Cask door creak open
behind her.  Not daring to look around, she stopped dead.  Her heart
thumped like a cracked bell in her chest.  Remember the hares, she told
herself.  Only things that move get hunted.

Sounds were difficult to catch in the wind.  Ash heard nothing she could
put a name to at first.  It could be a routine patrol, a
brother-in-the-watch changing guard, servants bringing spitted meat and
kegs of black beer to the Horn.  Surely the fact that no one was
shoutingand running was good?  Ash thought it highly likely that news of
her escape would be greeted by something harsher than a softly creaking
door.

Having waited for over a minute, she risked glancing back.  The Cask
door was closed.  No one was in sight.  The chains holding the gate
raised were still. Satisfied, she carried on toward the stables.

Sounds of music and laughter from the Horn grew louder.  A side door
opened as she watched, and a fat man dressed in shiny silk stumbled out.
Bending double, he promptly vomited against the wall.  Ash didn't stop.
The man was too drunk to notice anything moving in the shadows behind
his back.

A half-moon rode low over Mount Slain, castinga well-defined shadow for
the Splinter.  Ash tried not to look at the icebound tower, preferring
to watch steam rise from the fat man's stomach contents, ice crystals
form on her boots-- anything rather than the Splinter itself.  It was
foolishness of the worst kind, yet she couldn't help herself.  To look
meant to think, and Ash didn't want to turn any portion other mind that
way.  Not now, while she was this close.  Paces away from the massive
cross beamed door of the stables, she stepped as quietly as she could.
The dry, saw dusty odor of hay and oats mingled with the stench of horse
sweat and urine.  Ash was glad of smells that had names, rather than the
strange, slightly chemical odor that blew with the wind from Mount
Slain.  Rubbing her eyes to clear away the last traces of wind tears,
she padded to the door's edge.  All was quiet, and after a moment she
braced herself and peeked inside.

Master Haysticks and two grooms sat on wooden crates with their backs to
the door, drinking something hot from pewter tankards and playing blocks
with the hard focused attention of men serious about their game.  The
stone floor was brushed clean and all the horses were boxed.  A pair of
safe-lamps hung from brass pegs on the wall above Master Haysticks'
head, their horn guards yellow as an old nag's teeth.

Ash didn't pause to take a breath before entering.  She had to risk
this. The stables were her best chance--she had known that from the
moment she had decided to go.  The gate beyond the stables was the most
used and the least checked.  The brothers-in the-watch who manned it
were more interested in who was going in than coming out.  Those who
entered through the stable gate were usually tradesmen or delivery men
or fellow brothers-in the-watch. Crangelords, petty gentry, rich
merchants, and anyone else who thought enough of themselves to worry
about appearances always used one of the other gates, preferring to call
grooms to lead their horses away.  Master Haysticks and the two grooms
did not hear Ash enter.  A groom with a neck as red and shiny as a loin
of beef had just thrown the blocks, and Master Haysticks and the second
groom were studying the lay of the wood.  They did not look pleased.
Loin Neck had thrown a good hand, and Ash could tell from the shell-like
clink of coinage that money was riding on the wood.

She took a moment to recover from the ravages of the wind and cold.

The stables were dim despite the two safe-lamps, and sounds of horses
blowing, feeding, flicking their tails, and snoring were comforting to
her ears.  She liked horses.  After a moment she began edging toward the
long line of horse stalls that lay directly across from where the men
sat gaming.

She had to get to the far door.  The stables were the reason the
brothers-in-the-watch manning the gate were lax; they knew that whoever
presented themselves for leavetaking had already passed through the
stables and therefore the inspection of the stable master and his
grooms.  Ash had thought this through.  She wouldn't stand a chance at
any other gate. Brothers-in-the-watch were on guard day and night.  They
asked questions and would call a commanding officer rather than risk
lettinganyone of uncertain credentials pass.

Why, the west gate alone was manned by a full sept and lit by so many
torches that Katia said that all the snow for thirty paces melted.

Ash sucked in her cheeks.  If there was any way to leave Mask Fortress
other than through one of its four gates, she wished she knew it.

Climbing over battlements and roofs was out: She had broken her arm
fallingagainst an iron siege guard when she was six.  She knew just how
treacherous the walls of Mask Fortress, with their iced-up stonework,
murder holes, and spiked embrasures, could be.  "Hey!  That throw
doesn't count. Bloody rat over there turned the tally."  Master
Haysticks' voice rose in anger.

"Throw again or I'll have you on dung duty for a week."

"" S not my fault the rat"-- " Throw again!  "

Sounds of crates creakingand grown men huffing muffled the click of
Ash's bones as she crouched close to the floor.  Shadows deepened as she
crawled toward the line of stalls that ran the length of the stables.
Every stall in the stables had dividing walls that came to an end a full
foot above the floor.  Once a week the stables were sluiced clean, and
the gap between the walls and the floor was needed to allow all the
horse muck, shed hair, and moldering grain to be carried away.

Tucking her head close to her body, Ash ducked under the wooden divide
and into the first stall.  It had to be safer than iced-up stone.

A black gelding stood asleep close to the door, its legs locked in
position, its eyes closed and tail slack.  The sound of hay snapping
beneath Ash's chest woke it instantly.  Ash held herself perfectly still
as the large, liquid brown eye of the horse regarded her.  The gelding
dipped its head and smelled her breath.  Dust itched in Ash's nostrils
and hay stalks scratched against her cheek as she worked to control the
impulse to shy away.  The gelding's fore hooves were big as war hammers,
shiny with neat's-foot oil, and shod with iron.  The gelding whickered
and shook his head.  Prodding Ash with his nose, it waited to see what
she would do.  Ash glanced ahead.

The stone manger for the feed and the leather water bucket were pushed
hard against the back wall.  To keep as far away from the gelding's
hooves as possible, she would have to scramble over them to reach the
next stall.  Gathering the ends other cloak to her chest so they
wouldn't snag on splinters, she began crawling forward .  .

slowly.

Only a short stretch, she told herself, gaze darting between the next
divide and the gelding.  It was a good horse, she was sure of that.

But it was used to seeing rats, not humans, crawling in its stall after
dark.

Scrambling over the stone manger proved difficult and painful.  Ash
struck her shin on a sharp edge, and although she didn't dare spend a
minute inspecting the damage, she knew there was blood.  The gelding
watched her. Any time she moved too fast, it changed positions, stamping
its hooves onto the dung-packed stone.  Ash's heart beat unsteady in her
chest.  The skin on her face felt too tight.  Every second she expected
to hear a cry rip through the fortress and the night come alive with
armed men and light.  Where was Marafice Eye?

Was he back outside her chamber?  Had Katia slipped inside to check on
her one last time before she slept?

"Damn1."  Ash cursed under her breath as her elbow caught the water
bucket, causing it to tip over onto the stone.  The floor slanted
forward slightly, and the water ran straight under the stall door.

"Damn black's knocked its bucket again!"  came Master Hay- sticks'
voice.

"Skimmer, spread some new hay before the damp gets in his hooves."

Free of the stone manger and the bucket, Ash pushed herself through to
the next stall.  Her cloak caught on a bit of wood, and just as she
tugged it free the black gelding's door swung open.  Ash froze.  The
groom called Skimmer whistled as he spread fresh hay.  The gelding,
angry by now at all the disturbances, snorted and kicked.  Skimmer
swore.  Master Haysticks and the other groom laughed.  Ash thought she
heard the faint click of wooden blocks, then Skimmer closed the door.

"Bloody black's a devil," he said.

"That's the last time I go in there after dark."  He crossed back to the
crates.

"Hey!  Thems blocks been handled! They weren't laying like that afore I
fetched the hay!"

A lively argument broke out between the men, where Master Havsticks and
the second groom swore by every blind dog that had ever frozen to death
on a street corner that they hadn't even looked at the blocks, let alone
handled them.

Ash turned her attention to the stall she was in.  Apart from a harness
of fine dark leather hung from a dog hook next to the door, it was
empty.  The red-and-black insignia of the Killhound on the Iron Spire
was stamped across the noseband, indicating that a member of the Watch
normally stabled his horse here.  Ash didn't permit herself a sigh of
relief, though she was relieved.  Most of the Watch were out in the
city, patrolling the Slaining Night crowds, and that meant many of the
stalls would be empty.

She moved quickly after that.  The argument over blocks raged
nicely--Master Haysticks' voice rising from mild indignation to
thundering outrage as Skimmer continued to accuse him of cheating--and
the sharp voices helped mask all the little noises Ash made as she
crawled from stall to stall.  A fair number of stalls were empty, as she
had predicted.  The more crusted in hay, horse muck, and horsehair she
became, the more the horses seemed to accept her.  Apart from a nasty
clip from a pregnant mare who was sleeping lying down and struggled to
stand as her stall was invaded, Ash avoided further injury.  The secret,
she found, was to turn on her back, then stay perfectly still for a
moment, offering up the soft flesh of her throat, until the horse had
smelled and inspected her.  They usually let her pass after that.

Finally she found herself in the stall nearest the far door, sharing
space with a one-year-old filly who was bright, alert, and not the
slightest bit sleepy.  The filly was wary at first, but after a few
minutes of continuous sniffing, she began nudging Ash's cloak for
treats.

"Sorry, girl," mouthed Ash, strangely affected by the gentleness and
beauty of the young mare.

"No treats tonight."

After a quick peep under the stall door had assured her that Master
Haysticks and his grooms were too caught up in their argument to notice
someone slipping through the outer door, she mouthed her farewell to the
filly and slid under the wall.

Slipping into the deepest shadows, following the line of the stable
wall, she worked her way toward the exterior door.  The men's gazes were
turned inward, heads wagging, booted feet cuffing stone.  The argument
had turned nasty. Money was under dispute now, not wood.  One of the
safe-lamps was now burning dregs, and the flame was orange and weak. Ash
chose her steps carefully, pressing her chest against the damp stone and
walking on the balls other feet.  She wanted to run as fast as she could
for the door, but the noise and sudden movement would give her away.

Like the quad door, the far door was open slightly to let in latecomers
and brothers-in-the-watch.  Ash felt a stream of cold air blow against
her cheek. As she took the final step toward the opening, the quad door
rattled into motion.  Quick as she could, she shrank back into the
shadows.  Someone was entering the stables from the other side.

The quad door rumbled open, and the massive, bullnecked form of Marafice
Eye stepped into view.  Cloaked in the skin-soft leather of his office,
he carried a horn lamp burning with a hot blue flame in one hand and a
crab-hilted dagger in the other.  Master Haysticks and the grooms fell
silent.  The wooden blocks tumbled from Skimmer's hands onto the floor.

"You!"  said the Knife to Master Haysticks, stabbing the air with his
dagger.

"Has the Surlord's ward come this way tonight?"  Master Haysticks shook
his head with feeling.

"No, sir.  All's quiet.  No one but the Watch and their parties have
passed through."  The Knife grunted.  His small mouth gathered to itself
like something pulled shut with a wire.  Watching him, Ash felt the
bones in her legs turn to water.  How much of the stables could he see
from where he stood?

Were the safe-lamps throwing light to the far door or shining in his
face?

"Get this place lit up!  Lock all doors and let no one pass until you
hear from me again.  Is that clear?"

"But, sir, what about the other brothers-in-the-watch .  .  ."  Marafice
Eye didn't have to say anything to make Master Hay- sticks fall silent.
His eyes glittered, that was enough.  With a shrug of his shoulders that
in any other man would have been a gesture of uncertainty, but in the
Knife was a violent switch of muscle and bone Marafice Eye turned and
walked away.  A line of blue light trailed behind him like smoke.

Master Haysticks followed after, a lot happier to talk to the Knife's
back than his face.

"As you say, sir.  As you say.  Skimmer, get the lamps.  Cribbon, help
me with this door."

Ash didn't wait another moment.  While all three men were intent on
watching Marafice Eye leave, she slipped from the far door out into the
night.

Cold and darkness enveloped her so completely it was like diving into a
pool of black water.  The wind hissed.  Hard snow squeaked beneath her
boots as she moved.  Walls, their mortar fresh and in good repair,
towered to either side like stone giants.  Thirty paces ahead lay the
gate.

Stable gate, trade gate, whatever one chose to call it, was an iron
jawbone of spikes.  Two guardhouses, cut from pale limestone and scoured
smooth by centuries of hard wind, flanked the gate itself.

The gate was up, its great metal teeth suspended above the crossbeam,
dripping clods of snow and horse dung onto the ground below.  Chain
rigging held it in place.  Stretching from the crossbeam to the
guardhouse, wrappingaround gears and levers, forming knots of black
iron, the gate chains shuddered like metal foliage in the wind.  Ash
stood and looked, her breath shallow and halting.  Her only chance now
was if the brothers-in-the-watch guarding the gate hadn't heard other
escape.  She knew they shouldn't have--some- one would have had to
travel through the stables to tell them, and Ash knew for a fact that
had not happened--but the presence of Marafice Eye made her unsure of
herself.  He would crush her skull between his bare hands if he could .
.

Stop it.  Ash jabbed her knuckles against her forehead, trying to knock
out the fear.

The snow at her feet began to glow as many lamps were lit in the stables
behind her back.  Hearing the door rattle closed, she stepped aside and
waited until it was locked and bolted.  The fortress was coming to life.
The stables weren't the only new source of light, and quick glances to
either side showed torches being lit around the curtain wall. Sounds
broke through the driving roar of the wind: shouted orders, the whir and
clank of sealed gates, and the harsh percussion of metal arms.

Ash stepped toward the gate.  Tidying herself as she moved, she brushed
scraps of hay and muck from her cloak and tucked her hair beneath her
hood. She smelled bad and couldn't decide if that was a good thing or
not.  A square of pale light escaped from the grille covered window on
the left gatehouse, and several lines of freshly trodden snow led to and
from the door, so Ash headed that way.  A man appeared at the grille as
she approached.  Knowing she was being watched made it difficult to
appear natural, and her movements became jerky and stilted.

The gatehouse door swung open, and a brother-in the-watch stepped out.

The man was young and black haired, with a well- shaped mouth and eyes
set too far back in his skull.  A cruciform insignia stamped high upon
his steel gorget marked him as a grange lord third or fourth son.  He
drew his sword.

"Who goes there?"

The second man behind the grille raised a bright-burning lamp to the
window, throwing light onto Ash and the surrounding ground.  Ash
blinked.  She thought a moment, then curtsied.  With her gaze carefully
lowered, she said,

"Please, sir.  May I pass?"

The guard took a step forward.  Like all members of the Watch, he was
clean shaven and clad in soft beaten leathers worn over plate.  The red
steel of his blade shimmered and rippled as the patterns forged into the
metal drew the light.  Out of the corner of her eye.  Ash saw his gaze
flick behind her to the growing ring of torches spewing light and black
smoke over the wall. When a cry broke through from the other side, he
stilled himself to listen.

Ash held her jaw so tight it ached.  Grinding the heel other boot into
the snow, she forced herself to stay calm.  She was a servant, a
messenger girl, a seamstress.  She couldn't afford to act afraid.  "One
of Till Bailey's girls?"

Ash had been concentrating so hard on grinding her heel into the snow
that the question startled her.  Lifting her head, she risked glancingat
the watch brother.

He did not look pleased.  Sharp noises continued to sound within the
fortress.

"I said, are you one of Till Bailey's?"  He made a cutting motion with
his sword in the direction of the Horn.

"One of those brought in for Slaining?"

Ash took a breath.  He thought she was a prostitute.  "Answer, girl."

The guard's well-shaped lips slid across his gums, revealing small,
yellow teeth.

"Yes."  Ash nodded, her eyes fixed on the man's sword.

"One of Till's."

The watch brother spat.  Ash thought for a moment he would let her go.

He altered his grip on his sword, preparing to resheathe it, but as he
did so a great bell began to toll within the fortress.  Ash's heart
dropped in her chest.  It was the Quarter Bell, hung in the topmost
chamber of the Cask. Sounded in times of war, riots, or sieges, it was
the signal to secure all gates.

Lunging forward, the warden caught hold of Ash's arm and yanked her
toward the gatehouse window.  Sharp fingernails, the same yellow as his
teeth, hooked into her flesh.  Inside the gatehouse, the second man
moved away from the window, and a moment later metal chains began to
shudder and hum as gears and pulleys creaked to life.  Stable gate was
being lowered.

"Please.  Could you let me out before it drops?  Till's expecting me
back." Ash tried to match the sly charm Katia used when rootingafter
favors or rose cakes.  It was a mistake.  She ended up sounding
desperate instead.

The watch brother pulled her up to the window and forced her face
against the grille.

"Grod.  What should we do about this?  She's one of Till's."

The one called Grod was working the crankshaft.  He slowed but did not
stop as he took a look at Ash.  Grayingand nearly bald, he had the look
of a man who had soldiered for many years.  His eyes were sharp as a
pig's, and he wore no fancy insignia at his breast, shoulder, or throat.
Ash's first reaction was to back away, but the first brother had his
hand on her scalp and was holding her fast against the grille.  The
crisscross iron cut her face into squares, and she could feel the cold
metal stealing warmth from her cheeks.  Slowly, carefully, using the arm
that was pressed against the gatehouse wall, she reached inside her
cloak for the jeweled pin she had taken for selling.

The bell continued to toll, sending out deep, wailing notes that hurt
Ash's ears.  Overhead, the gate clattered and screeched, descending in
small, lurching stages as its weight fought against the chains.  As
Ash's fingers found and then closed around the smooth brass of the cloak
pin, Grod shook his head.

"She's not one of Till's.  Thin scrap of nothing like that.  With that
hair and that mucked-up cloak.  Till likes 'em plump and pretty, not
dark and scraggy as a strip of trail meat."  Grod's eyes narrowed.  His
gaze focused on a lock of Ash's hair that had poked through the grille.
Releasing his hold on the crankshaft, he straightened his back and
snatched the lock. Ash's eyes teared as he ran his fingers along its
length.

Soot rubbed off in his hand.  A cold smile hardened his face as he
rolled the newly cleaned lock between his fingertips.  Abruptly he
tightened his grip.

"This one stays with us.  Bring her round, Storrin.

And we'll bind her fit for hauling.  "

On the word hauling, Ash yanked her head free of the grille.  Pain stung
her scalp as she lost a lock of her hair to Grod.  Swiftly she swung her
arm forward and drove the brass spike of the cloak pin into Storrin's
well-formed mouth, driving hard through lip tissue and gum to the smooth
bone beneath.

The man swore viciously.  Blood welled from his upper lip as he lashed
out in anger with his fist.  Ash took a hard blow on her shoulder but
managed to keep her footing.  She had to get through the gate.  Inside
the gatehouse, she was aware of Grod working on the crankshaft, meaning
to lower the gate before he came to the aid of his partner.

It was the move of someone practical and cold-hearted.  Ash despised him
for it.

She ran for the gate.  Storrin was faster, seizing her cloak tails and
yanking her down into the snow.  Falling to her knees, Ash struggled A
CAVERN OF BLACK ICE f 237 with the ties at her throat.  She couldn't
breathe. Snow crystals pround into her shins like powdered glass.

Storrin held her cloak like a leash as he jabbed his blade into her back
and yelled at her to stop fighting.  Ash felt little pain.  She was
concentrating on loosing the ties and freeing Storrin's stranglehold on
her throat.  The gate juddered to life almost directly above her, fresh
gobs of snow dislodging from its spikes as it dropped.  Ash's hands felt
big and clumsy as she clawed at her neck.

Why won't the damn thing come undone?

Storrin yanked hard on her cloak, making Ash slide backward in the snow.
A moment was lost to blackness as she fought to regain her footingand
stand. Jab!  Jab!  Storrin poked his blade into her ribs.

"Stop fighting me, bitch!"

Ash's mouth flooded with something that had to be blood.  Her head felt
heavy and swollen, and suddenly there was no room for her thoughts.

Reach!  Reach!

Voices hissed through her mind like scalding steam.  The pressure was
unbearable, forcing blood and heat to her face.  Another yank on the
cloak.

"Get back here."

REACH.  "

Ash reached.  With numb, frozen fingers, she reached into the taut
hollow other throat and tore at the cloak.  The fastening broke.  Hot
blood rained down her neck, steaming in the freezing air.  Gaspingand
shaking, she took a diving man's breath.  Stumbling forward, she dug the
toe other boot into the snow.  Storrin was at her back, still pulling on
her cloak tails.  It took him a moment to realize she was no longer
attached.

The second was all Ash needed.  Forcing strength into legs that felt
cold and oddly numb, she hauled herself to her feet.  And ran.  The gate
was two-thirds of the way down.  As Ash fell under its shadow, she heard
a high-pitched wail crack the air.  All the chains rattled, and gears
and pulleys began to spin out of control.  The gate dropped.

Ash screamed.  Storrin reached.

Two tons of black iron smashed to the earth.  A soft gurgle sounded,
like water forced from a pipe.  Ash felt air and snow and something else
spatter against her back.  She was on the outside.  Outside!

Behind her, she heard the gatehouse door blast open and Grod cry out to
the Maker.  Strange.  He didn't sound angry.  He sounded scared.  Ash
glanced back.  Storrin was under the gate.  An iron spike had entered
his spine.  His legs were jerking, the muscles contractingand relaxing
so it looked as if he were performingan obscene dance in the snow. Blood
from the impact had sprayed all the way to her feet.

Ash swayed and nearly fell.  Turning, she ran into the night.

CHAPTER FIFTEEN.

Within Mask Fortress he escaped through the stable gate.  Grod watched
her run east.  By the time he'd raised the gate and called for aid she
was gone. Lost in the Slaining Night crowds.  "

"And the other man .  .  .  What was his name again?"  "Storrin."

Marafice Eye spat the word, clearly displeased that Iss had already
forgotten the man's name.

"He's dead.  It wasn't the falling of the gate that killed him, but the
raising."  Iss nodded, interested despite all he had on his mind.

"Yes.  I've seen things like that before.  As long as a man isn't moved
and the spikes stay in place, he lives.  The moment one tries to free
him, the internal organs tear apart and the lungs flood with blood.
Unfortunate. Most unfortunate.

You have saved the body?  " " You're not having it.  " The skin over
Marafice Eye's lips stretched white as he spoke.  Seeing him standing
there, his back to the great Roundroom fire, his boots dripping snow
melt onto the gold-and-turquoise rug, his entire body shaking with fury,
Iss decided to say no more.  Marafice Eye was protective of his men,
fiercely so.  The Red Forge would burn long and bright this night in
memory of a brother lost.

Turning his back on the Knife, Iss stared into the yellow flames blazing
in the hearth.  How could Asarhia have gone?  Didn't she know he would
never hurt her?  Hadn't he told her a hundred times that he loved her
more than any real father could?  Damn her!  She had to be found.  There
was no telling whose hands she might fall into out there.  The Phage
might find her .  or even the Sull.  Iss took the black iron poker from
its stand near the hearth and turned over piece after piece of burning
coal. After a few moments he had collected himself enough to finish the
matter at hand.

"Have Storrin's body brought before the White Robes for blessingand
annunciation--wake them if you must.  If they complain, tell them that
the Surlord himself commands it.  And see to it that the man's widow,
his mother, or whoever else he leaves behind is adequately compensated
for the loss."

Marafice Eye grunted.  Even in a chamber the size and height of the
Roundroom, which occupied a full quarter of the ground floor in the
Cask, the Protector General of Spire Vanis dominated the space.  He was
a dangerous animal, not to be toyed with- Iss knew that.  "You never
mentioned what business was so pressing it pulled you away from
Asarhia's door."

"No.  I didn't."  Marafice Eye stood his ground, his eyes hardening
along with his tight little mouth.

Iss held his gaze.  Information was cheap to come by in Mask Fortress:
He'd have answers soon enough.  Caydis Zerbina, with his soft linen
slippers that never made a sound and his long agile fingers shaped for
foiling locks, would see to that.  There was little Caydis and his
dark-skinned brethren did not know about Marafice Eye.  The Knife
prefers to court his women in the dark, Sarab, Caydis had once breathed
in his soft musical voice.  Hzs night mushroom is sadly misshapen.  Iss
found such information both useful and distasteful.  And he always sent
Caydis in search of more.

Returning the charred black poker to its stand, he said,

"No matter.

Asarhia must be found.  The servant girl must be questioned.  It seems
highly unlikely to me that Asarhia could have orchestrated such a clever
escape on her own.  My ward is a bright girl, but far too naive and
timid to have carried off something so cold-blooded without help.

Soot in her hair, crawling under horse stalls, strutting to the stable
gate, and declaring herself a prostitute!  " Iss paused, his pale hand
knotted around the poker shaft.

"The servant girl must be involved in some way."

He looked at the Knife without seeming to.  The man's face save
nothingaway as he murmured,

"I'll take the truth from her."  "Call her now."

Iss released his grip on the poker as Marafice Eye left the room.  The
Roundroom was bright and warm, decorated with silk hangings and silk
rugs and thirteen black pewter lanterns that burned the fragrant flume
of sperm whales, giving off a sweet childlike scent.  Iss had taught
Asarhia to read and write here, beneath the light of the pewter
lanterns.  Once when she was nine years old her feet had frozen to
blocks in the quad, and he had stripped her down in front of the fire
and warmed her pale little toes in his fists.

"The girl will be here soon."  The Knife strode back into the chamber,
shaking tapestries and wall-mounted weaponry as he moved.

"Ganron has reported back.  Watch has been tripled on Almsgate,
Hoargate, and Wrathgate.  The east" -- Iss flicked a wrist, silencing
the Knife.

"Vaingate must also be watched.  I want a triple guard posted there as
well." "Vaingate leads nowhere.  No one in their right mind would leave
the city by way of Mount Slain.  I'll not waste my men setting them to
guard a dead gate."

"Indulge me," Iss said.

"Waste them."

Marafice Eye glowered.  His big hands crunched the Killhound broach at
his throat, forcing the soft, lead-based alloy into a shape that looked
more like a dog than a bird.

The Surlord explained himself only once his Knife had nodded and said,

"Aye."

"You know Asarhia's history as well as I do, Knife.  She was abandoned
outside of Vaingate.  Vaingate.  Now, for the first time in her life
she's free to go where she chooses.  If you were in her position,
wouldn't you be curious about the place where you were found?

Wouldn't you like to stand upon that frozen ground and spend a moment
wondering why your mother left you for dead?  Asarhia is a sensitive
girl. She hides things even from me, yet I know she feels her
abandonment keenly. Some nights she even calls out in her sleep.  "

Marafice Eye took this information and chewed on it, his hands dropping
to his waist where his red sword was sheathed and hung.

After a minute of silence he spoke.

"If you're so sure she'll visit Vaingate, then I say we don't increase
the guard at all.  Visibly.  The girl's not stupid--we've seen the truth
of that ourselves tonight-and she won't show herself by the gate if she
judges it unsafe.  Let her come.  Let her see only beggars and vendors
and street filth.  Let her come in good faith, unawares.  And let me be
there to stop her when she does."

"She is not to be harmed.  Knife."

"She killed one of my men."

Iss felt the anger come to him but did not show it.  His voice was quiet
as he said,

"You will not hurt her."

"But-" "Enough!"  Iss kept his eyes upon Marafice Eye until he was
satisfied that Asarhia would be returned to him whole.  Turning his back
on the Knife, he contemplated the stone relief work above the hearth.
Impaled beasts, two-headed wolves, goats with women's heads and breasts,
and serpents with the angled, segmented eyes of insects looked down at
him from their limestone poles.  Iss shivered.  Asarhia!  The stupid
girl.  He would not have hurt her if she had stayed.  Caydis would have
seen to it that she had every comfort. Her life would have barely
changed.

Knuckles rapped against wood.

"Girl's here, sir."  Marafice Eye opened the door, and a brother-in
the-watch pushed the little dark-haired maid into the room.  With one
quick movement the Knife caught the girl's arm and twisted it hard
behind her back.  The girl let out a small cry but was sensible enough
not to fight him.  "Leave us," Iss said to the watch brother.  When the
door was closed, he turned to the servant girl and shook his head.

"Katia.  Little Katia.  I trusted you and you let me down.  Now look at
the terrible mess you are in."

Katia's lips trembled.  Her fine dark eyes glanced sideways toward the
Knife. He looked away.

Iss took pity on the girl.  She was so very frightened, and she had
already been beaten once this night.

"Let her go."

The Knife released her immediately.  The girl let out a sob and stumbled
forward, hardly knowing what to do.  She looked around the room for a
moment, then flung herself at the Surlord's feet. "Please sir.  Please.
I didn't know what she was planning.  I swear it.  She told me nothing.
Nothing.  If I'd known I would have come to you like I always do.  I
would have told you, sir.  I swear."  Finished she broke down into soft,
shuddering tears, her head shaking, her little hands graspingat the
watered silk of Iss' robe.

Iss patted her shiny curls.

"Hush, child.  Hush.  I know you would have come to me."  His fingers
slid under her chin, forcing her to look up.

"You're a good girl, aren't you?"  Katia nodded, tears pooling in her
eyes, mucus running from her nose to her mouth.

"There.  Wipe your face ..  .  That's better, isn't it?  No need to cry.
You know me and you know the Knife, and neither of us has ever hurt you,
have we? So there's nothing to be afraid of.  All we need from you is
the truth."

Katia was quiet now but still shaking.

"Sir, I told you all I know.

Ash--I mean Miss Asarhia--said nothing to me about wanting to leave the
fortress.  She kept to herself this past week.  Ever since the day she
went riding in the quad and came back and found Caydis in her chamber,
she"-- " She saw him there?  "

Katia nodded.

"Yes, sir.  Made him feel bad.  Promised that she wouldn't tell on him
being slack about his business if he didn't tell on her."

"I see.  And did she say anything to you?"  Katia hesitated.

"Tell me the truth, child."

"Well.  .  .  she hurt my arm, and said she'd hurt me more if I didn't
tell her what you asked about whenever you summoned me to your chamber."
Katia twisted silk in her hands.

"So I told her how you're most particular in wanting to know when her
menses start .  .  .  but that's all I said.  I swear it.  She was right
queer that day.  All cold and angry.  Told me to leave straight after."

Iss patted the girl's head.

"Good girl.  You're doing very well.  Now.

This past week, have you seen any sign other menses?  Think hard, girl.
"

"No, sir.  All her underthings were as clean as if she'd never even worn
'em."

A soft breath puffed from Iss' lips.

"As if she'd never worn them."

He exchanged a glance with Marafice Eye.  It took him a moment to settle
his mind.

"Now, Katia.  One last thingand you may go.  Have you taken inventory of
all the items in Asarhia's chamber?"  Katia nodded.

"So, discounting the jeweled cloak pin we found in the snow and the
silver brush we found in her cloak, do you know of any other items she
may have taken?"

"No, sir.  The brush and the pin are the only things that have gone."

Iss continued to stroke Katia's hair.

"So she has nothing to sell for coinage, and no cloak to keep her warm.
What a poor affair her first excursion into the city is likely to be."

"She'll end up in Almstown, most like."  Marafice Eye had sat himself on
one of the dainty satin-upholstered chairs near the door, and judging
from the way he was pressing his forearm against the armrest, he seemed
intent on breaking it.

"I'll double the Watch numbers there as well."

Iss nodded, well content to abide by the Knife's judgment.  He'd never
had occasion to doubt its worth before.  Turning his attention to Katia,
he said,

"Look at me, girl."  Katia raised her chin.  Such a pretty, plump little
thing.  A perfect mix of servant girl cunningand little girl fear.
Asarhia had cared for her very much.  "Please, sir.

I won't have to go back to the kitchens, will I?  Please.  " Large brown
eyes pleaded as small, slightly grubby hands clawed at the silk of his
robes.

Iss was not unmoved.  His hand slid across her hot cheek.

"No.  You won't have to return to the kitchens.  I promise."

The girl was so relieved and delighted, her face was a genuine pleasure
to watch.  As she kissed his silk robe, reared, and murmured a hundred
little words of thanks, Iss nodded to Marafice Eye across the room.

Katia was so caught up in relief, she didn't hear the Knife approach.

For an instant, as his hands clamped around her head, she thought it was
a caress.  One other hands even fluttered up to touch him.  Then the
Knife's grip tightened and she knew to be afraid, and the look she sent
Iss tore at his heart.

One quick wrench was all it took to break her neck.

People will die for this.

Fire and ice burned his flesh and his soul.  The pain was as deep and
many layered as rock formed and then compressed over millions of years
beneath the sea.  The Nameless One knew pain.  He knew its weights and
measures, its aftertaste and its cost.  His joints ached with the soft
calciferous pain of old age, and even to rest them curled and at ease
brought no relief.  His broken and mis- mended bones burned within his
flesh like heated rods, and his organs shrank and hardened, losing
function bit by bit.  He no longer knew what it was to straighten his
back or urinate without pain.  He could not recall when last he had
taken a breath that satisfied him wholly or chewed a piece of meat until
it was flat.

Pain he knew.

The past he did not.

He strained for it every day, strained until blood vessels broke in his
belly and spine, until his jaw locked, his wounds wept, and the shaking
of his body opened sores upon his skin.  His fear of harming
himself--once so strong that it was the only thought he could retain in
his mind from one year to the next--had now faded to a mild concern. The
Light Bearer always fixed him. The Light Bearer with his salves and
bandages and gauze bags and tongs.  The Light Bearer would not let him
die.  It had taken many years for the Nameless One to learn this, and
more after to accept it, but now it was set firmly in his mind.

Knowing this had freed him, not from pain--nothingand no one could free
him from that--but from fear of death.  The Nameless One no longer had
complete control over his face muscles, but bitterness still leaked
across his face. Even pain so terrible it tore whole years from his life
could not make him welcome death.

He did not want to die; that was another thing he knew.  In time he
would know more.

Waiting.  That was his life.  Waiting, pain, and hate.  He waited for
the Light Bearer to come, waited for the scraps of light and warmth he
brought, ate them up like a dog after bones.  A hand on his shoulder, a
warm hand, could burn him now.

He yearned for the warmth and the touch and the contact, but when he
received it, it was too much.  When the touch was withdrawn he felt
nothing but relief, yet even before the memory faded and the imprint of
the Light Bearer's hand left his skin, he yearned for it all over again.
Loneliness wasn't like pain.  It had no degrees and niceties; it did not
shift and deepen and lighten, or change from day to day.

It fed consistently moment after moment, hour after hour, year after
year, gnawingaway at the back of his throat, consuming him piece by
piece.  What it left behind scared him.  The confinement he could stand,
the torture and usage he could stand, even the red-and-blue flames of
fire and ice that burned in place of his past.  But the loneliness, the
utter loneliness, ached with a pain he could not bear.

It turned him into something he hated.

The Nameless One shifted in the iron chamber that was his home, his
chamber pot, and his bed.  Chains, their metal mottled and corroded by
years of sweat, urine, and feces, did not rattle so much as crack like
the knuckles of a young and soft-boned child.

Hate was not new to him; that was the last thing he knew.  It came too
easily and fit too well to have been something newborn during his
confinement.  Even as he craved each visit from the Light Bearer, craved
the world of light, warmth, and people, he hated all he craved with
utter coldness.  Loneliness fed off him, and he fed off hate.  Hate was
how he lived through years of darkness, how he survived the aching
stillness and the separate weights of physical pain.  It was how he
faced a world with neither day or night, seasons, sunlight, nor cool
rain.  It was how he clung to the last shred of self.  People will die
for this.

Counting was beyond him--he knew nothing of numbers and their kind--but
the words he whispered into the darkness had the feel of things many
times said. They were a comfort to him.  They made tolerable the
wrigglingand pinching of the creatures inserted beneath the skin on his
forearm, back, and upper thigh.  They turned the sawing of their
chitinous mouthparts into a soft bearable hum.

Skin on the Nameless One's face cracked and bled as he forced muscles to
work upon a smile.

People will die for this.

All he had to do was remember the past, that was the thing.  Remember
who he was.

Already he was stronger than he had been.  The Light Bearer did not know
this; he thought his charge the same.  But he was wrong.  The Nameless
One added to himself in cornea-thin slivers, cumulating in the darkness
like rotting meat growing mold.  He could retain thoughts from one day
to another now.  It cost him in other ways, forced his body to fight the
pain alone as his mind wet-nursed a thought, and his joints ached to
bleedingas he held himself still while he slept.

Still, he knew things now, and he judged it worth it.  For uncountable
years he had known as little as the creatures that grew to maturation
beneath his flesh, aware of nothing except hunger and pain and thirst.

He had himself now.  And he spent his days waiting for the chance to
reclaim more.

When the Light Bearer took, when he descended into the chamber with his
light and his warm packages oozing honey and bean juice and stole that
thing he needed from the Nameless One's flesh, he uncovered a river of
dark currents as he worked.  These glimpses of darkness, swells, and
eddies of liquid glass whetted the Nameless One's tongue.

The current ran for him alone.  And every time the Light Bearer slit
open skin with his thin engraver's knife and extracted what he needed
with his little silver tongs, the river's bank meandered closer.  One
day it would come close enough for the Nameless One to enter.  One day
he would use its waters to douse the flames that burned in place of his
past.

Settling himself in the position that brought most comfort, with his
legs tucked beneath him and the chains pulled high across his chest, he
began straining for the name he'd lost.  Time came and went.

Darkness endured.  Somehow, despite all his efforts and his deepest
wishes, his mind slipped from his task, and loneliness came to feed upon
him once more.  Eventually he slept.  His dreams when they came were all
of warm arms, touching him, holding him, car- tying him up toward the
light.

CHAPTER SIXTEEN.

A Visitor Heavy snows had fallen on the clan hold during the ten days he
was away.  The filly didn't like the soft, often chest-high drifts and
left to her own devices chose paths that were indirect, to say the
least.  Raif let her have her say.  The roundhouse was in sight now, and
he could find nothing inside himself that welcomed the thought of coming
home.

Overhead the sky was striped gray and white by high winds.  A storm far
to the north, born in the frozen waste of the Great Want, was working
itself out beyond the horizon.  At ground level the wind it generated
was biting.  The filly got the worst of it, and her nose and eyes were
crusted and weeping, and ice crystals formed continually around her
mouth.  Every hour or so Raif would stop and clean her face and bridle
and check the flesh around her mouth for chilblains.  He could muster no
such enthusiasm for himself.  His fox hood was stiff with ice; five
days' worth of breath had accumulated in the guard hairs, turning each
strand of fur into a brittle quill of ice.  The parts ofRaifs cheeks
that touched the hood were numb.

His eyes stung, part snow abrasion and part snow blindness.

Everything he'd looked at for the past two days had been blurred.  The
others probably had the sense to sit out the worst days of the storm,
raise camp hard against a leeward slope, and cover their tents in snow.
Raif forced his wind-cracked lips to stretch to a hard line.  He
wouldn't think about the others.  They would come back, perhaps two or
three days later than he, but they would return, and when they did his
life in the clan would be over.  Mace Blackball would see to that.

RaifSevrance ran.  from battle, he would say.  The year man broke his
oath.

Raif raised a fist and ground his raven lore into his chest.  He had
done Mace Blackhail's work for him!  And, if time could be turned and he
could go back to the Bluddroad and the ambush, he couldn't say if he
would do it again.  The horror of killing women and children had seemed
so clear then. Ridingalone for the past five days had dulled it.

Pulling the filly from her path to one of his own choosing, Raif steeled
himself against doubts.  The past was the past, and wishing it different
never brought anyone relief.

As he cut across the graze, a line of blue smoke rising from the near
side of the roundhouse caught his attention.  He rubbed his sore eyes,
making them worse.  When the stinging subsided, he concentrated upon the
smoke, tracing its source to the blue stone roof of the guide house
Uneasy, he kicked a better pace from the filly.  The guide house had no
hearth or chimney, only a smoke hole for letting out lamp fumes, yet
from the volume of smoke escaping from the roof, it looked as if someone
had built and lit a fire.  Everything else about the roundhouse seemed
normal.  Longhead and his crew had cleared the snow from the court, and
a handful of young boys were out takingadvantage of the cart-size snow
piles that had been shoveled aside.

The boys stopped playingand turned to watch as Raif approached.

Berry Lye, a great turnip-headed youth with red ears who was younger
brother to Banron, brushed the snow from his buckskins and ran forward
to greet Raif. He wanted to know what had happened at the ambush.  How
many Bluddsmen had Banron unseated with his hammer?  How had his new
armor stood up to the fight?  Raif silenced him with a single look.  He
was in no mood to talk to children.  Berry's face reddened to match his
ears, and for a moment he looked just like his brother.  Raif turned
away, suddenly ashamed.  He didn't even know if Banron was alive or
dead.

Berry ran for the roundhouse, eager to be first with the news that at
least one of the ambush party had made it back alive.  Raifslid from his
horse and led it to the stables.  He felt sick to his stomach.

What was he going to say?  How could he tell the clansmen and women with
due respect what he had done?

Pretty, copper-haired Hailly Tanner emerged from the stables to take his
horse.  She actually blushed as their hands touched over the reins.
Raif, like many young men in the clan, had wasted hours dreamingabout
Hailly's pale, lightly freckled skin and perfect strawberry mouth. Until
today she had never deigned to notice him, let alone gone out other way
to tend his horse.  Now she stood before him, asking quite coyly if the
filly needed hay or oats.  Raif showed a grim smile.  He was a year man
now; that was the difference.  Before he had been nothing, a lad with a
borrowed bow and no oath, unworthy in every way of her attentions.  He
gave her his instructions and left.

Ignoring the small crowd of women and children who had begun to gather
at the main entrance, Raif headed for the side door instead.

Before he did or said anything, he needed to visit the guide- house.

Alone.

Anwyn Bird stood in the entryway, arms folded, watching him.  Raif
thought he might be in for a grilling, but something must have been
showing on his face, for the gray-haired matron let him pass
unchallenged.  As he headed along the stone passage to the guide house
he heard her calling for a keg of warm beer and a platter of fried
bread.  Despite everything, Raif felt his mouth watering.  He had trail
meat in his pack, but if he had eaten any on the way home, he had no
memory of it.

The door to the guide house was open.  Tattered scraps of smoke and
burned matter sailed from the doorway as he passed inside.  He thought
for a moment, then shut the door behind him, taking time to ensure it
was firmly closed.

The interior was as dark and suffocatingas a smokehouse.  Raif's eyes
stung fiercely.  He couldn't see anythingat first except the massive
blocky outline of the guide stone Gradually he became accustomed to the
darkness and began to pick out details in the room.  He was standing at
the foot of the guide stone The granite was slick with graphite oil.

Pockmarks in the age-old stone were crusted with hard, milky mineral
deposits that glinted like exposed sections of bone.  The stone itself
seemed darker than he remembered.  Perhaps it was the smoke.

A small fire was burning in the west corner, its densely packed timbers
wetted with hog's blood to stop the wood from burning with a hot fast
flame. Directly above, the smoke hole had been newly enlarged, and fresh
tar had been painted around its edges.  No tallow or oil lamps were lit.
The guide house floor was littered with debris, and bits of rock
crunched beneath Raifs boots as he stepped toward the stone.  Despite
the fire, it was deathly cold, and a harsh acrid stench rose above the
gamy aroma of cooked blood.

Uneasy, Raif stripped off his soft inner gloves and dropped to his knees
by the guide stone He wasn't good at prayers.  Tern had taught both his
sons that it wasn't right to ask the Stone Gods for anything for
oneself.  They were hard gods, not easily moved by suffering.  A man's
life and his problems were nothing to them.  They watched over the clan
holds and the clans, demanding their proper place in each roundhouse and
around each clansman's and clanswoman's waist.  Yet they gave little
back.  .  .  and they answered no small prayers.  Raifs fingers hooked
around the tine that hung from his belt.  Weighing the antler tip in his
fist, he suddenly realized there was no need to pray: The Stone Gods had
been at his side through the ambush and long journey home.  They were
here in the powdered guide stone at his waist.

They knew all he had come to say.

Not knowing if that thought gave him comfort or made him afraid, Raif
reached forward and laid his palms on the guide stone

The stone was as hard and cold as a frozen carcass.  Raif had to fight
the desire to withdraw his touch, knowing that to do so would be a kind
of defeat.  Forcing his jaw together, he pressed his flesh harder
against the stone.  Numbness took his fingertips, then knuckles, as
blood vessels carried the stone coldness toward his heart.  A dull pain
sounded in his upper left arm.  The light entering his pupils wavered,
and his vision flickered and dimmed.

The numbness crept across his palms, tingling like alcohol evaporating
from his skin as it spread.  After a few minutes he could feel nothing
of the guide stone surface.  The pain in his arm throbbed like a pump
drawing up water.  For the briefest of instances, Raifwas taken with the
idea that he was siphoning something from the guide stone pulling it
inward toward himself.  He felt a moment of utter stillness, heavy as
the deepest sleep, where he understood that if he could just reach
beyond the stone's surface, everything would become known to him.

"What makes you think you can heal the stone?"

The voice snapped the thread.  The pain and the pulling stopped.  The
stillness collapsed inward, creatinga rush of light and darkness that
formed images as it slid back into the stone.  Raifsawa forest of high
trees, their foliage rippling from blue to silver like the sea; a lake
of frozen blood, its surface hard as hammered metal, its depths dark
with distorted shapes trapped within the ice.  Other things came and
went, moving too quickly for him to capture or understand: a city with
no name or people, a pair of gray eyes, frightened, and a raven flying
north in winter when all other birds flew south.

Before he could commit it all to memory, someone tugged at his wrists,
pulling his hands from the stone.  RaiPs hands peeled away slowly,
making sucking noises as his skin fought to keep hold.  He felt no pain,
only a vague sensation of loss.  Turning, he found himself looking into
the black eyes oflnigar Stoop.

"You should not have touched the stone, Raif Sevrance," he said quietly.

"Did you not see that it is broken?"

Raifs heart was still racing from all the guide stone had showed him,
and it took him a few seconds to decipher what Inigar had said.  He
shook his head.

"Broken?  I... I don't understand what you mean."  The guide held out a
hand dark and twisted with age.

"Then I shall show you."

When Raif gave Inigar his hand he did not expect to need the guide's
help standing, but his legs buckled as they took his weight and he
stumbled against the stone.  Surprisingly, Inigar pulled him up steadied
and held him until he had regained enough of his strength to stand
alone.  Looking at the small, sunken-chested guide with his white old
man's hair and his dark, membrane-thin skin, Raif wondered how he could
manage such a feat.

Inigar smiled, not kindly.

"Follow me."  Disappearing into the smoky darkness, he gave Raif little
choice but to do as he said.  Coming to a halt at the opposite side of
the guide stone Inigar wagged his head and said,

"This is why I burn the smoke fire.  This."  Raif followed Inigar's
gaze.  A deep fissure ran from the top edge of the stone halfway to the
floor, exposing the wet and glistening interior of the rock and
gathering shadows like a fault line in the earth.  Graphite oil oozed
from the cleft like blood.

"It happened five days ago."  Inigar looked at Raif sharply.

"At dawn."

Knowing there was a question in the guide s words, yet unwilling to
answer it, Raif said,

"The ambush went well.  The others will be back within a day or two."

Inigar ignored his words completely.  Runninga hand along the crack, he
said,

"The Stone Gods watch over all clans.  Despite the claims of each and
every clan chief since the Great Settling, they have no favorites.
Blackhail, Dhoone, Scarpe, Ganmiddich: They are all one and the same to
those who live within the stone.  If Scarpe wins a victory over Gnash,
they are not displeased.  If Ganmiddich takes the Croser roundhouse and
makes it their own, they find no reason to be enraged.  The Stone Gods
created the clans, they put the craving for land and battle within us,
so they do not grieve when clans make war and lives are shed.  It is
their nature as well as our own.  " However, when something happens that
goes against all they have taught and bred within us, threatening the
very existence of the clan holds themselves, then the gods get angry.  "
Inigar punched the cracked guide stone with the heel of his fist.

"And this is how they show it!"

Raif stepped back.

"Yes, RaifSevrance.  Perhaps you had better step back, for all our
sakes."

Feeling his face grow hot, Raif began to shake his head. He couldn't
bear to look at the crack in the stone.

"I... I..."

"Silence!  I don't want to be told what happened from your lips.  Some
news can come too soon, when a man is not ready or able to chew it."

Inigar Stoop looked straight into RaiFs eyes.

"Like oaths."  Raif winced.  The pain returned to his arm, soft and
sickening like a pulled muscle.

"We three knew, didn't we?  Eleven days ago on the court.  Me, you, and
the raven."  The guide grabbed Raifs elks king tore the ties apart to
reveal the raven lore beneath.  He plucked the piece of horn from Raifs
neck, snapping the twine.  Closing his fist around the lore, he said,

"I was not the one who gave you this--that shame is not mine--and
perhaps it is as much the old guide's fault as it is yours.

Either way, you are not good for this clan, Raif Sevrance.  You are
raven born, chosen to watch the dead.  And I fear that if you stay
amongst us, you will watch us all die before your eyes have had their
fill.  "Already you have watched the deaths of your father, ten of our
best warriors, and our chief.  Yet that still wasn't enough, was it?

You had to watch the death of Shor Gormalin, too.  Shor.  The finest man
in this clan.  An eagle, he was.  Tell me, what right has a raven to
watch over an eagle's death?  "

Raif looked down.  He had no answer.

Still Inigar Stoop wasn't finished.

"And what of your brother, Raif Sevrance?  Who seconded your oath and
took possession of your swear stone What new shame have you brought him?
If I had such a brother, who loved me with all the fierceness of his
bear lore, who spoke up for me when no one else would, and linked his
fate to mine without a moment's hesitation, I would count myself
blessed.  I would revere and obey him and spend all my days repaying his
trust.  I would not shame him with my words or my deeds."

Raif covered Ins face with his hands.  He had spent the last five days
pushingall thoughts of Drey from his mind.  Now the guide was pushing
them back.  And Raif knew he spoke the truth.

Inigar opened his fist and let the raven lore drop to the floor.

"You came here to seek the Stone Gods' guidance.  So look hard upon the
guide stone and see if it does not offer the answer you need " He
glanced once at the fissure in the stone, just long enough to ensure
that Raif understood his meaning, then turned and walked into the smoke.

"When you are done, go and join those gathered to greet you on the
court.  A visitor awaits you there."

Raif closed his eyes.  He stood and did not move, fearing to touch the
stone again.  It was a long time before he scooped up his lore and left.

"Leave him alone!  All of you!"  Anwyn Bird broke through the crowd of
people on the court, laden tray held out before her like a battering
ram.

"Can't you see the year man needs food and drink before you go bothering
him with questions?"  The clan matron favored Raif with a smile so
gentle and proud, it made him ashamed.

"Here, lad.  It's the best dark beer I have.  Drink it."

Raif took the horn from her, grateful to have something to focus his
attention upon.  The sunlight reflecting off the snow was dazzling after
the darkness of the guide house and the river of faces before him, all
chatteringand asking questions at once, made him want to run away.  He
stood his ground.  These people were his clan, and they had a right to
know of their kin.  He held the horn to his lips, inhaled the rich,
woodsy aroma of beer aged in oak barrels and then warmed slowly over the
hearth for three days.  Anwyn was right: It was the best she had.  And
that was why he chose not to drink it.  Resting the horn against his
chest, he tried to pick out the faces of Raina and Effie in the crowd.
He couldn't spot them.  A small group of people stood in darkness behind
the great door perhaps they were among them.

"We must know what happened, lad."  It was Orwin Shank, his big red face
grave and worried.

"Take your time, tell us as you see fit."

Raif nodded slowly.  Why was everyone treating him so kindly?  It only
made things worse.  Forcing himself to meet Orwin Shank's eyes, he said,

"Bitty is alive and well.  He fought bravely, and his blade took at
least two Bluddsmen that I counted."

Orwin Shank reached out and clamped a hand over Raifs shoulder.  Tears
sparkled in his light blue eyes.

"You always bring news to ease a father's heart, Raif Sevrance.  You're
a good lad, and I thank you for it."

Orwin Shank's words were in such contrast with those he had heard
earlier from Inigar Stoop that Raif felt his eyes stinging.  He didn't
deserve them. Glancingaround, he addressed the crowd, fearing that if he
didn't get it over and done with soon, he would lose his nerve.

"The ambush was a success.  All went as planned.  Corbie Meese led a
crew from the north of the road, Ballic the Red from the south.  My
brother was chosen to lead the rear.  The battle was fierce, and the
Bluddsmen fought hard, but we wore them down and forced them into the
snow, and then took victory for ourselves."  Raifs gaze sought out
Sarolyn Meese, Corbie's plump, sweet-natured wife.

"Corbie fought like a Stone God.  He was beautiful to watch."

"Is he hurt?"  Sarolyn touched Raifs arm as she waited for his reply.

"No.  A few nicks, perhaps.  Nothing more."

"And what of Ballic?"

Raif couldn't tell whom the question came from, but he answered it as
well as he could.  Other questions followed, everyone wanting to know of
their loved ones and kin.  Raif found himself relaxingas he spoke.

It was surprisingly easy to avoid speaking of what came later in the
clearing.  All that mattered to the clans folk was if their sons,
husbands, and brothers were alive and well and had fought bravely.

Raif was relieved to find himself telling truths that hurt neither
himself nor any member of the ambush party.

When Jenna Walker stepped forward and asked about her son, Raifs relief
left him as quickly as if it had never been there at all.

"Toady was badly injured.  He may be dead."

Jenna Walker shook off the people who moved swiftly to support and
comfort her.  Green eyes, sharp with anger, pinned Raif to the spot.

"Why do you not know for sure?  Why are you here before the rest?  What
happened after the raid?"

Raif took a breath.  He had feared this moment for five days.

"What happened to Banron?"  It was big, turnip-headed Berry Lye pushing
his way to the front of the crowd.

"How many Bludds- men's skulls did he crack open with his hammer?"

"Tell us why you're here, Raif Sevrance."  Jenna Walker's body shook as
she spoke.

"Tell us."

Raif looked from Berry to Jenna Walker.  He opened his mouth to speak.

"Enough!"  Raina Blackhail stepped from the shadows behind the great
door Dressed in soft beaten leathers and fine black wool, she looked
every bit a clan chiefs wife.  Sable fur at her throat and cuffs rippled
with every breath she took, and a silver knife slung at her hip caught
the light.  The crowd parted for her as she made her way forward.

"The year man has had a hard journey through new snow.

Let him name those he believes wounded or dead, then allow him time to
rest and eat.  "

Despite all her finery, Raina's eyes were dull, and her face had lost
all its fat.  Raif was shocked to see her widow's weals still bleeding.

"Tell Berry of his elder brother."

It was a command, and he obeyed it, seeing in his mind Banron Lye's body
lying in a ditch being worried by dogs as he spoke.  He gave Berry and
his kin little hope, telling them that Banron had not moved even after
the dogs had been shot.  The belief that his clansman was dead grew in
Raifs mind as he spoke.  He remembered standingacross the Bluddroad from
Banron.  Watching. .  .

You are raven born, chosen to watch the dead.

"Any others?"  Raina's voice cut through his thoughts.

He shook his head.

"I saw no others fall."

The relief of the crowd showed itself in relaxed fists and downward
glances. Some of the older clansmen touched their measures of powdered
guide stone giving thanks.  Raif saw Jenna Walker's questions held,
unspoken, on many faces.  Raina ensured that no one spoke them out
aloud, guiding everyone back to the roundhouse by the simple act of
heading there herself.  Anwyn helped, promising hot ale and fried bread
to all who came inside out of the cold. Raif stood his ground, watching
the clans folk disappear one by one into the roundhouse.  More than
anything else he wanted to go inside and find Effie, seize her in his
arms, and press her child's weight against his.  Yet he no longer knew
if that was the right thing to do.  Raina had kept her away from the
meeting on purpose, wanting to shield her from harm.

That was what he had to do now: shield Effie, Drey, and his clan from
harm. Inigar Stoop had made him see that clearly.  "Raif."

Raif looked up as his name was spoken by a voice he had not heard in
five years.  A broad bear of a man, with stubbly reddish blond hair and
light coppery eyes, stepped from the roundhouse onto the court.

Squinting into the snow clouds, he said,

"I was hoping for a more favorable light.  With a good set of shadows
upon me I swear I look a full stone lighter."

"Uncle."

It took Angus Lok only three strides to reach Raifs side.  Catching him
in a massive bear hug, Angus crushed him so tightly, Raif felt his rib
cage bend. Just as quickly, Angus let him go and stood exactly an arm's
length from him and examined him as thoroughly as if Raif were a horse
he meant to buy.

Dressed in undyed suede pants and saddle coat, with high black boots and
enough leather belts crossing his chest to harness a team of horses,
Angus Lok looked every bit the seasoned ranger that he was.

His cheeks were red with snow burn his lips were smothered with beeswax,
and his earlobes were bound with soft leather strips to prevent
chilblains and the 'bite.

"Stone Gods, lad!  But ye've grown!"  He knuckled the twelve-day beard
on Raifs chin.

"What d'you call this?  When I was your age I barely had that much hair
on my head, let alone my jaw!"

There was no answer to that.  Raif smiled.  Angus was here, and he
didn't know if that was a good or a bad thing, but he knew that Angus
could be trusted and was owed due respect.  Tern had said so many times,
even after the person who had brought the two men together had died: Meg
Sevrance, wife of Tern, mother of Drey, Raif, and Effie, and sister to
Angus Lok.

Abruptly Angus' face changed.  Hazel eyes watched Raif closely.

"I

arrived early this morning.  Raina told me about Tern .  .  .  He was a
good man, your father.  A fine husband to Meg. Adored her, he did "
Angus smiled softly, almost to himself.

"Though I must admit I hated him at first sight.  There was nothing that
man couldn't do better than me: hunt, shoot, drink, dance" "Dance?  My
father danced?"

"Like a devil in the water!  Tern only had to hear a tune once to start
snapping his heels and making steps.  Quite a sight, he was, with his
bear-claw cap and bearskin weskit.  I do believe it was the reason my
sister first fell in love with him, as he was hardly the handsomest of
men.

"Least I didn't think so at the time."  Stupidly, Raiffelt close to
tears. He had never known Tern could dance.

Angus touched Raifs shoulder.

"Walk a while wi' me, lad.  I've been in the saddle for two long weeks,
and I've a hankering to stretch these old legs."

Raif glanced back at the roundhouse.

"I need to see Erne."

"I've just been with her.   She's in good hands with Raina.   She can
wait a little while longer for her brother."

Raif wasn't convinced, yet it was obvious that Angus wanted to talk to
him, so he let himself be led away.

Sunlight had turned the graze into a perfect slope, white and smooth as
a hen's egg.  Hemlock and blackstone saplings were no longer
recognizable as trees, just strange, man-size mounds of snow that most
clansmen called pine ghosts.  The snow underfoot was loose and grainy,
the motion of the wind preventing it from freezing hard.  A few hare
tracks broke the surface, soft and discreet as snagged wool.

Raif found little comfort in walking through familiar surroundings.

Inigar Stoop's words prayed on his mind.  I fear that if you stay
amongst us, you will watch us all die before your eyes have had their
fill.  Raif shivered.  Everything looked different now the guide had
spoken.  Trying to save the Bludd women and children from burning in the
war wagon had been a mistake.  No lives were saved.  And in the end he
had only created something worse.

"Here.  Drink this."

Angus Lok's voice seemed to come from a very long way away.  It took
Raif a moment to pull his thoughts from the field north of the
Bluddroad.  Angus pressed a flask into his hand.

Raif weighed it for a moment and then drank.  The clear liquid was so
cold it stung his gums, completely tasteless, and strong enough to
render his breath invisible in the freezing air.  Angus slowed his pace.
After a few minutes he stopped by a pine ghost and rested his back upon
it.  Clods of snow dropped from the branches onto his boots.

He made a small motion toward the rabbit fur-covered flask, encouraging
Raif to drink more.  Raif took only enough to heat his mouth.

"You had a hard time on the Bluddroad."  It was not a question.  Angus
unbound his wrist ties and stripped off his fine sealskin gloves.  His
undyed clothes, the plain journeyman's blade strapped to his thigh, and
his short-cropped hair marked him as an outsider.  He was not clan. Tern
had said that Angus and his sister grew up in the city hold of Ille
Glaive, close to the Ganmiddich border.  Tern had met Meg during the
year he was fostered at Ganmiddich, when that rich border clan held a
summer dance for its year men and clan maids.  Angus had been
invited--Raif could not recall why--but he did remember that Crab
Ganmiddich, the Ganmiddich chief, had forbidden him to come unless he
brought a woman of his own to dance with.  Angus had brought Meg.  Tern
saw her, and according to Gat Murdock, who was also present, he never
gave her chance to dance with another man all night.  They were married
two months later, on the very day that Tern was released from his year
man oath.

Meg Lok never returned home.  On the day she married Tern Sevrance she
became clan.

"Raina told me that you can shoot targets in the dark."  Angus busied
himself as he spoke, turning his gloves inside out and scraping the
lining clean with a hand knife

"She also said that when you and Drey returned from the badlands, you
mentioned something about sensing the raid as it happened."

Raif felt his face grow hot.  What right did Raina have to say such
things to an outsider?

"Others tell me you're having problems with Mace Blackhail, arguing with
him in front of clansmen, disobeying his orders" "Say what you mean,
Angus.  I know well enough how things stand in this clan."

Angus was unaffected by Raifs anger.  Finished with his gloves, he
reversed them and pulled them back on.  Only when he had cleaned and
resheathed his knife did he see fit to reply.

"I have business that takes me south to Spire Vanis.  I think you should
come along."

Raif met Angus Lok's eyes.  Irises shot with flecks of bronze returned a
steady gaze.  How much does he know?  Has he been talking to Inigar
Stoop?

"Why make such an offer now?"  Raif said sullenly.

"Who put you up to this?"

Angus Lok gave Raif a look that made him wish he hadn't spoken.  Angus
wasn't clan, but he was kin.  Respect was his due.

"When a man arrives back ahead of his party, it's usually a sign that
there's trouble between him and the other members of that party.  And
when a clansman walks away from battle, he makes himself a traitor to
his clan."  Angus' face hardened along with his voice.

"I'm not a fool, Raif.  I heard what you said on the court.  You knew
enough about the fighting, but you said as good as nothing about the
wounded.  You don't even know for sure who's alive and who's dead.  It's
obvious you didn't see out the fight.  Something happened, didn't it?
Something happened to make you ride away."

Angus held up a hand to stop Raif from speaking.

"I don't want to know what it was.  Clan business is not my business.
My sister's kin fs, and from what I've heard this morning, Mace
Blackhail has a mind to be rid of one of them.  Now, by walking out on
an ambush, that kinsman has as good as sharpened the staves for his own
hang- ins Raif looked down.  One afternoon, two people.  Two people
telling him it was best if he left the clan.  His hand rose to weigh his
lore.

Clan was everything.

All he loved and knew was here.  Only eleven days ago he had sworn an
oath binding himself to Blackhail for a year and a day.  If Inigar Stoop
had refused to hear his oath, refused to warm the stone for his yea ring
then everything would be different.  He would have been just another lad
in the clan, not sworn to anyone or anything.  If he had left the battle
as Raif Sevrance, he would have been forgiven.  Raif could almost hear
Orwin Shank or Ballic the Red speaking up for him: The lad is young, un
sworn and untested.  Who can blame him for acting like a pelt-shorn
fool?

Instead he had left as a year man And no one would wear their jaw
finding excuses for a year man who had left the field before battle's
end. Disobeyingan order, quarreling with the clan chief, even wasting
arrows on a war wagon that was already alight, were offenses that could
be dismissed as heat-of-the- moment anger or over zealousness Clansmen
could and would forgive such misdeeds.  But for someone to leave the
field while the battle was still raging, ride away without word or
warning .  .

Raif closed his fist around his lore.  Angus was right: Mace Blackhail
would see him staved and skin-hung.  The truth of what happened, the
hunt and slaughter of the Bludd women and children, would be forgotten.
It had to be. Raif knew he would never mention it in his own defense. To
do so would dishonor Drey, Corbie Meese, Ballic the Red, and all the
rest.

He would not bring such shame upon his clan.

Better to let Mace Blackhail smooth over the incident; let him spin some
wolf tale where the Bludd women were armed and trying to escape, let
everyone who took part in the slaughter return home believing it, and
let the truth lie dead on the Bluddroad.

Raif felt a finger of ice tap his cheek.  Watcher of the Dead.  For the
first time in his life, he understood what it meant to be raven born.

The raven circled overhead, watched and waited, and then picked at the
lifeless remains.  Inigar Stoop had the truth of it in the guide house
He was not good for the clan.

The fifth Blackhail guide stone which had been quarried from the stone
fields south of Trance Vor and had stood within the roundhouse for three
hundred years, had split because of his actions.  The very stone itself
had told him to go.  Raif could not recall all the images the guide
stone had shown him, but one thing was certain: None of the places was
home.  The Blackhail clan hold harbored no bloodred lakes or forests of
silver blue trees.  The guide stone had told him to go and shown him the
way.

Raif shivered, suddenly colder than the day itself.  He looked up and
met eyes with Angus Lok.  Angus' large hearty face and bright coppery
eyes showed no signs of the temper he had displayed minutes earlier.

He looked worried now and kept glancing east, perhaps searching for
signs of the ambush party or to track the progress of the storm.

It had been five years since he had come here last.  Effie had been
little more than a baby at the time.  Raif tried to recall all he knew
about his uncle.  He had a wife and children, yet Raif found he had no
memory of where they lived or what they were called.  He didn't even
know how Angus made his living.  Raif knew Meg had loved him dearly, and
when she had been alive Angus had visited the roundhouse twice a year.
He always brought gifts, good ones, such as practice swords made from
petrified wood, chunks of green sea glass thumb rings carved from walrus
ivory, bowstrings woven from human hair, and little fur pouches made
from whole collared lemmings, just the right size for holding flints.

Raif smiled as he remembered how he and Drey had fought over the gifts.
One of them would always end up bleeding.  Tern would clout both of
them, and then Angus would miraculously produce a second identical
object from his pack.  After that Meg would scold everyone--Angus and
Tern included--and shoo them all away until they had found some good
sense.

Slowly Raif's smile faded.  He glanced back at the roundhouse.  Clan was
everything: home, memories, kin.  To leave would mean never coming back.
A man could not break an oath and desert his clan and ever expect to
return home.  A muscle pulled high in Raifs chest.  He loved his clan.

"So.  What do you say, lad?  Will you come with me to Spire Vanis?  I'm
not as young as I once was and could do with a young buck to watch my
back."

Yes, RaifSevrance.  Perhaps you had better step back, for all our sakes.

Raif closed his eyes and saw the guide stone leaking wound.  Opened his
eyes and saw Drey as he last glimpsed him: a hammer in his hand, saliva
rolling down his chin, mouth filled with words Mace Blackball had given
him.  No.  Raif stopped the memory before it burned itself more deeply
into his soul.  Instead he forced himself to remember Drey on the court
the morning they had left for the ambush.

Out of twenty-nine men, he had been the only one willing to come forward
and second his oath.  If I had such a brother .  I would not shame him
with my words or my deeds.

Raif pulled himself up to his full height, hand coming to rest on the
hilt of his half sword Inigar Stoop was right.  Stay, and no matter what
happened he would only bring shame to Drey.

The day grew darker and the badlands storm rolled south as Raif spoke
his reply to Angus Lok.

CHAPTER SEVENTEEN.

And Now We Must Brin; Them War Vaylo Bludd kept his stallion on a tight
rein in the snow.  The old horse's eyesight was failing, and despite its
advancing years it was still as mean as a pike.  Any man or horse who
drew too close could still find themselves the recipient of a swift kick
to the shins or balls courtesy of the stallion who answered to the name
of Dog Horse.

Vaylo Bludd had a soft spot in his heart for the old nag.  Although it
had long since willfully disregarded all its obedience training, it
still remembered two basic things: Dogs and small children were not to
be kicked.

Smiling, Vaylo revealed his black and aching teeth.  He'd had a terrible
time training the stallion.  It was a bad horse, everyone who saw it
said so, yet here they were eleven years later, the Dog Lord and his bad
horse, trotting through territory gained, as comfortable with each other
as a man and mount could be.

"Light the torches, man!  Light them!"

Ridingat the head of the party of twelve, Vaylo heard his sixth son
shout for light.  Hanro had done little but shout orders all day.

Vaylo wasn't quite sure whom he was trying to impress but swore to
himself that next time his sixth son called for torches, scout reports,
or wet halts he would make a point of riding Dog Horse close enough to
land a swift kick to his vitals.  Just because a man shouted orders, it
didn't mean he was leader of the party.  Hanro needed to learn that. All
his sons did.

Not liking to dwell on the weaknesses of his seven sons, Vaylo turned
his attention to his surroundings.  Late afternoon light was fading
rapidly, turning the snow underfoot blue and translucent like ice.

Ahead lay the Copper Hills, once key to the Dhoone's greatness and
military might.  Copper mined there had made Clan Dhoone rich, allowing
them to build the largest roundhouse in the clan- holds, dam rivers,
divert streams, and cart a mountain's worth of topsoil to the northern
fell fields converting barren land left by the retreating Hell's Tongue
glacier into prime livestock graze.

This was the first time Vaylo Bludd had been out riding in the
Dhoonehold since he had taken it, yet he had lime mind for the fine
grasses, the well-stocked trout lakes now sealed for the winter beneath
a crust of freshwater ice, or the herds of elk traveling southeast
through the blackstone forests, fat and glossy from two seasons of good
grazing on the badlands to the north.  All he had eyes for was the
Bluddroad.

His grandchildren were four days late.  The party had been set to leave
the Bluddhouse thirteen days back.  They should have arrived at Dhoone
by now. Drybone thought it likely that the party had met with bad
weather in the hills and had set the great war cart down on its trusses
and made camp until the worst of the storm had passed.  It sounded
likely, and Drybone was a cautious man--for a Trenchlander--yet Vaylo
couldn't shake off a feeling of unease.  His dogs were fussy and quick
to bite, and the scent of Sarga Veys hung around the Dhooneseat like
peat smoke.

In a way it had been a relief to leave the roundhouse.  Clan Dhoone was
not home.  Perhaps in time that would change, when his sons' wives and
their children arrived and claimed the hold as their own, but for now it
was a place of strange echoes and foreign shadows and large empty rooms
that no amount of birch fires could warm or light.  The place made his
teeth ache. To add to his troubles, four of his seven sons were living
there with him, fighting like foxes down a hole, scheming, bickering
over land and borders, and petting drunk as fools each night.  And each
and every one of them thought he could take the Dog Lord's place!

Vaylo Bludd spat out a wad of black curd.  The dogs trottingat the
stallion's hocks growled and snapped, shaking their heads and worrying
against their leather collars and hames.  They hated being spat at.

"Use your noses, then," he barked at them.

"You weren't brought here to plow snow.  Search.  Find."  Just to spite
them, he made the stallion rear and kick out its hooves.  Damn dogs!
They'd been traveling since before dawn, and the only scents they'd
caught were a lone broad back ewe, which they'd sent cowering up a slate
crag, and a raven-killed eider whose flesh was one-day froze.  Still,
even though Vaylo was inclined to be churlish with his dogs, he was
secretly quite relieved.

No scents meant no people, and no people meant no foreigners on the
road.

Indeed, the snow underfoot was as white and level as the head on a good
stout.  They had seen no sign of riders all day, and now that the light
was failing they wouldn't be able to spot either tracks or camp smoke.
Which was why the dogs needed to earn their keep.

The dogs, instantly recognizing the change in their master's
temperament, ran ahead of the party, bounding or pushing through the
snow, depending on the length of their legs.  Vaylo sat back in the
saddle, his ancient leathers creakingalong with his bones.  Stone Gods!
But it was cold!  Made him want to piss by the minute.  He remembered
once when he was young, riding from the Trenchland border to the
Bluddhouse in a single day, not stopping once to empty his bladder or
ease the chaff around his thighs.  Damn fool thing to do!

Probably damaged something internal along the way.

"Vaylo.  We can't ride for much longer.  Even with the torches lit."

duff Drybannock, better known as Drybone, fell in at Vaylo's side.

Even as he adjusted his horse's pace to match his chiefs, Vaylo could
hear the slap and patter of a second horse hurrying to catch up.

Vaylo didn't have to turn his head to know who the second rider would
be. Hanro wouldn't want to miss out on anything Drybone was likely to
say.

"We'll ride a while longer," Vaylo said, deliberately speaking loudly to
relieve the burning in his sixth son's ears.

"Give the dogs chance to spot a league or two."  As he spoke, he glanced
over at the man he trusted most in the clan.  Drybone was a great wall
of a man, with barricades for shoulders and skin the color of red clay.
He was not clan, not quite.  His mother had been a Trenchlander whore,
and his father. .  .  well, whore's bastards seldom knew just who their
fathers were.  When Drybone turned seven, his mother had sent him from
the Trenchlands to the Bluddhold and told him never to come back.  He
was not one of their kind, and he was not wanted anymore.  Vaylo sucked
on his old teeth.  He hated Trenchlanders.  What sort of woman would do
that to her child?  He still remembered Cluff being brought to the
Bluddhouse by massive, bulb-nosed Yagro Wike, who had caught the lad
tickling for trout in the Flow.  Thin as a fence post, he was, and
nearly wild with hunger and sunstroke.  When asked what he was doing on
Bludd territory, he had replied just the way his mother had taught him:
"I'm a Trenchborn bastard.  My father was a Bluddsman, and I'm searching
until I find him and make him pay his due in my rearing."

The lad had such a fierce look in his bright blue eyes and such a hard
sense of purpose within his small clenched fists that Vaylo had taken to
him on the spot.

"A bastard, eh?"  he'd said, ruffling the lad's night black hair.

"Well, you should fit in just fine here.  If no man speaks up to claim
you, then I'll take you as my own."

That was twenty-five years ago.  Drybone was a full-sworn clansman now
and the best swordsman in the clan, yet the bastard was still in him.

It never went away.  Vaylo knew that.  They understood each other, the
whore's bastard and the clan chiefs bastard.  They knew what it was to
give up their places at table, to fight a real or imagined insult until
their mouths filled with blood, and to watch the laughter and scolding
of legitimate children with envy so potent that it took something from
you as surely as a long day's hunt in the woods.  Vaylo had seen to it
that Drybone had fared better than he, but you could not shield a child
against the cruelty of other children.  And to try to was a mistake of a
different, greater kind.

Drybone had grown up well enough.  He was a good solid fiehter a hard
worker, and as vigilant of people's moods and motives as any bastard
ever was.  Vaylo knew his sons resented him, yet he didn't care one jot.
Let them fret over who would take over his chiefdom when he was dead and
gone.  Worry might make men of them yet.

"Balhagro would have pulled well off from the road to make camp,"

Drybone said, squinting into the darkness beyond the pale sheets of
torchlight.

"And would have thought to cover the wagon's tracks."

The Dog Lord nodded.  Drybone had a better opinion ofBalhagro's
initiative than he had, but that didn't mean he wasn't right.  Age had
brought Vaylo the slow realization that he would never know everything
about men and that even those he knew best were capable of surprising
him.  Balhagro was a steady man; that was why Vaylo had chosen him to
lead the moving party.  That and the fact that Balhagro's eldest
daughter had just produced his first grandchild, so the man knew just
how fiercely grandchildren must be guarded. "Aye,"

Vaylo said, suddenly hopeful that Drybone was right and Balhagro was the
sort of man to take extreme caution.

"We should have brought the hawks.  They'd be better than the dogs in
the snow.

"Your best pair were out last time I looked."  Drybone glanced at Vaylo,
a question in his sharp blue eyes.

Vaylo Bludd seldom lied.  He either spoke the truth or said nothing.

Looking at CluffDrybannock, he saw a man who took care that his
appearance was neither lesser nor greater than those around him.  His
braids were closely tied, but not excessively so; his furs and leathers
were of good quality, but he wore no sable, lynx, or stillborn calfskin.
The great sword at his waist was shorter than most swords given that
name, but it was polished to a high sheen and couched in the best lamb's
wool.  Vaylo didn't have to look around to know how his sixth son was
dressed in comparison.  Hanro was the dandy of the bunch.  Spent more
time oiling his braids than most women did plucking their leg hair.  His
crown was always shaved so smoothly that sometimes Vaylo wondered if he
wasn't just plain bald.

Kicking his stallion forward, Vaylo made a minute gesture to Drybone to
keep up, and the two rode ahead along the darkened road, leaving the
rest of the party to the light of the torches.  Hanro followed his
father for a while, trottingawkwardly in the middle of the two groups.
Then, obviously deciding he looked ridiculous attempting to listen in on
his father's conversation, he slipped back into the main party.  When
Vaylo heard his sixth son's voice cracking orders in the peeved tone of
a slighted dance partner, he knew he was free to speak.

Leaning in toward Drybone, he said,

"The pair should have homed by now, Dry.  I sent them to Duffs
Stovehouse to see if the stove master had given ale or warmth to Sarga
Veys."

Drybone took this information and thought on it, the muscles on his lean
beardless face giving nothingaway.

"Storms?"  Vaylo shook his head.

"Storms have been to the north.  Duffs is to the south."

"You think the birds were shot?"

"No.  I think they were stopped."

"By Veys?"

"He's a magic user.  Dry.  They can spell birds out of the sky."  The
word magic was enough to make Drybone sign to the Stone Gods, touching
both his eyelids and then the copper vial at his waist containing his
measure of powdered guide stone

"If he is a threat to the clan, say it, and I will take the south road
and tend his throat myself."

Hearing Drybone speak, Vaylo felt the muscles in his old heart tighten.
Drybone was not a man to make such statements lightly, and Vaylo knew he
meant what he said.

"I don't know if he's a threat or not.  Dry.  I don't even know what he
and his master want.  I just know I don't trust either of them.  And
when my two best hawks fail to home from a journey I've sent them on a
dozen times before, then it sets my mind to worrying."

It would have been easy then for Drybone to point out that Vaylo should
never have accepted Sarga Veys' offer of help in the first place, yet if
the thought was on his mind, he didn't speak it.  Vaylo was grateful for
that.  He needed no reminder of his mistakes.  Living with them was
penalty enough.

"You think Sarga Veys met with someone at Duffs?"

"I think it's possible.  The morning he visited the Dhoonehouse he was
pokingaround, asking questions of the stable hands and pot boys.  He's a
sly one, that Veys.  I don't trust any man whose jaw is as smooth as his
arse."

"Did he ask for anything in return for his master's help with the Dhoone
raid?"

Vaylo looked at Drybone.  It was a bold question he asked.  Many
Bluddsmen knew that something had happened the night of the Dhoone raid
to give them an unnatural advantage; fewer knew that their clan chief
had arranged it; and fewer still knew whom he had arranged it with. None
knew the terms of the deal.  Now Drybone was asking for that confidence.

Perhaps it was the darkness and quiet along the Bluddroad, or the
thought that his grandchildren could be out somewhere in these hills,
freezingand hungry, their wagon mired in thick snow, their fuel running
low, but for some reason Vaylo wanted to speak.  He had been the Dog
Lord for over thirty years, and at no time during his tenure could he
remember feeling so uncertain about the future.  All his life he had
taken what he wanted.  Now he feared the Stone Gods wanted it back.

Keeping his voice low and his left hand resting on his guide stone
pouch, he said,

"Veys and his master are up to some kind of doggery Dry.  When they
first came to me six months back, they said they wanted nothing in
return for their help.  Said the clan holds needed to be united under
one firm leader, and that I, as chief of the mightiest of the clans, was
just the one to do it. Veys swore his master would never ask for
anything in return.  And to this day he hasn't.  Yet I know in my gut it
isn't right.  I have a suspicion I'm being used, but can't for the life
of me work out how."  Drybone's expression never faltered as his chief
spoke.  If he was shocked, angered, or disappointed, he did not show it.
After takinga moment to correct his gelding's path, he said,

"Then we must be watchful, you and I.  All our actions from now on must
be well thought, and our priority must be to secure the Dhoonehold and
prepare for an unknown threat from outside."

Reaching over, Vaylo clasped Drybone's arm.  They were bastards
together, and they knew what it was to defend their possessions against
those seeking to take them away.  Just knowing he had Drybone's support
was enough to set his mind at ease.

As Vaylo's eyes met Drybone's and recognized and acknowledged the
loyalty there, a wolf howl broke through the glassy stillness of the
night.  Keen and hard, it drove through Vaylo's mind like a stave
through his heart.  The hairs on the back of his neck bristled, and deep
within his stomach the remains of his last meal turned to lead.

The wolf dog.  Even as he took his next breath, he heard the other dogs
yippingand barkingas they rushed toward the call.  Swinging his great
weight around in the saddle, Vaylo followed the wolf dog's cry with his
eyes.  It came from the north, on the wooded slope that lay above the
road.  Without pausing to give orders or finish his business with
Drybone, Vaylo kicked his old stallion into a canter.

He followed the road for as long as he could, his eyes aching with the
strain of holdinga path in the darkness.  The snow reached the
stallion's fetlocks, and great clouds of blue crystals shot into Vaylo's
face as he rode.  Dimly he was aware of the rest of the party following,
but he had no mind for them. The boiled-leather body armor that
stretched across his chest felt as tight and constrictingas a corset,
and Vaylo swore curses to the man who had buckled it.  The wolf dog's
howls made him mad with fear.  Three years he had owned that beast, yet
he had never once heard such a sound from its throat.

As he took the slope, a pair of dogs sprang forward, frothingand
howlingand throwing their heads from side to side, eager to lead the
way.  Vaylo spoke words to the stallion, and the old beast allowed the
dogs to guide him.

Limber pines, their spines bent by the weight of newly fallen snow,
shivered like caged animals as he passed.  Saplings spilled their loads
as the stallion brushed against them, snow hitting the earth like fallen
fruit.  The exposed pine needles glistened with protective resin,
scenting the air with the smell of winter and ice.  The cold made
Vaylo's eyes water, and he wiped tears away with fingers encased in
dog's-hide gloves.  The fur around his collar was stiff with breath ice,
and his woolen cloak pulled at his throat, its fibers heavy with massed
snow.

The dogs led the stallion along a cut bank where runoff flowed in
springand through dense clusters of black fir and stone pines.  Vaylo
thought he detected an unevenness in the snow underfoot, but he couldn't
be sure if it was due to tracks lying beneath the surface or uneven
ground.  His heart felt too big in his chest, as if some unknown disease
had enlarged and distended it, causing chamber walls to thicken and
muscle to bloat.  He could hardly breathe.  Abruptly the dogs separated,
allowing the stallion to step ahead of them into a gently sloped
clearing high above the road.  The wolf dog, with its thick-muscled neck
and metal-colored snout, stood in the center and howled one last time as
its master approached.  Vaylo slid from his horse, letting the reins
fall slack over the stallion's neck.  Behind him the other dogs waited,
their yelps growing increasingly softer until there was no sound at all.
The wolf dog's eyes were two coals burning in the darkness.  Vaylo
stepped toward them, knowingas he did so that he would find nothing
good.  He was the Dog Lord, and it had been many years since he had last
fooled himself with false hope.

We are Clan Bludd, chosen by the Stone Gods to guard their borders.

Death is our companion.  A hard life long lived is our reward.  The
Bludd boast echoed in the back of Vaylo's throat.  Words that had been
said so many times over so many centuries that their truth had been
deadened by layers of callused skin.  Vaylo did not want to think on
their meaning.  Not tonight.

Bones cracking, furs shedding ice, he stepped toward the wolf dog.

The dog shrank as he approached, crouching on all fours and lowering its
belly to the ground.  A soft whine vibrated deep within its throat, and
it began to lick and snuffle at something that stuck out from the snow.

Vaylo fell to his knees.  Lashing out violently, he sent the wolf dog
away. Speaking words harsher than he had ever spoken before, he made
sure it would not return for the rest of the night.  Oblivious of the
creature's slow, reluctant withdrawal and the thin, almost human cries
it made as it left, Vaylo stripped off his gloves and thrust his bare
hands into the snow.

He dug until his fingers turned blue and his skin cracked and blood
rolled over flesh he could no longer feel.  He dug until his leather
cuffs froze solid and his knuckles were bared to the bone and snow
driven deep beneath his fingernails was ground into lenses of ice.  He
dug until his hands and wrists swelled with frostbite, blood ceased
flowing to his fingers, and flesh died.  Others came and offered help,
but he would let no one near him.  Light was brought, words were spoken,
but all he had mind for was digging his granddaughter's body from the
snow.

Nine, she was.  The fiercest little thing that had ever worn a braid on
the Bluddhold.  She beat all the boys her age at swordplay, and she
fought hard and dirty, and Vaylo still had the sore spots to prove it.
Just before he'd left, she'd jumped him in the storeroom and stuck him
in the knee with her older brother's training sword.  Vaylo smiled as he
remembered her wild, triumphant giggling.  That girl, he thought.  That
girl is a Bluddsman through and through.

Her eyes were closed, but her mouth was open and full of snow.  The
hammer blow that killed her had not drawn blood.  As Vaylo dug and
scraped and freed her body from the snow, he spoke words, scolding her
for playing in the snow. What had Granda always told her?  Never play in
the snow in unknown woods.

When finally she was free, he tugged the cloak from his back, wrapped
her tightly, and carried her to where Dog Horse could watch over her.

He never kicked children; she would be safe with him.

That done, he went back to the snow and dug again.

It took him all night to free his grandchildren.  Others worked on the
women, and more still worked on the road, digging out the men who had
fought to save the party.  Vaylo paid them little heed.  His
grandchildren were cold, and they needed their Granda to warm them, and
he couldn't stop until he had lifted each tiny body from the snow.

Dawn came, bringing light that was not welcome and a new day that was
wanted even less.  Clouds smothered the sky.  The snow turned pearly and
gray, the color of uncooked seal flesh.  The pines around the clearing
were perfectly still.

"The Sull did not do this."

Vaylo looked up from where he was crouched by the body of his newest
grandchild, a baby boy no more than ten months old.  Dry- bone stood
above him, his face dark with grief.

"The Sull would never kill children."

Vaylo nodded.  He knew why it was important for Drybone to speak: He was
halfTrenchlander, and the Trenchlanders were part Sull.  Turning back to
the frozen body of his grandson, Vaylo began to brush the ice from the
child's fine black hair.

"Clan Blackhail did this," he murmured.

"And now we must bring them war."

Somewhere many leagues to the west, the wolf dog began to howl.

CHAPTER EIGHTEEN.

Leaving Home the and Rama came to see them off.  As Raif held his
sister, pushed his cheeks against her soft, beautiful hair, he was aware
of something moving in the darkened hallway beyond the roundhouse door.
Wooden boards creaked, and a slight form slipped into the cave of
shadows that existed beneath the stairs.

"That's just Nellie Moss," Erne said without lookingaround.

"She's always following Raina about.  One day she'll end up dead in the
snow."

Raif pulled back from Effie so he could look at her face.  Huge blue
eyes, the color of the sky at midnight, regarded him with a level gaze.

"What do you mean, Effie?  Why will Nellie Moss end up dead?"

Effie shrugged.  The russet-colored dress she wore was woven from heavy
goat's wool and made her look like a doll dressed in grown-up clothes.

"I don't know.  She'll just be dead, that's all."  Oh, gods.

Raif rocked his sister against his chest.  She was such a small
thing--too small for her age.  When had she learned to speak of death so
calmly?

Gently he set her down on her feet.  A few strands of hair had fallen
over her eyes, and he took a moment to push them back.  He had to
believe she would be better off without him.  He had to.  "Effie will be
safe with me and Anwyn," Raina said, taking hold of Effie's arm and
leading her away.

"And Drey will be back today or tomorrow, and you know how much he loves
her."

Raif did not speak.

Angus touched his arm.

"Come on.  Dawn's cracking.  We'd best be on our way."  With that, he
led Moose and his own horse, a muscular bay with clever eyes, across the
court. A light snow was falling, and Angus' hood was up.  The fur around
the hood was dark and glossy, and Raif could not tell what animal it
came from.

Raif turned to face EfFie and Raina Blackhail one last time.  Raina had
worked through the night to get supplies together for the journey south.
She hadn't once asked why he was leaving, but she knew about the guide
stone and had guessed that something other than a battle well fought had
taken place on the Bluddroad.  Like Inigar Stoop, she had refused to
hear the details.  Raif didn't know why she was going out other way to
help him.  It might be that Ini- gar had told her he was bad for the
clan.  Yet somehow Raif doubted that.  Raina Blackhail wasn't the kind
of woman to act on someone else's words.

Yet she had married Mace Blackhail that same day he had been made chief,
with Dagro less than forty days dead.  According to Anwyn, the ceremony
had been short and joyless, and not one sworn clansman had come forth to
dance above the swords.  Raina herself had retired to the guide house
straight after, and no one, not even Inigar, had been able to persuade
her to come out and eat at her own bride's feast.

Anwyn said that Mace had been in a fury and would have broken down the
door if the thought of missing the ambush hadn't pulled him away.

Raif reached for the usual anger, but it wasn't there.  Mace Blackhail
had won.  He had everything: the clan, the clan chiefs wife, a
successful ambush to boast of when he returned.  All those who had
questioned his leadership were either dead, muzzled, or gone.  "I will
speak to Drey on your behalf," Raina said, breaking into his thoughts.

"My husband's voice won't be the only one he heeds."  She met Raifs
gaze, and in that instant he knew the real reason she had married Mace
Blackhail.

Strangely, it made it easier for him to go.  If she could marry a man
she hated just to guard over the clan, then surely he could do this for
Drey?  Quietly he spoke his last words to Effie and then walked the
short distance to where Angus Lok was waiting with his horse.

When he was mounted and ready in the saddle, the reins couched in the
split in his thick dogs-hide gloves, he spun his horse to face south.

He did not look at Effie or the roundhouse again.

You are not good for this clan, RaifSevrance.

Without another word, Raif kicked Moose hard and rode away.  Angus Lok
caught up with him an hour later as Moose worked his way through the old
snow on the outskirts of the graze.  Raif guessed Angus had held back to
talk privately with Raina, but he wasted no thoughts on what matters had
passed between the two.  He concentrated only on the way ahead.

Dawn was a slow process.  Light came, but it had no direction or visible
source.  The ground snow stripped shadows of their depth, and the
distance to the sandstone ridge and taiga beyond was hard to judge. Raif
had hunted in the great pine forest more times that he could count. When
he was a child he had imagined it went on forever; in all the rangings
he had been on, he had never once made it to the other side.

Angus rode in silence.  After an hour or so he spoke a word to the bay
and took the lead.  Guiding them down to the base of the ridge, he
followed a hunting track Raif had little knowledge of or feel for.

Clansmen seldom took the ridge to the east, preferring to walk their
horses up the more gentle inclines to the west.  The snow was thinner
here, and Moose stepped on hard ground for the first time all day.

Young hemlocks and stone pines glistened with rime ice like bodies
emerging from water.  Even with their outer bark and needles hard froze,
their sharp, resinous smell still spored the air.  Raif kept an iron
grip on his thoughts, blocking out everything but the little needed to
get by.

Hours passed.  The temperature rose along with the light.  Ptarmigan
shrieked from the cover of snow-laden ground birch, and far in the
distance a black-tailed deer brayed like a mule.

"That's a good horse you have there."

Raif's mind was so tightly locked on the many small adjustments
necessary for riding up a rocky slope, it took him a long moment to
realize that Angus had spoken.  Glancing up, he saw Angus had pulled
back so the bay was almost alongside Moose.  Obviously Angus was well
used to travel: Every part of his body was oiled, bound, waxed, hooded,
and insulated against the cold.  His face alone boasted separate areas
of beeswax, elk fat, and neat's-foot oil. Seeing where Raifs gaze
lingered, Angus grinned.

"My wife would have me heated in a dry pan and then trodden to death by
donkeys if I let anything happen to this handsome face."

Raifmade a smile.  He didn't want to talk.

"" Course, when she sees you, I'm counting on her turninga blind eye to
the odd broken vein.  She should let me live .  as long as I don't lose
half a nose to the 'bite.  "

Even as he realized it was Angus' intention to get him talking by any
means he could, Raif couldn't help but be interested in what he said.

He knew almost nothing about his uncle's family.  Angus kept all the
details close.

"We're going to your home?"  He felt like a traitor as he spoke.

If Angus Lok was pleased that Raif had spoken, he did not show it,
merely concentrated on keeping the bay's coffin bones clear of the
rocks.

"Perhaps, when my business in the south is done.  It's been a long time
since my wife last saw you and Drey, and she's never once set eyes on
Effie.  She'd skewer my ears if she knew I had you with me and didn't
bring you home. Right fierce, she is.  Especially in the cold months."

Drey.  How long would it take him to crush his brother's swear stone to
dust? Raif heard his voice say,

"I don't remember your wife ever coming to visit the roundhouse."

"Aye, lad, well you wouldn't.  Wee bairn, you were.  Drey was still in
his pelts.  Had the meatiest little calves I've ever seen on a boy his
age.  Knew how to kick with them, too--just like his da."  Angus Lok
looked up.  Bits of reddish blond stubble had already grown through the
lard smeared on his chin, giving his face the fierce look of a stinging
fish.  His eyes were a different matter, shifting color from copper to
dark amber as quickly as if pigment had been poured into his irises.

"It's for the best, you know.  Effie and Drey will get by without you.
Good people are watching out for them, don't forget that.  Mace
Blackhail is just one man.  He might lead the clan, but he isn't the
clan.  Men and women like Corbie Meese, Anwyn Bird, and Orwin Shank are
the clan.  They will follow Mace only so far."  Raif wanted to believe
what Angus said, but Angus hadn't been party to the ambush on the
Bluddroad.  He didn't know what good people were capable of when a man
like Mace Blackhail stood behind them.  In the short time Angus had
spent with the clan, he had uncovered a great deal of its business from
the private conversations he'd had with Raina, Orwin Shank, and others,
but he didn't know Mace Blackhail.  Raif set his lips in a hard line,
tasting the frost that had formed there.  No one but he knew the Wolf.

Angus said no more on the subject.  Instead he concentrated on guiding
the horses up the slope.  The sandstone cliffs were slick with ice.

Underground streams forced water through the soft, porous rock,
creatinga breaking ground of loose gravel and split stones.  Ferns and
bladder grass lashed at the horses' cannons as they climbed, and great
beds of frozen moss made it difficult for even the bay to keep his
footing.  Angus dismounted and led the bay, and after a few minutes Raif
did likewise.

In the three hours they had been traveling, Raif had seen no sign of
Angus' incoming path.  Snow had been light for the past day, and up
within the protected folds of the ridge wall there was little coverage,
so Raif had expected to see some indication--flattened grass, broken
ice, horse tracks--that his uncle had traveled this way less than two
days earlier.  He looked and looked, but there was nothing.  As they
crested the rise and Raif saw nothing but level snow stretching out
toward the great black body of the taiga, he drew level with Angus and
said,

"Why aren't we taking the same route out of the clan hold as you took
coming in?"

Angus Lok's eyes shifted color for the second time that day, and Raif
saw tiny flecks of green in the irises he had not noticed before.

Pulling back his hood, he said,

"You've got a good eye on you, lad."

Raif took out a shammy and began cleaning ice and mucus from Moose's
nostrils as he waited for his uncle to say more.  Angus turned out his
hood to air it, then took his rabbit flask from his pack.  He drank a
good portion.  When he was done he did not offer the flask to Raif.

"Ranging is my business.  I've traveled the Territories for twenty years
and it's my wont never to take the same route twice in a season " Angus
smiled, showing good straight teeth.  "" Course, me being me, 1 took the
easy way in, so now we're stuck taking the bastard's way out.

I'm always doing that, lad.  You'll get used to it given n time.

Raif felt the force of his uncle's charm and goodwill working to settle
his mind.  Before he'd had chance to frame a reply, Angus spoke to
change the subject.

"What say I take out some of those calf livers Anwyn bled until they
were dry as bone and then boiled until they were boot leather, and eat
them in the saddle?  I'd like to get to the pines before next snow."  He
squinted into the dead whiteness of the sky.

"Looks as if we're in for some bad weather before dark.  What do you
think?" Raif shrugged, letting the matter drop.  His uncle's evasions
were more telling than any straight answer.  Just a couple of sentences
and Angus Lok had put the old subject to a quiet death while blithely
introducingat least another two to block the way back.  It was a clever
feat, and one Raif made a mental note not to forget.  As he put his boot
in the stirrup to mount Moose, the gelding turned and Raif was forced to
swing round to keep his footing. Abruptly he found himself staring back
over the ridge toward the roundhouse. He wasn't prepared for it.  All
day and he had never once looked back. Muscles in his chest tightened.

The round, snow-covered roof of the roundhouse was clearly identifiable,
floating within the moat of cleared ground that was the court.
Smokestacks showed up as black rings against the white roof, and the
steam and soot they belched looked like fumes venting from an
underground fault.  Dark dots moving through the graze told of a hunt
party out to shoot wild boar, ptarmigan, and deer.  Raif strained to
hear the yelps of the setters.  When his ears finally picked up the
high, familiar braying, he suddenly wished he hadn't heard it and
turned, He made a lot of noise settling himself in the saddle and
kicking Moose forward.  When that wasn't enough, he spoke, saying the
first thing that came into his mind.

"How is your daughter?  Is she wed yet?"

Angus had also mounted and was now sitting in the saddle, chewing on a
liver. He seemed glad of an excuse to spit it out.

"Cassy's not wed.  No."  He was silent a moment, his face thoughtful.
After breaking the bay gently into the knee-high snow, he said, ""
Course, you wouldn't know about the other two, would you?  There's Beth
now--my second girl--and my little one, Maribel.  Though call her that
and she won't know who you're talking to.  Doesn't even know her own
name.

Little Moo she is, and Little Moo she'll stay.  " Angus smiled softly to
himself.

"Can't think what the young men will make of it when time comes for
courting."

Fearing silence just then, Raifsaid,

"Tern said you live near Ille Glaive."

"Aye, that we do.  Couple of days away, nothing more."  Angus swung
around in the saddle and unhooked his bow case from the bay's hip strap

"Here," he said, holding it out for Raifto take.

"You carry it for a while.  I see you haven't one of your own, and it
would be a shame to waste the only bow in the party on the man who's
least able to use it."

Raiftook the bow automatically, even though he knew his uncle was being
modest.  Tern was fond of telling the story of how Angus had once shot a
wild boar through goose grass at two hundred paces.

"Twilight, it was," Tern had said.

"And even the shadows had shadows."

Only when Raif had stripped off his outer gloves and was busy with dog
hooks, fastening the bow case to Moose's leather wear did he realize
that Angus had changed the subject yet again.  "Orwin Shank said that on
the morning the party formed for the ambush, you returned to the
roundhouse with a dozen heart-killed beasts.  Quite a haul for a night's
work.  Tern must have been a good teacher."

"He was."

Ignoring the hostile tone of Raifs voice, Angus carried on.

"I knew a man once who could heart-kill any beast he set his sights on.
He could even do it in the dark.  We shared a season's hunting together
many years back now.  Whenever we made camp, I'd sit around the cook
fire facing in, and he'd sit facing out, bow on his lap bow ring on his
finger, watching the darkness for game.  Sooner or later some poor
possum or shoat would always draw close to investigate the fire and the
smell.  That was when Mors would take them, clean as if it were day."

Angus put his hand on his chest.

"Never saw as much as a cleft foot or a red eye myself, and I'd sit by
that fire thinking the man I'd chosen to camp with was as mad as a dog
with a stick in its eye.  Yet off he'd go, trekking into the darkness,
and sure enough five minutes later we'd have fresh kill to roast.  Took
me quite a while to get accustomed to it, I can tell.  And just between
you and me heart killed possum tastes like shit."

Raif smiled.

Angus grinned, his eyes turning coppery again.

"I used to say to him, Mors, can't you hit them in the head or
something? and he'd say, No.

Only the heart.  "

The quick, appraising look Angus gave him as he spoke sobered Raif
completely.

"Who was this Mors?"

"Oh Mors is still alive.  Though he's a bit different now than he was
twenty years ago.  Who knows, one day you may meet him."  Angus was
silent as he guided the bay through a drift of snow that reached to the
gelding's chest. When they were free of the incline, he said,

"I

asked Mors once if he could kill men the same way as he killed beasts.
"

"And?"

"Said it wasn't the same.  He'd tried, but couldn't do it."  Inside his
fox hood, Raifs neck and cheeks flushed hot.  He saw the Bludd spearman
tearing flesh from Rory Cleet's thigh, remembered finding the man's
heart in his sights.  .  then shooting him dead.

Heart-killed.  Suddenly feelingas if he couldn't breathe, Raif pushed
back the fox hood.  All the sickness and weakness that had seized him
after the killing came back with such clarity it was like feeling it
over again, here, on the taiga's edge.

"Here.  Drink this."

Raif looked up.  Angus Lok was holding out his flask.  Raif shook his
head. How long had it been since he'd torn back his hood?  Surely only a
moment? Yet Angus had had enough time to find and uncork his flask.

Shrugging off Raifs refusal, Angus took a swig from the flask himself.
Smiling fondly at the flask as he corked it, he said,

"We'll rest a bit once we're under cover of the trees.  Feed the horses.
The snow in the forest should be light enough for us to make a fair pace
before dark."

This time Raif was grateful for the change in subject.  His heart was
racing, and the taste of metal leaked through his mouth like blood from
a sliced gum. Although he didn't much feel like it, he forced himself to
speak.

"Will we travel north through the taiga until we reach Black Spill?"

Angus shook his head.

"No.  We'll head north a bit, then east.  There's a few places I mean to
visit along the way."

 "Stovehouses?"

"Aye.  I have a habit of running out of good liquor in the most
inconvenient of places, so I never miss the chance to top my load.

Besides, the stove master wife at Duffs has a way with needle and
thread. And Darra would have my eyeballs for chewing curd if I passed
that close and didn't bring her back a length of cloth.  " Raif nodded,
but not lightly. Stovehouses were the backbone of the clan holds Any
mud-and-hide mound, felt-covered dugout, log cabin, or ancient barn
could be named one.  All a stove house needed was a stove.  Some of the
larger ones like Duff's were more like inns, with a stove master to keep
the stove lit day and night, cots to sleep on, hot food, warm ale, and
stalls to box the horses.  Others were little more than deserted shacks,
their walls plugged with wax against the wind, their stoves cold, a cord
of logs stacked in the corner, and dried food packed high in the
rafters, out of reach of bears.  All clansmen traveling from one clan
hold to another used them.

They were a basic necessity in a land where storms could roll from the
Great Want in less time than it took to skin an elk.  Stovehouses were
no-man's-land.  Any man or woman from any clan had right of refuge in
every stove house in the clan holds Wars, border disputes, clan feuds,
and hunting rivalries were all set aside once a clansman stepped within
shadow of a stove.

Stove laws were sacred in the clan holds and although many legendary
fights and battles had taken place in the woods and balds directly
surrounding the great stove houses no one ever bared weapons inside.

To do so would bring shame and condemnation upon oneself and one's clan.

As he rode through the thick, powdery snow, Raif worked out who he would
be likely to meet at Duff's.  His mood darkened.  Any number of clansmen
could be there, hunting by day in the winter game runs east of the
taiga, warming themselves around the great copper stove shaped like a
brewer's vat at night.

And then there would be Bluddsmen.

Raif felt for his raven lore for the first time that day, turning it in
his hand like a game piece.  He didn't want to think about what would
happen between Bluddsmen and Hailsmen once news of the Bluddroad slaying
leaked out. Stove laws would be tested to breaking then.

"Have you got that bow of mine braced and ready?"  Angus called from
ahead.

"I'll be expectinga pair of ice hares in payment for the lending.  Fat
ones, mind.  Not some skinny albino rats."  Raif looked over Angus'
shoulder to the black wedge of forest they were about to enter.  By
turns scattered, dense, fire leveled, and wind stunted, the taiga
stretched for hundreds of leagues south and west of the clan hold A
stand of old, perfectly straight black spruce formed the forest's north
wall, and Raif was aware of light and wind levels droppingas he
approached.  It was like enteringa building.  The snow underfoot became
firmer and more shallow with each step.  Noises fell away. Overhead, the
limbs of the spruces created a ceiling of nursed snow.

Raif swallowed as he took the bow from its case.  He couldn't get the
taste of metal out of his mouth.

Angus slowed the pace.  After a few minutes he looked over his shoulder.

"What say we stop and nosebag the horses?"

Raif shook his head.  He didn't want to stop.  Already he was searching
for game.  It was a reflex action of all clansmen upon entering the
taiga, but none more so than those who chose the bow as their first
weapon.  Even as he hated himself for it, part of him welcomed the
relief.  Hunting meant not having to think.

Time passed.  Angus was silent, his hood pulled close to his face.  The
taiga deepened, revealing narrow corridors leading to frozen ponds,
standing stones ringed with crow berries and clearings bedded with ice
grass and touch-me-nots.  The smell of pitch settled in Raifs clothing
like dust as he watched the ground for game.

A ptarmigan, fat as a loaf of bread, flew up through the spruces,
dislodging snow as its wings clipped pine needles.  Raif drew his bow,
sighted the bird, then called it to him.  Blood warmth flooded his
mouth.  The rapid beat of the ptarmigan's heart pulsed like a vein in
his cheek.  The bird was young, strong, its belly full of crow- berries
and soft willow leaves.  Raif breathed once on the bowstring to warm it
and then let the arrow fly.

A soft thuc sounded, then the arrow hit the ptarmigan with such force,
it knocked the bird from the sky.  Raif didn't have to see the body to
know that the arrowhead had found its heart.

"A pretty shot," Angus said.

Raif glanced down.  His uncle was watching him intently, his eyes the
color of old wood.

After a moment Angus turned his horse.

"Wait here.  I'll fetch the bird."

Spitting to clean his mouth, Raif watched his uncle slip through the
trees. Absently he ran a hand over the bow.  Made of a combination of
wood and horn, and tilled so smoothly that it was like touching glass,
the bow was unlike any other he had held before.  Silver and midnight
blue markings had been stamped deep into the riser, but Raif couldn't
work out how.

By the time Angus returned with the ptarmigan, Raif had shot two hares.
The first he saw clearly as it ran from the path of Angus' have The
second was crouched in a head of sagebrush, and Raiftold himself he had
seen it before he released the string.

"We'll eat well tonight," Angus said, pulling the shafts from the hares
and bagging them along with the bird.

"I can see it's going to be useful having you along, RaifSevrance."

Raif waited for his uncle to bring up the fact that all three creatures
had been heart-killed, yet his uncle said nothing, merely busied himself
with cleaning the arrow shafts before the blood froze.

They fastened feedbags on the horses and rode until dark.  Angus led
them to a deserted stove house that Raif thought only clansmen knew of.
Dug out of sandstone and clay, the stove house was little more than a
hole in the ground.  Hidden in the center of an island of stone pines,
the entrance was covered by a slab of slate as big as a wagon wheel.
Raif worked to clear the moss and root- wood from around the edges as
Angus took his pickax to a nearby spawning pond and broke out some
freshwater ice.

Raif worked himself hard, pushingaside the entrance slab by himself
rather than waiting for Angus to lend a hand.  When that was done, his
muscles were achingand his inner woolens were soaked with sweat.  It
wasn't enough. Taking the hand ax from his pack, he went to cut wood.

Angus found him an hour later, his gloves and oilskin glued with sap,
pine needles stuck to his sleeves, veins in his chopping hand open and
bleeding, and the yellow bruises of imminent frostbite coloring his
skin.  A pile of logs, cut almost to splinters, was heaped at his back.

"You've done enough now, lad," Angus said, taking the ax from him and
guiding him away.

"Come wi' your old uncle.  The stove's glowing like a warm heart, and
there's good food upon it, and you may not have your clan this night,
but you and I are kin."

Raif let himself be led to the stove house

Angus had done a good job of turning the clay-walled hollow into a place
filled with warmth and light.  A damp cloth was steamingagainst the
belly of the brass stove, and Angus took it and wrapped Raifs hands
closely to stop chilblains from forming.  Next he bit the cork from the
rabbit flask that had been cooling in a pot of snow.

"Drink," he said, and Raif did.  The alcohol was so cold it burned.

The stove house was tiny and low ceilinged.  Pine roots had broken
through the walls in some places, jutting out like bones from a
rain-worn grave. Raif sat on the ground in front of the stove and ate
and drank what Angus gave him.  The skin on the roast hares was black,
and it crackled as it broke, releasing hot juices and scalding steam.

The ptarmigan meat was rich and fatty.  Angus had stuffed it with wild
sage and roasted it in its feathers.

There was a lot of smoke.  The smoke hole was open, but the stove was
old and warped, and fumes and soot leaked from the stack.  Raif felt
numb.  He couldn't remember the last time he'd rested or slept.

"That bird was a beauty," Angus said, sucking on a wing bone.

"Daresay it would have been better for a plucking, but for the life of
me I hate pulling feathers."  He watched Raif through the smoke, his
large keen face now cleared of its protective oils.  Settingaside his
dish of bones, he said,

"When you shot the bird, did you taste or smell anything?"

Raif shook his head.

"Nothing coppery, like blood or metal?"

"No," Raif lied.

"Why do you ask?"

Angus shrugged.

"Because that's what happens when a man draws upon the old skills."

"Old skills?"

"Sorcery, some would call it.  I've never cared for the word myself.

Frightens people.  " A quick glance at Raif.

"Better to use the Sull name: rhaer'san, the old skills."

Hair on Raif's arms lifted at the mention of the Sull.  The Sull were
seldom named out loud.  The Trenchlanders, who lived on Sull lands and
were part Sull and who traded fur and lumber with the clan holds were
different. Clansmen often took their names in vain.  But the Sull.  no
clansman ever dealt with the Sull.  The great warriors of the Racklands,
with their silver letting knives, pale steel, recurve bows, and proud
locks wasted neither breath nor time on clan.  Raif tried to keep his
voice light.

"What are the signs that a man is using the old skills?"

"Well as I said, the one who draws it often tastes and smells metal.

He'll weaken, too.  His vision can blur, his stomach cramp, and often
he'll get pains in his head.  It all depends upon the level of power
drawn.  I saw a man fall from his horse once, just plain keeled over
into the mud.  It was a full week before he could stand on his own two
feet.  Drew too much, you see, tried to do something he had neither the
power nor the skill for. Nearly killed him.  "

Raif felt his cheeks burn.  He had come close to falling from his horse
after he had heart-killed the Bludd spearman.  "There was a time when
those who could draw upon the old skills were valued, when mortar
binding the Mountain Cities was white as snow, and the clan holds had
kings instead of chiefs. Indeed, you'll find some who'll tell you that
the masons who built Spire Vanis owed as much to the old skills as they
did to their chisels and lathes. A few will even swear that Founding
Quarterlords had more than a few drops of old blood running in their
veins."

"Old blood?"

Angus' eyes shifted color.

"It's just a term.  Old blood.  Old skills.

The two are one and the same.  "

It was an evasion, and Raif guessed Angus would work quickly to cover
it.  He was right.

'"Course in those days, it wasn't unheard of for clansmen to draw upon
the old skills.  Small things: healingand foretellingand the like.  It
wasn't until Hoggie Dhoone's time that the clan holds turned their backs
on sorcery."

"No clansman worth his lore would take part in anything unnatural."

"Is that so?"  Angus scratched his chin.

"And how do you suppose a clansman gets his lore?  Chance?  Fate?  Or
does the guide pluck straws from a hat?"

"He dreams."

"Aah.  That's it.  He dreams.  Nothing unnatural there, that's for
sure." Angus tilted his head one way and the other, making a great show
of thinking.

"And then there's the guide stone itself... I suppose each clansman
carries its powder with him at all times so he's never caught short of a
spot of mortar.  Must come in mighty useful those times when you're out
rangingand you see a poorly built wall.  A few cups of water, some fire
ash, and a handful of powdered guide stone and you'll have it re pointed
in no time."  Raif glowered at his uncle.

"We carry our guide stone with us because it's Heart of Clan.  It's what
we've always done."

Surprisingly, Angus nodded.

"Aye, lad, you're right.  It was wrong of me to bait you.  Can't help
myself sometimes--I'm wicked like that.  If Darra were here, she'd have
me out packing snow by now."  Standing, he fed the ptarmigan bones to
the stove.

Raif watched the flames shiver through the smoke hole.  His cheek and
fingers were throbbing where they had taken the frost, and a deep
weariness stole over his body like rising water.  He was annoyed at
Angus but too tired to make anything of it.

"Does anyone use the old skills today?"

Angus did not stop tending the stove, but something in his body changed
as Raif spoke.  Shrugging to the flames, he said,

"Some.  A few."

"In the city holds

"Aye, perhaps.  But it's frowned on there, just as it is in the clans.

The cities have their One God, and he's a jealous one at that.  Any
powers not of his making have long been forced into the shadows, their
time nearly past.  Hoggie Dhoone recognized that a thousand years ago,
when he drove all who used the old skills from the clan holds The One
God has long arms.  He lives within the Mountain Cities, but make no
mistake: His reach extends to the clans.  " " But we worship the Stone
Gods.  "

"Aye, and you've got the last of the great Clan Kings to thank for
that."

Raif ran a hand through his hair.  He didn't understand what Angus was
gettingat.

"Why do you keep mentioning Hoggie Dhoone?  He hated the cities and
their one jealous God.  His armies slew ten thousand city men at the
Battle of Stone Cairns.  He made the Bitter Hills his wall, swearing
that no man who was not a clansman would ever raise a roof beyond them.
He saved the clan- holds.  And he had no dealings with the One God."

Angus began packing the stove for the night, adding only the largest
chunks of firewood to the stack.

"Aye, you're right about Hoggie Dhoone: He did save the clan holds He
saw the cities for what they were.  He knew that given half a chance
they'd march their armies over the Bitter Hills and shatter clan guide
stones to dust.  He knew what they thought of the clan holds and its
nine gods.  Hoggie Dhoone was no fool.  He fought the cities with one
hand, and met them halfway with the other."

"Hoggie Dhoone never met anyone halfway."

"Did he not?"  Angus shrugged.

"So it's just coincidence that he began outlawing the old skills at the
same time the Mountain Cities did?

Not the act of a clever man who saw the way the world was turningand
chose to turn with, not against it.  "

"I don't understand."

"It's simple.  Hoggie Dhoone was not prepared to give up the Stone Gods.
He knew the Mountain Cities thought them cruel and barbaric, and he also
knew that the sort of fanatic wars that raged in the Soft Lands to the
south could easily break out in the North.  So rather than set himself
and his gods apart and risk the self-righteous might of the cities
falling upon him, he chose to run with the pack.

Everyone who used the old skills was exiled or hounded.  It was nothing
to him.  The Stone Gods have always been hard gods.  They're not known
for weeping over the dead.

"In one canny move, Hoggie Dhoone turned the Mountain Cities into his
allies. Oh, there were battles aplenty--you know that better than
me--but they were always over land, not religion.  Shared beliefs may be
a powerful thing.  But nothing quite binds like shared hatred."

Raif stared at Angus; he didn't know what to think.  Hoggie Dhoone was
the last of the great Clan Kings, and no one in the clan had ever told
his story quite like that.  It lessened him.

"If the Mountain Cities were as fanatical as you say, then why didn't
they go after the Sull?  Their gods are older than the clans'."

Angus closed the stove door, creating darkness.

"Because it suited them to strip land, not gods, from the Sull."

Raif closed his eyes.  He thought Angus might say more, but he didn't
and began settling himself down by the opposite wall.  Raif almost spoke
to break the silence.  Suddenly he didn't want to be alone with his
thoughts.  Time passed.  Angus' breathing grew shallow and regular, and
Raif imagined his uncle asleep.  How long before 1 sleep?  he wondered.
How long before the nightmares come?

CHAPTER NINETEEN.

Swinging from a Gibbet Ash held her breath, scrunched her face as tight
as it would go, and began to hack away at her hair.  She couldn't look.
Couldn't bear to see it fall to the snow.  Stupid, she told herself.
Vain, weak-minded, and stupid.  It was only hair.  It would grow back.
Still, she couldn't quite bring herself to cut it as short as she had
intended.  She tried, but her hands kept defying her, and the knife kept
sliding downward, and she didn't have the heart to fight it.

She had originally planned to cut it as short as a boy's, but that
decision was taken in the broad light of day, when decisions were easier
to make and keep.  Now, at midnight, sitting on an iron bench cleared of
snow in the Street of the Five Traitors in Almstown, hemmed in by
shadows, overhanging eaves, and mounds of black, shoveled slush, she
didn't much feel like doinganything.  And she was very much attached to
her hair--even if it wasn't curly and bright like Katia's.

Vain, weak-minded, stupid, Ash scolded herself again as she sawed the
blade through the last strands.  There.  Done it now.  Runninga hand
through her ragged, shoulder-length hair, she tested its new feel and
weight.  Her head felt uncommonly light, as if she'd drunk too much red
wine at supper.  Pale silver strands, long as snakes, curled in the snow
at her feet.  Kicking them with the toe of her boot, she told herself
they were nothing really, just a heap of old straw.

Hearing footsteps and thin jabs of laughter, Ash bent forward and
scooped up the hair, then folded it into the cloth bag tied at her
waist.  She could get good money for it on Shorn Lamb Street, but she
was no longer sure if selling it was a good idea.  She had heard the
talk in the city.  Everyone who was anyone was looking for a tall, slim
girl with long pale hair and no breasts.  Ash glanced down at her chest.
Slowly, little by little, that particular aspect of her description was
being rendered obsolete.  It was quite amazing how fast a body could
grow when it had a mind to.  Even when the body in question was being
fed nothing but goose grease and oats.

Ash concentrated on stayingas still and silent as she could until the
laughter and footsteps had passed.  Her rough wool cloak itched, and
things living within it crawled as slowly as things living in cloaks did
crawl on cold nights in early winter.  At least they weren't biters. Ash
supposed she should be grateful for that.

She had sold her old clothes the very same night she had broken free of
the fortress, before word of her escape had had chance to leak through
the city and everyone knew to be on the watch for a girl matching the
description of Penthero Iss' ward.  Her dress had been plain but of
excellent quality, and her calf-leather boots were the best to be bought
in the city.  The old bid wife who had purchased them had been happy to
give Ash a whole outfit in exchange, complete with a lined and hooded
cloak, thick wool leggings and mitts, a dress dyed a forgettable shade
of brown, and a stout pair of "whore's boots."

According to the bid wife the boots were named for whores because they
boasted soles so thick that a girl could walk the streets all day and
not feel the pinch.

Ash wondered about that.  Sometimes she caught men looking at her feet.
The toes were capped with a particularly bright strain of copper that
could be seen across a fair-size street.  Just this afternoon she had
worked charcoal and horse dung over the metal, hoping to ward off
speculative glances from men and ill-humored appraisals from other
girls.

The leather belt with a silver buckle that she had worn during the
escape had also been sold, and the three silver pieces she had haggled
from the bid wife had been enough to buy a loaf of oats and a sausage
skin full of goose drippings every morning for the past five days.  She
had one silver left.

At night she slept alongside beggars and street whores.  It was easy
really, watching people, seeing where they went and what they did Early
in the evening, even the poorest and sickest slid away to known dens to
sleep. Wedge-shaped spaces under stairs, sewers blocked with ice,
collapsed watch towers with makeshift roofs of elk hide disused roast
pits, abandoned outhouses and dry wells, burrows dug into the great
mounds of snow that built up along the city's south wall, and cracks in
the very city itself, leading downward to vaults of precision-cut stone
and warrens of crawl spaces, under- spaces, and sinkholes: Ash had seen
people slip into them all.

The first night had been the worst, after she had left the bid wife
stall with money in her hand and nowhere to go.  She didn't trust places
that were dark and deserted and had chosen to stay on noisy,
crowd-filled streets. Through the course of the night she had walked the
length of the city, across the great stone court known as the Square of
Sorrows, where Garath Lors had declared himself king before being cut
down by his brother's dark cloaks along the Spireway with its crumbling
stonework and rotted spikes; and down into the dim and slushy streets
ofAlmstown, where the soot from a thousand charcoal fires turned every
wall, roof, and walkway black.  Even the falling snow was black,
catching minute flecks of burned matter as it sailed toward the earth.

Ash thought Almstown was a kind of hell.  Katia had always spoken about
it with a sort of wistful affection, telling how you could buy whole
sides of bacon, steamingand ready to eat, warm your hands with mugs of
beer so hot that you could set them on the ground and melt snow, and
walk down any street and see dark- skinned women dressed in
cloth-of-gold hoods and thin-lipped assassins glittering with knives.

Ash tried, but she saw only the filth and the smoke and the open sores
on people's faces.  She had no money to buy bacon or beer, and the only
people she saw were prostitutes fighting with their pimps, pot boys
shoveling slush, charcoal burners tending their smoke fires, and tired
old men getting drunk.

No one trusted anyone.  Ash had learned quickly to keep her hands and
eyes to herself.  It didn't do to look too long at anyone or stand too
close to a man selling hot food or cold beer.

Still, Ash thought, rising from the bench and stepping into the street,
Almstown was a good place to get lost in.  No one cared about finding
the Surlord's ward.  There was money in it--Iss had offered a crow's
weight in gold for information leading to her capture--but the
inhabitants of Almstown didn't think for one moment that any fine lady
from Mask Fortress would ever find her way here.

Ash had heard people talkingabout it.  Women joked that they'd dye their
hair with lye, bandage their breasts, and go and claim the reward for
themselves. Men spoke in hushed voices, murmuringabout the Rive Watch,
forced searches, torchings, and how Marafice Eye had blinded a carcass
gutter for claiming, wrongly, that he had seen Asarhia March enter the
Bone Temple and ask the tall and silent priests for asylum.

Ash shivered.  Sometimes she wondered if Marafice Eye hadn't done such a
thing just so news of it would reach her and make her afraid.

Determined not to be afraid, she headed south through the butcher's
market and onto the paved streets beyond.  When the pale,
straight-as-arrow forms of the Horn and the Splinter drew her eyes, she
did not look away.  At this distance they were the only structures
within Mask Fortress that were visible.  Ash knew that all she had to do
was head north for a few streets to lose sight of the Horn, but she had
yet to find one street corner, alleyway, or ditch within the entire city
of Spire Vanis from which the Splinter couldn't be seen.

In a way it was a good thing.  All she had to do was look up into the
southern sky to see the reason why she had fled.

Before she pulled her gaze downward, she couldn't help but linger on the
sloping roofs, flickering watch towers, and hammered iron domes of the
southern skyline.  At the farthest point south lay Vaingate.

Vaingate.  The last built and least used of the four city gates.  Ash
didn't know how many hours she had spent imagining what it would feel
like to walk through the limestone arch and onto the mountainside
beyond.  Vaingate was her one connection with her mother the only thing
they shared.

Both of them had passed through that gate.

Ash took a breath and held it.  All her childhood dreams had begun with
her standing outside Vaingate.  She imagined finding the place where
she'd been abandoned, running her hands through the loose scree and dry
brush, and finding something that no one else had found before.  Some
bit of parchment, a rusted locket, a scrap of fabric, anything that she
could hold and say, This once belonged to my mother.

In her more elaborate dreams, she'd find something that told her who her
mother really was, and she'd search the city and find her, and her
mother would turn out to be warm and glowingand utterly good .  yet she
never had a face.  Ash smiled bitterly.  She saw the dreams for what
they were today.

There was no hidden marker waiting for her on Mount Slain.  Her mother
had set her down to die; she would have left nothing that could give her
away. It was a sin against the Maker to abandon a healthy child.

And even if she had dropped something--a hairpin or a ribbon or a bit of
lace from her dress--sixteen years of snow and floods would have washed
it clean away.

Ash continued to look south.  Even if she went there and found
something, there was no telling whom it had once belonged to.

Besides, it wasn't safe.  Vaingate was too close to Mask Fortress.  No
one but sheep drovers, hunt parties, holy men traveling to the Cloud
Shrine, and healers in search of mountain plants passed through.  She
would be spotted the moment she drew near the gate.

Somehow, despite everything, Ash found herself moving south.  Five days
had passed since she'd escaped--enough time for the Rive Watch to grow
bored and ease off the hunt.  They had a whole city to search.

How could they possibly watch over every street corner and marketplace?
I'll just get close enough to look.  It was midnight.  She could cross
the city and reach the gate before dawn.  As long as she stayed clear of
Mask Fortress and the watch towers, she'd be safe.

Gradually she increased her pace.  Walking with her head down and her
hand on her hood, she avoided all contact with strangers.  When she drew
close to the massive shantytown of animal hides, elk bones, and
ice-rotted timbers that had grown up along the city's west wall, she
altered her course to avoid it.  The smell of deer fat, dung smoke, and
thousands of unwashed bodies was enough to keep her away.  Even from a
safe distance, she could still see the massive circle of snow melt
caused by the heat and the filth.  The farther south she traveled, the
cleaner the city became.  Narrow streets gave way to wide causeways and
smoothly paved squares.  Brightly lit taverns and coarse houses were
replaced by limestone halls and tightly shuttered manses with bronze
doors.  Fewer prostitutes stood warming themselves by charcoal braziers,
and fewer drunks urinated against walls. Even the snow underfoot grew
lighter--not white exactly, but certainly gray.

It took Ash a full five minutes to walk past the unlit facade of the
Quarter Court, where the grange lords stood in judgment of all crimes
except treason. It had been built by the tenth Surlord Lewick Crieff,
Lord of the High Granges, whom everyone called the Halfking, and his
badge of a half-moon shiningabove the knife-edge peak of Mount Slain was
cut into every limestone cap, ledge, and corbel.  After checking to see
if anyone was watching, Ash stopped and rested her back against the
black, soot-encrusted stone.  She was growing tired, and tiny hobnails
in her whore's boots were cutting into her feet.  Ash cursed the bid
wife who had sold them to her, thought for a moment, then cursed all
whores as well.  She was beginning to wonder if heading for Vaingate had
been a good idea.

Ahead lay a vast cleared space surrounded by a circle of standing stones
known as the Dreading Ring.  Six gibbets stood in the center of the
circle, massive T-shaped timbers forming a dark scaffold against the
sky.  Justice was swift in Spire Vanis, and once a man or woman had been
convicted of a crime, he or she was marched straight from the Quarter
Court and punished in the stone circle for all the city to see.  No one
was ever hanged--the grange lord executioners were chosen for their
skills with knives, not rope--but the bodies were hauled up later to
feed the crows.

All but one gibbet was empty.  The small body that was roped there hung
like an empty sack.  A sharp burst of wind made the rope creak and set
the body swinging.

Ash edged back along the wall, suddenly unsure of herself.  Running away
had been a mistake.  She had nowhere to go, no one to help her no plans
beyond the need to survive.  Soon she'd run out of money .  .  .

then what?  She had no skills.  Her description was posted around the
city. Many of the brothers-in-the-watch knew her by sight.  Pushing back
her hood, she took a long hard look at the gibbets.  Her scalp was hot,
and sharp edges of newly cut hair prickled her skin.  She longed for the
safe enclosed space other chamber, for Katia's endless chatter, warm
baths, sweet food, and clothes without rough edges.  She wanted her old
life back.

Abruptly she pushed herself off from the wall.  She had made her choice
five days ago, and giving in because she was tired and her feet were
achingand she didn't like the look of the way ahead was stupid.

Stupid.  She would carry on walking.  She would go to Vaingate and see
the place where she was abandoned and then found.

Kaaw!  Kaaw!

Ash jumped as the shadow of a raven glided over her face.  Looking up,
she saw the great bird swoop down from the roof of the Quarter Court and
soar toward the gibbets.  As it entered the circle of ancient stones, it
rolled its wings, catchingan updrafr that lifted it almost vertically
alongside the occupied gibbet.  Hovering for a long moment, it jabbed
its bill into the face of the corpse and pecked out some bit of sinew
that snapped like a snake as it came free.  With the morsel held firmly
in its bill, the raven beat its wings and rose to the top of the gibbet.
Settled, it threw the strip of sinew into the air, caught it, and
gobbled it up.

With its throat muscles still working to push down its meal, the raven
swiveled its neck and looked at Ash.  Bobbing its head up and down, it
clucked and cooed like a mother hen.

Come.  Join me.  Good flesh.

Ash shivered.  Although she didn't much want to, she took a step
forward, then another.  The snow was sticky under her feet, streaked
with tar and spilled blood.  Moonlight poured into the stone circle,
running like liquid silver along the crossbeams of the gibbets.  The
wind dropped as she neared the center, and for the first time all night
she felt the cold.  The bird, black as the bricks at the back of a
hearth, fussed and cooed until it came to rest by the occupied gibbet.

The body was strung up by cordage as thick as a man's wrist.  Tarred
ropes wound between its legs, around its neck, and under its arms.  It
took Ash a moment to realize the body was naked, as the flesh was
stained dark by what might have been excrement or mud.  Crows had been
pecking for days, and the soft flesh of the belly had been opened and
the guts spilled.  The eyes were dark holes, picked clean.  Teeth roots
showed where lip and gum tissue had been torn away.  The head was shorn.

Ash swallowed softly.  It was a woman.  It hardly looked it, as the
breasts were gone and the genitals were obscured by a knot of rope and
clotted blood, but what was left of the waist and hips formed a slack
pouch of curves. Frightened, Ash gazed upon the face once more.

That was when she saw it.  A lock of hair caught in the rope.  Dark,
curly hair.

Promise to take me with you when you go.

Ash took a step back.  No .  Moonlight shifted, and shadows on the
corpse's face fell into place.

Ash saw the high curve of a cheek, the dimpled hollow of a chin.  Why,
you're wicked, miss.  Plain wicked!

Ash began shaking her head.  Her stomach churned and churned until she
thought she might be sick.  The corpse, the thing that was and wasn't
Katia, watched her with dead eyes as it swung upon its rope.  Katia!

Katia!  Katia!  The raven took to the air, beating its knife wings,
screaming and triumphant as it vanished into the night sky.  Ash did not
know how long she stood in the stone circle, facing Katia's corpse.  Not
long enough, a small voice told her.  If you stayed here forever, it
wouldn't be long enough.  When a gray sun began to rise in the east and
the city started to creak to life, she turned and fled north .  .  .
deserting the little maid one last time.

CHAPTER TWENTY.

Duff's hey rose before dawn and headed southeast.  High winds blew,
creatinga snowstorm from old frozen snow.  Raif pulled his fox hood over
his eyes and mouth so only his nose showed.  The small specks of taiga
he saw through the fur were all he needed to guide his horse.

The wind came from the north and blew at his back, and it seemed to push
him away from the clan hold

Angus took the lead, taking Raif along gullies and over frozen ponds,
finding trails long lost to the snow.  Neither he nor Raif spoke.  They
sat, hunched low on their horses, and suffered the battery of the wind.

Raifs bow hand was swollen, and the skin on his fingertips had begun to
shed. An ugly blister, dark and bloody as a kidney, had formed on the
heel of his hand.  Every time he grasped the reins to make an
adjustment, pain made him close his eyes.  Beneath the fox fur, his
mouth set in a grimace.  Well, that would teach him to go axing wood on
a night as cold as hell.

After six hours spent in darkness, dreaming violent unspeakable dreams,
the biting whiteness of the snowstorm and the mindless monotony of
riding through the taiga were a relief.  Raif had risen before Angus. He
had heated fat and stock from the ptarmigan in a small tin pot, and
while he was waiting for the steam to thin, he had made the only
decision he could.  Clan was behind him now; remembering it, longing for
it, believing that somehow in the future he would find a way back, were
things he could not allow himself.  He had fixed his own fate, and now
he must live with it.  He was no longer part of the clan.

He had thought long and hard about discarding his lore, of throwing it
in the iron stove along with the remainders of the last meal or taking
it outside and burying it in the snow.  But each time he grasped it in
his hand and pulled on the twine, he heard the old guide speak.

It's yours, RaifSevrance.  And one day you may be glad of it.  So
Raifkept it.  He rode, his thoughts sealed as deeply as cached meat, his
raven lore a cold bit of horn against his skin.  Haifa day passed with
no relief from the storm.  The snow, rolled to hard pellets by the wind,
rattled like hailstones against the trunks of stone pines.

Great clumps of snow dropped from overhead branches, dislodged by the
violent push and pull of the air.  Raif did not hunt.  His right hand
wept pus and blood into his mitt, and the storm created a whiteout.

Yet almost against his will he found himself searching for game.

Even on a day like this living things were out in the forest.  A weasel,
white and sleek as a dish of milk, watched Raif's passing from the cover
of a paper birch.  An ice hare popped its head out of its burrow, its
cheeks puffingas it drew breath.  In the overhang above a frozen stream,
a snag cat broke shrew bones with a single snap of its jaw.  Raif was
aware of all these things, swore he saw them, yet when he peered through
his fox hood, little more than the white haze of snow on the move met
his eyes.

Darkness came early.  The wind died with the light, leaving the forest
feeling hollow and used up.  All the trees had been stripped of snow,
and many of the first-year saplings were snapped and broken.

Overhead, the sky shifted from gray, to charcoal, to black.  Angus led
them to the strip of taiga that bordered along the Southroad, and they
followed the road's path from a discreet distance through several hours
of darkness. Wagon tracks, horse dung, bones, and cast-off scraps
littered the road, reminding Raif that soon he would come into contact
with clansmen.  In fine weather, taking a direct route, a man could ride
from the Blackhail roundhouse to Duff's in a single day.  Even the
Dhoonehouse was only four days' hard ride from Duffs, and Gnash and
Dregg were nearer.

When the glow of Duffs Stovehouse finally appeared over the rise Raif
was stiff with cold.  His neck ached with a hard, nagging oain and his
hand burned.  Angus made a signal, and they cut onto the road.  Quarter
of an hour later they reached the stove house

Duff's was a stocky building with rounded walls and a rounded roof.

Built from great, tree-size elm wood timbers and banded with iron
staves, it looked like a giant beer barrel knocked on its side and sunk
deep into the snow.  Two doors led inside.  The largest led to the
stables, and Angus and Raif headed there first.  Raif brushed down Moose
and the bay while Angus exchanged quiet words with the groom.

The groom was young, blind in one eye, and he spoke with a soft,
hesitant stutter.  Raif had seen him many times over the years, but
until he watched Angus speak with him, he had never seen the young man
laugh or smile.  When the exchange was over, Angus grasped the groom's
hand and bade him,

"Stable the horses near the door."  Raif glanced around the dark,
well-ordered stables.  Over half of the two dozen boxes were occupied,
and a handful of sturdy cobs and mountain-bred ponies stood in the
lean-to outside.

It was a long walk to the stove house second door.  Piles of newly
dumped snow mounded along the stove house walls.  Hoarfrost sparkled on
the timbers, and high upon the roof, where the brick chimney cut through
the wood, snow could be heard hissingand sputteringas it melted.

Heat, smoke, smells, and sounds blasted against Raif's face as he pushed
open the door and entered Duff's.  Even as his eyes worked to grow
accustomed to the light, his mouth watered at the smell of charred fat,
elk meat, and onions.  Normally at this hour someone would be singingand
some crusty old clansman would be blowing the pipes.  People would be
laughingand arguingand gaming recklessly, yet although over thirty men
and women sat or stood in the bright, wood-walled stove room they kept
themselves in small groups.  Raif recognized a small party of spear men
from Clan Scarpe, their hair either black by birth or dyed that way,
their weapons sheathed in intricately plaited cords that were designed
to show the sharpness of their blades.  A man and woman from Clan Gnash
sat warming themselves by the great brick and metal stove.  The woman
wore her waist-length red hair unbound in the manner of all Gnash women.
She was dressed in soft pigskin pants, and the belt around her waist was
weighed with the Three Daggers: one horn, one steel, and one flint.  A
great circle ofDhoonesmen dominated the room. Massive men, they were,
with blond hair, full beards, and blue ink tattooed into their faces.
Strapped to their backs, waists, thighs, forearms, and calves were their
weapons.  Steel as perfect and brilliant as running water sent knife
light flashing through the room.  "Step away from the door, lad,"
murmured Angus close to RaiPs ear.  "Let's not give the patrons too long
to think on who we are, or why we're here."

Raif, as if woken from a trance, obeyed his uncle's order and made his
way to the back of the room.  Talk, which had come to a dead halt the
moment he and Angus had entered, resumed with the hushed frenzy of
cockroaches escaping from light.  As Raif picked a bench to sit at, as
far away from the stove as it was possible to be, Angus exchanged nods
with the stove master

Duff had a bit of every clan in him, at least that was what he claimed.
He was the hairiest man Raif had ever seen, and in his youth he had been
famous for his teeth.  Logs, barges, carts, carrion, and sleds: With a
rope between his teeth, Duff had hauled them all.  His teeth were still
splendid to this day, and as he brought over a tray steaming with hot
shammies, hot beer, and hot meat, he grinned broadly, revealing
surprisingly small but perfectly even teeth.  Raif remembered Tern
asking Duff once how he had got his teeth so strong.

"I used to crush pond ice with them," he had said.

"Angus!  You old dog!  How long's it been?"  Duffs brow reflected a
moment of strenuous thought as he loaded his goods on the table.

"Aye, I canna be bothered thinking.  Too long, that's for sure."

"Duff.  You've grown fatter and uglier.  By the Stones, man!  That neck
hair needs a shearing.  If I was your wife, I'd bind your arse to that
stove and shave you."

Duff's laugh was his second wonder.  Rich and hearty, it rolled up from
his chest like breaking waves.

"If you were my wife, Angus, I'd bind myself to the stove and light it."

Raif grinned, suddenly feeling better than he had all day.  He had
forgotten how much he liked Duff.  The two men continued on, railing
each other with such unabashed relish and affection, it was obvious they
were old, old friends.  A few heads turned at the laughter, but no one
took longer than they should paying heed to the stove master and his
guest.

As he took a draft of bitter foamy beer, Raif spent a moment studying
those people who had not caught his attention when he had first walked
through the door.  A small party of trappers kept to themselves in the
far corner, chewing on long strips of birch bark as they mended the
wires for their traps.  An old Orrlsman, his eyes milky with snow
blindness, sat close to the stove with his dog.  Across the way, a woman
wearing the gray leathers and moose felt of Ban- Then was busy finishing
her supper of fried onions and elk meat.  Like all women from Bannen,
she carried a long sword of black steel on her back.  Two men sat in the
shadows directly opposite Raif, nursing half-empty tankards between
gloved hands.  They were clansmen, but their hoods were up and they were
dressed in dark oilskins and Raif could not place them.  There were no
Bluddsmen.  Which, consideringa circle of Dhoonesmen commanded the room,
was lucky for patrons, staff, and stove laws alike.

Raif knew that everyone in the room saw him as a Hailsman.  Blackball
was the most austere and least given to show of all the clans.  It had
been stripped of its badge five hundred years earlier when Ayan
Blackhail took the life of the last Clan King, and no one had worn the
Hail Wolf since.  Even so, the silver cap on Raifs tine, the beaten
silver strip that tied his hair, and the black leather of his belts,
scabbards, and fronts placed him from Blackhail as surely as the blue
tattoos on the Dhoonesmen's faces named them Dhoone.

Blackhail was the only clan hold where silver was mined, and the metal
was worked into the hilts of all hand knives and swords.  Tern's half
sword had a layer of silver wire wrapped around the grip, and the
leather scabbard it was housed in was dyed black to match the graphite
lesions in the Hailstone.

"You won't mind keeping your own company for a while, Raif," Angus said,
slappinga hand on his shoulder.

"Duffs going to take me in the back so I can pick a length of cloth for
my wife."

"Aye," Duff said.

"Me poor wife hates to show herself once she's plaited her hair for
bed."

Raif nodded to both men.  He thought they spoke a little too casually,
but it was no concern of his.  Angus shrugged off his coat and packs and
followed Duff to a small door in the back of the room.  Raif watched
them go.  Did Angus greet the trappers along the way?  "Raif Sevrance."

Turning, Raif came face-to-face with the two men who had been sitting in
the shadows wearing oilskins.  They were Hailsmen: Will Hawk and his
son, Bron, who had been fostered to Dhoone for a season.  Bron was the
one who had brought news of Dhoone's defeat to the clan.  Raif was
immediately on his guard.  He gave back greetings but did not ask what
business brought father and son to Duff's.  Will, a somber man with the
kind of pale skin that showed many veins, sat on the stool that had just
been vacated by Angus.

"I see you're here with your uncle.  The ranger."

It was an invitation to speak, not a question.  Raif nodded.  Will made
a gesture toward Bron, bidding that he sit.  Bron's mother was a
Dhooneswoman, and he had the fair hair and light eyes of the Dhoones.

He was known for his swordsmanship, Raif recalled, and, strangely
enough, for his fine singing voice.  Raif thought he didn't look much
the sort to break into song.

When father and son were settled close.  Will took a heavy breath and
said,

"How did the ambush go, lad?"

Raif worked to keep his face still.  He had been expecting the
question--as a senior clansman, Will Hawk would have taken part in
planning the ambush--yet Raif found it difficult to speak.  He had spent
the past two days sealing off his memories of the clan, and he did not
want to reopen them.  Not here.  Not now.  He glanced into Will Hawk's
eyes. Genuine concern nestled there, along with growing impatience.
Raifdid not know Will Hawk well, yet he was a full clansman and was
therefore owed respect.

"The ambush went well.  All was as Mace Blackball said."

"Who amongst us took hurt?"

"Banron Lye.  Toady Walker."

Both Will and Bron touched their guide stone pouches.  Silence followed.
After several minutes Will said,

"And so you're heading south to spread the word to Scarpe and Orri?"

Raif shook his head.  He would not lie to a clansman.  Will waited for
him to explain himself.  Raif breathed and did not speak.  After a
minute of silence, he could no longer look his clansman in the eye.

Bron took a ewe's heart from a platter and began to chew on it.

In the corner of his vision, Raif saw Angus emerge from the back room of
the stove house He was carrying a dainty bundle with exaggerated care,
and one of the trappers made jest of him.  Angus laughed along with the
rest, falling into an easy conversation that grew lower as the minutes
passed.

"So you are just traveling with your uncle for a while," Will said at
last.

He knows, Raif thought.  Will knows 1 have broken my oath.  Will stood.

His eyes carefully avoided Raif as he said to his son, "Come.  There is
no company worth keeping here tonight."  Puzzlement shot over Bron's
face, but he obeyed his father, swallowing the last of the heart and
standing. Together they walked back to their place at the far side of
the room.

Raif did not move.  Shame burned him.  There were no excuses he could
give, nothing he could say to bring Will back to his table.  He had
broken his oath, and no words could change what that made him.

Blackhail was the oldest of the clans, and there were many who held it
was the hardest, too.  It had its traitors, Raif knew it must have
traitors--three thousand years of wars, successions, and infighting had
to produce some men who had broken their oaths--yet their names were
never spoken.  Their memories died before they did.

Once when he was younger, Raif remembered asking Inigar Stoop why there
was a deep black pit in the farthest corner of the guide- stone, big as
a wolf and filled with oil that had hardened over centuries to dark
jewels.  Inigar had run his stick fingers over the hollow and said,

"This is the place where we cut traitors' hearts from the stone."

Raif felt the shame heat sear him.  How long would it be before Inigar
picked up a chisel in his name?

Hard footsteps crunched on snow and then the stove house door burst
open. The temperature dropped immediately as a cold wind circled the
room.  Raif looked up to see four Bluddsmen enter the stove house

Faces hard, bodies weighted with steel, they stopped just beyond the
doorway and surveyed the room.  Air and space contracted.  The
Dhoonesmen stood as a single body, sword hands dropping to the
hand-and-a-half hilts of their great swords In the far corner Will and
Bron shifted themselves without seeming to move, making body and weapons
ready.

Raif felt the full force of the Bluddsmen's attention.  He watched as
their gray and dark blue eyes seized upon the silver piece in his hair
and on his tine.  He saw them hate.

Hair shaved clean around their faces, braids descending down their backs
like rope dipped in tar, they looked like no other clan.  Their leathers
were tanned in different ways, and their weapons were heavy forged.
Seeing them here, at close quarters, Raif realized how little he had
learned by fighting them on the Bluddroad.  Clan Bludd was a force unto
itself.

"Close the door, Chokko.  Bring your men to warm their bellies at the
stove." Duff moved into the strip of space separating the Dhoonesmen
from the Bluddsmen.

The one named Chokko raised a gloved fist.

"Nay, Stovemaster.  This is not something to be smoothed over with beer
and warming.  Our clan bleeds this night."

"Take it outside, Chokko.  No misdeed is greater than breaking the law
of the stove."

Chokko shook his massive head.

"I have respect for you.  Stove- master.

Know that.  And I come to pick no fight with the Dhoone-" He and the
head Dhoonesman shared a long, bitter glance.

"But I will fight this night.  I have to.  My heart will not let me rest
until I have taken BIackhail blood."

A murmur of cold fear passed through the room.  The Dhoones- men's faces
darkened.  The woman from Gnash slid her hand down toward the Three
Daggers at her waist.  The Scarpemen, war-sworn allies of Clan
BIackhail, bristled like hackles on a dog.  Will and Bron Hawk shed
their oilskins and walked with hard dignity into the center of the room.

Beneath the table, Raifs fist closed around Tern's sword.  His heart
hammered, yet strangely he felt something close to relief.  So this is
how it would end, fighting Bluddsmen.

"The stove laws work two ways, Chokko," Duff said, holding his position
directly in front of the Bluddsmen, barring them access to the rest of
the room.

"If men are at my stove, keeping my peace, I will not allow anyone to
force them outside against their will."

"Bravely said, Stovemaster," said Will Hawk, entering the Bluddsmen's
space.

"But we are Clan BIackhail, and we will not cower and we will not hide,
and ifBludd wants the chance to best us, then so be it."  The last words
were addressed to Chokko, and the stove- light seemed to dim as they
were spoken, leaving the two men in a place of their own.

Chokko did not blink--hardly, in fact, seemed to breathe.  He spoke, and
although his words were said to Will Hawk, he meant the whole room to
hear them.

"Our chief sent a dog to us--we, who were camped along the Elk
Trail--telling of what BIackhail had done.  The bitch died even as I
took the bale from her collar, so hard had she traveled in two days and
one night.  The message told of an ambush along the Bluddroad, and how
three dozen of our wives and children were hunted like animals and then
slain in the snow, in cold blood."

A hiss, like the sound of trees whipped by high wind, took the room.

Duff closed his eyes and touched his lids.  The couple from Gnash signed
to the Stone Gods.  The woman from Bannen touched the black iron pendant
containing her measure of powdered guide stone and spoke a single word:
"Children."  Even the Dhoonesmen looked down.

Will Hawk shook his head.

"You lie, Chokko of Clan Bludd.  My clan would never slay wives and
children in cold blood."

The Bluddsman at Chokko's side pushed forward.

"We do not lie.  Our chief does not lie.  We are Clan Bludd, and even
when the truth is hard we speak it."  Chokko gripped his clansman's arm
to stop him from drawing his sword.

"It is the truth, Bailsman," he cried.

"And you will know it soon enough when you receive the swift judgment of
our blades."  A muscle pumped high on Will Hawk's cheek.  His eyes
glittered in the stove light Raif tensed, his chest as tight as a bow at
full draw.

Will Hawk turned toward him.

"Tell them they lie, Raif Sevrance.  That I may carry the pride of my
clan to this fight."

All eyes fell on Raif.  The Bluddsmen, realizing straightaway the full
implication of Will's appeal, sent looks filled with such loathing that
Raif felt them as blows against his skin.  All was quiet for one
terrible, unbearable moment.  The knowledge Raif held damned them all.

Bluddsmen and Hailsmen would fight this night regardless of what he
said--that much was clear--but how could he send Will and Bron Hawk into
a fight with no honor?  Four massive Bludds- men in their prime, against
three Hailsmen, two of them year men newly sworn?  They would die.  He,
Will, and Bron would die.

Raif swallowed hard, gathered himself in.  Clan was everything.  What he
was didn't matter--his soul was already lost--but he couldn't send Will
and Bron to their deaths on a lie.

He stood.

"We did what we had to."

Gasps erupted.  The Bluddsmen drew steel.  The expression on Will Hawk's
face was a kind of death for Raif.  He knew he would never be forgiven
for the words he had spoken.

Will struggled with the truth for only a moment, yet when he turned to
face the Bluddsmen he was no longer the same man.

"Hold your steel until we are outside," he said, his voice hard and
weary in one.

"I

will not confound one wrong with another.  Bron.  "

He looked at his son.

"Your year man oath to Dhoone still stands.

This is not your fight.  "

Bron shook his head.

"Tonight I am a Bailsman," he said.

A look of pure pain crossed Will's face.  By the time he spoke it was
gone.

"Come, then, son.  Let us fight for our clan."

Father and son moved toward to the door.

Raif stepped forward, following them.

Hearing the scrape of his chair and the slap of his footsteps on stone
Will Hawk turned and held up his hand.

"Nay, Raif Sevrance.

Take your seat.  I would rather a Bluddsman cut out my heart than a
traitor fight at my side.  "

Will held his position for one moment and then walked outside.  The
Bluddsmen followed.  Bron followed.  Someone shut the door.  Like a
ghost, Raif continued walking.  Slowly.  Unstoppable.  Angus came and
fought him, big meaty arms clampingaround his chest, knees jabbingat his
shins.  Duff slid a bar across the door, then came to Angus' aid.  Raif
fought back.  Hands pushed, feet kicked, chests blocked his way.  They
slowed but could not stop him.  He took great hurt and gave great hurt,
yet it all seemed as unreal as any dream.  All that mattered was the
door.  Not once did he doubt that he would reach it.

Like game, he had set its oak and iron heart in his sights.  It was his,
and he would take it.  If Angus and Duff had known that, if he could
only have explained, they would have let him go.  But they didn't, so he
fought them, and all three took harm.  Sometimes he caught glimpses of
himself in other men's eyes.  A Dhoonesman held his hand to his tine, as
if he were seeing something unspeakable like a Stone God come down for
vengeance.  The Scarpemen looked afraid.

Hot blood ran down RaiFs nose to his mouth.  Yellow fluid slid across
his eye.  His fists were like machines, up and down they went, smashing
flesh, as his feet claimed ground beneath him.  Filled with the same
inevitable force as an arrow in flight, he had no choice but to move
toward the door.

When, suddenly, Angus spoke a word.  He wiped blood from his face and
shook his head, and then he and Duff fell away.  Raif barely registered
their withdrawal.  It was nothing to him.

He would have reached the door without it.  His hands came up and dealt
with the bar, and a moment later he stood facing the snow and the night.
Cold breezes worked his skin as he took in the last seconds of the
fight.  One Bluddsman was down.  Bron was down.  The remaining Bluddsmen
delivered long thrusts with their swords, impaling the flopping,
powerless form of Will Hawk.  Only their blades kept him standing.  Raif
lost himself after that. Afterward he would remember things, or perhaps
what lime Angus Lok told him became memory, but when he stepped through
the threshold and into the snow he became something else.

Swords don't ring when you draw them, yet to Raif it seemed as if his
did. His mouth was dry, utterly dry.  His raven lore burned like
white-hot steel against his skin.

Watcher of the Dead.

That was his last thought before his mind spiraled downward to a place
where all that mattered were the Bluddsmen's beating hearts.

CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE.

Sarga Veys Penthero Iss stood high in the cool marble blackness of the
Bight and watched as Sarga Veys entered Mask Fortress.  Not for Veys the
soldiers' sparseness of stable gate or the common squalor of north gate.
No.  Veys took the east gate, whose fine marble columns and wrought-iron
gratings were usually reserved for lords, ladies, and those of high
office, not second-rate envoys who had knowledge of the old skills.  Iss
exhaled softly into the shadows.  Sarga Veys was an interesting piece of
flesh.

As he crossed the quad, Veys kept turning his head toward the Splinter.
After a moment he stopped, spun his heels, and spent a full minute
contemplating the ice-bound tower.  Iss didn't like that.  He didn't
like that at all.  A small drawing out of himself, like a long sniff or
a wet finger thrust into the air to test wind speed, served to assure
him that Veys was studying the Splinter purely with his two own eyes,
not probing it with sorcery as he feared.  Withdrawing back into
himself, he became aware of the taste of metal in his mouth and a drop
of urine sliding down his thigh.  It was disgusting to feel the wetness
there.  He despised his weaknesses. Working the tainted saliva into a
wad for spitting, he looked once more upon the white-robed form of Sarga
Veys.

Sarga Veys was looking directly at him.

Unsettled, Iss took a step back.  I am in shadow, he told himself, and
five stories above him.  How then does he know 1 am here?  The drawing!

Sarga Veys had sensed the drawing.  Iss' face darkened.

The power he had drawn to test for sorcery was so slight, a little moth
on the wing, it should not have been detectable.  Yet there was Sarga
Veys, smiling now, raising his arm in greeting.  Iss turned and exited
the room.  Veys would know now, with utter certainty, that something was
housed within the Splinter that his Surlord wished him not to see.

Descending the ice-cold stairs of the Bight, Iss prepared himself to
meet with Sarga Veys.  Although the sun had newly risen above Mount
Slain, the day was already little to the Surlord's liking.  Only an hour
earlier, beneath the darkly sloping ceiling of the Hall of Trials, the
Lady of the Eastern Granges and her besworded son the Whitehog had
challenged his right to apportion land along the city's northern reach.

"My grandfather's brother owned hunting rights to the Northern Granges,"
Lisereth Hews, Lady of the Eastern Granges, had said, her voice rapidly
becoming shrewish.

"And I claim them here and now for my son."  It was a ridiculously
trumped-up claim, of course, but Lisereth Hews was a dangerous woman.
The white and the gold of the Hews suited her just as well as it suited
any man.  She would cause trouble over this.  Four of the past ten
surlords had come from House Hews, and the good lady was scheming to
place her son as the fifth.

The matter of the Northern Granges, newly come into dispute owing to the
death of its lord, Allock Mure, had provided her with a convenient
excuse to show her teeth.

Iss bared his own teeth.  Lisereth Hews was a fool if she thought she
could take him on.  He would not sit and grow old and wait for the
assassins to come.  The great old houses of Hews, Crieff, Stornoway,
Gryphon, Pengaron, and Mar would find battles aplenty soon enough.

Once within his private chamber, Iss took time to change his clothes.

The urine stain on his robe was a tiny thing, but Sarga Veys had quick
eyes and a quick mind, and Iss would not allow him the satisfaction of
putting two and two together and realizing that his Surlord was not as
powerful as he seemed.  Sarga Veys was a skilled and subtle magic user,
and that meant he was dangerous as well as useful.

Iss dressed without haste, content to let Caydis Zerbina fasten the
dozen pearl buttons on each cuff and lace the ties on his silk coat so
that they formed an elaborate herringbone design across his chest.

He was indifferent to clothes but knew well enough their many uses and
always made a point of dressing in expensive silks, heavily weighted and
exquisitely cut.

When he was satisfied that he had kept Sarga Veys waiting long enough he
indicated that the Halfman should be let in the room.  Caydis moved to
the door without making a sound.

"My lord."  Sarga Veys entered the chamber and then bowed, awaiting his
Surlord's pleasure.

Iss studied the curve of Veys' neck, the texture and pigment of the
skin. Even though Veys had just returned from a journey lasting several
weeks, no dirt from the road clung to him.  He must have stopped in the
city and bathed before presenting himself at the fortress.  Not liking
the cool detachment such an act betokened, Iss made a note to have Veys
followed while he stayed in the city.  He already knew much about the
Halfman, but it never hurt to know more.

"Sarga Veys.  I trust I find you in good health?"  Veys opened his mouth
to reply, but Iss blocked him.

"I failed to notice the sept as you returned.  I trust the
brothers-in-the-watch came to no harm?"

"They asked if they could ride on ahead of me when we came within sight
of the city.  I saw no reason to refuse their wish."  He lied.  No
member of the Rive Watch would ever ask anything of Sarga Veys.  More
likely they had abandoned him as soon as they'd judged it safe.  Iss
nodded.

"I see."

Suspecting his lie had been detected, Sarga Veys straightened his
shoulders.

"Next time I ride on your behalf, my lord, I would prefer to handpick
the sept myself."

"As you wish."  Iss didn't care either way.  Let Veys try to handpick a
sept. It would be interesting to see just how far he'd get before
Marafice Eye stepped in to have his say.

"Have you any further demands before we begin?  Perhaps a new horse, or
a new title, or a new set of robes with gold trim?"

Sarga Veys' violet eyes darkened.  His throat muscles worked, and for a
moment Iss didn't know if he meant to draw sorcery or to speak.  Veys
hardly seemed to know himself.  After a moment he calmed himself,
swallowing whatever sorcery or wordage had massed upon his tongue.

"I apologize, my lord.  I am tired and ill worn.  I do not much care for
the cold open lands of the North."

Iss was immediately conciliatory.

"Of course, my friend.  Of course."

He touched Veys' arm.

"Come.  Sit.  Wine.  We must have wine.  And food.

Caydis.  Bring us what you know is good.  Make it hot.  Yes, by all
means see to the fire first.  How right of you to think of our visitor's
well-beingas well as his belly.  " It was interesting to watch the
effect the little show of pandering had on Sarga Veys.  He liked being
courted.  That was one of his weaknesses, his belief that he was
entitled to better than what he got.

When Caydis left the room, closing the door as softly as only he could,
Iss turned to Veys and said,

"So.  All has gone to plan in the clan holds

Veys' smooth skin glistened like linen dipped in oil as he said,
"They're fighting like dogs in a pit."

Iss nodded.  He did not speak for a moment, wanting to settle the
knowledge in his mind and claim it for his own.  Absently he ran a hand
over his mouth.

"So Mace Blackhail acted upon the information you gave him?"

"Immediately.  It was a massacre.  Thirty women and children slain in
cold blood--most of them kin to the great Dog Lord himself.  Now Bludd
is at Blackhail's throat, Dhoone and Blackhail are at Bludd's throat,
and all the clans in between are scrambling to take sides."  Veys
smoothed the perfectly white sleeves of his robe.

"The Dog Lord will find thorns growing on the Dhooneseat soon enough."
"Perhaps."  Iss had a higher opinion of Vaylo Bludd than Sarga Veys did.
Sarga Veys saw only the crudeness, the spittingand swearing and dogs.
Iss saw the ruthless determination of a man who had lorded Clan Bludd
for thirty-five years and was loved as a king by his sworn men. Besides,
Sarga Veys was missing the point.  The Dog Lord was just one chief among
many. Clan Croser, Clan Bannen, Clan Otier, Clan Scarpe, Clan
Ganmiddich, and all the rest had to be brought into the war.  It wasn't
enough that Blackhail, Bludd, and Dhoone fight; all their war-sworn
clans must, too.  When the time came to send a host north for battle, it
would be the promise of easy land and easy wealth that stirred the
grange lords and their armies.  The fat border clans would be first
taken.  The cold giants of the Far North, with their massive stone
roundhouses, steel forges, and ice-bred warriors, would come later.  .

once they'd fought themselves bloody over years.

Iss ran a pale hand over his face.  Could he do this?  Did he have a
choice? The world was changing, and the Sull would ride out from their
Heart Fires soon enough.  If ever there was a chance to seize greatness
and power, this was it.  If Spire Vanis didn't move to claim a
continent, then Trance Vor, Morning Star, and Ille Glaive would.  An
empire would be created.  And he, Penthero Iss, son of an onion farmer
from Trance Vor and kinsman to Lord of the Sundered Granges, would not
stand by and watch as others took what should be his.

"I picked up one or two other intelligences whilst I was in the North,"
Veys said, his voice slicing through Iss' thoughts like cheese wire

"I think you may find them interesting."

It was an effort to bring his mind back to the subject at hand.

"Go on."

"Our old friend Angus Lok is on the move again.  Heading north to the
clan holds last I heard."

This was news.  Angus Lok had been to ground for six months.  None of
Iss' spies had been able to locate him.  He and his family live within a
few days' ride of Ille Glaive, was all they could ever tell him.

"If Angus Lok is on the move, then so is the Phage."

Sarga Veys met eyes with his Surlord.

"I wonder why."

I bet you do, thought Iss.  Not for the first time he contemplated
ridding himself of Veys.  The Halfman was too clever, too sharp.  He had
already betrayed one taskmaster.  How much easier would a second
betrayal be?

"Seems you were one of them once, you tell me what the Phage are up to."

Veys shrugged.

"With the Phage .  ..  who can know for sure?  they keep themselves as
close as bats on a cave wall.  In the whole of Spire Vanis there are
probably only five people who have ever heard of them, and two of them
are sitting in this room."  Veys moved forward in his seat, and Iss knew
to expect a second revelation.

"Of course, there was that raven Stovemaster Gloon brought down."

 "What raven?"

"Well, apparently the good stove master lives in fear of ravens flying
over his chimney--you know how superstitious stove masters can be about
their god-cursed stoves."  Veys waited for his Surlord to nod.

"So, whenever Gloon climbs up on his roof to clean his stack he always
carries a braced bow with him in case he spots a raven flying overhead.
He likes to take potshots at them.  Hangs them from the rafters like
trophies. Anyway, seven days before I arrived, Gloon brought down the
biggest raven he'd ever seen.  He couldn't stop braggingabout it.  The
man exaggerated, of course--little men like that always do--but when he
cut the bird down to show me, I noticed a line of sinew wrapped around
its leg."

"A messenger bird."

"Yes.  And it was heading north toward the ice."

"There was no message."

"No."

Then the bird was homing, toward the Ice Trapper tribe.  No others
besides Ice Trappers and the Sull used ravens.  Invisible hairs on Iss'
arm lifted.

"What direction did it come from?"

"South.   Just south."   The look on the Halfman's face told Iss that he
had already made the connection between the bird and Angus Lok.   He was
clever, so clever.

But the news was tantalizing.  That was the problem: Veys had a way of
uncovering just the sort of information that Iss liked to know.  And he
was so very useful, so very adept with sorcery.

Iss attended the tray of food and wine that Caydis had discreetly slid
upon the marble-topped table.  All things fragrant were upon it: the
wine warmed with cloves and then poured into cups rubbed with lemon, the
egg yolks shuddering like oysters under the weight of turmeric and
sesame seeds, the fried figs split and steaming, and lamb's tongues
spread with rose jam, musk, and amber.  No one prepared food like Caydis
Zerbina.

No one could find the things he did.

Offeringa silver cup filled with wine to Sarga Veys, Iss contemplated
all he had learned.  So the Listener of the Ice Trapper tribe had sent a
raven? That meant the North was preparing itself for the dance of
shadows to come. Iss sat back in his chair, stilling himself with deep
breaths held long in his lungs.  Let them dance, he thought.  Let the
Sull dance with shadows and the clan holds dance with swords, and let
those bold enough to move while the music plays steal a world from under
their feet.

Sarga Veys popped a fat fig into his mouth.  He was looking more than a
little pleased with himself.

"I hear your ward has gone missing.

The sweet and lovely Asarhia.  I could help you track her down if you
like.  "

"No."  Iss let the word stand alone.  He would not explain himself to a
second-rate envoy who had neither land nor family allegiances to call
his own.  The thought of Sarga Veys even touching Asarhia filled Iss'
chest with cold unease.  Asarhia was so young, so unknowing .  .  .  Iss
put down his wine cup untouched.  She had to be found.  The city was no
place for her to be.  She could get hurt, raped.  She could lose her
fingers overnight to the cold, starve to death in some dingy little tent
in Almstown, or curl up in the cairn-size snowdrifts that massed along
the city's north wall and sleep her way to death.  Iss had seen it
happen.  Every spring, during first thaw, a hundred or more bodies would
be carried through the sluice gates along with the snow melt

The poor fools all died with smiles on their faces, thinking that the
blue tongues of frost that killed them were as warm and soothingas
flames.

Iss breathed heavily.  He needed to call the Knife.  The search must be
expanded, the reward doubled, Almstown and all its shanties razed to the
ground.  Asarhia must be brought home.  He had not spent sixteen years
in her rearing to let her fall into an- other's hands.  Catching Veys
looking at him with eyes that knew and guessed too much, Iss rose and
walked to the door.  Caydis Zerbina waited on the other side, and one
word was all it took to give him purpose.  "Will you need me to head
north again, my lord?"

Veys said.  Iss shook his head.

"No.  It's a delicate game we play, this making of wars.  Push too often
and we risk making our intentions known.  Far better to watch and wait
and see. Blackhail has lost its chief, Bludd has lost women and
children, and Dhoone has lost its clan- hold: Let clannish pride and
clannish gods do the rest."

"But what of their war-sworn clans?  What of Ganmiddich, Bannen, Orri.

.  "

"All in good time, Sarga Veys.  If the game slows or the rules change,
you'll be the first to know."

The Halfman bowed his head.

"As you wish."

Iss waited for the next question, knowing full well what it would be.

"And my next duties?"

"I haven't given them much thought, my friend.  There's nothing
pressing. Obviously, I'd be grateful for any word you might bring of
Angus Lok and his family.  Apart from that I suggest you rest yourself
after your long journey, take time to enjoy the refreshments of the
city."  Iss flipped the lid on a silver box crusted with emeralds that
had once belonged to the Surlord Rannock Hews, whom Borhis Horgo had
slain in the black mud of Hound's Mire forty years earlier while five
Forsworn held him down with the heels of their boots.  Taking something
from the box, Iss smiled indulgently at Sarga Veys.

"Here,"

he said pressing the object into the Halfman's hand.

"Spend it wisely."

Sarga Veys' face was a thing to behold as he stared at the golden piece
the Surlord had given him.  The idea that he wasn't needed, that he
could be dismissed as easily as a wetted prostitute, was something that
had never occurred to him before.  He was the young and brilliant Sarga
Veys, the Phage's greatest find in over a decade.  Who would not want or
need him?  Any other time Iss might have been tempted to smile at the
specks of stricken pride shining like salmon roe in Sarga Veys' eyes,
yet for some reason he did not.  Veys was dangerous.  And although it
had been necessary to teach him a lesson, he was exactly the sort of
person who collected and nursed his slights.

Iss was saved further thought on the subject by the arrival of Marafice
Eye, swiftly brought by Caydis Zerbina.  The Knife neither knocked nor
waited.  He entered the room, claimed space, then set his small blue
eyes upon the game: Sarga Veys.  Instantly Iss regretted summoning him.
His intent had been to intimidate the Halfman and put him in his place.
Yet the business with the gold piece had already achieved part of that,
and Iss knew he was in danger of going too far.

Sarga Veys, who still hadn't recovered from the blow of being judged
unnecessary to his Surlord's immediate plans, colored slightly under the
force of the Knife's gaze.  Without realizing what he did, he shrank
back in his chair.

The Knife did nothing except stand; he needed to do no more.  Iss looked
from one man to the other.  A change of plan was in order.

Takinga shallow breath, he addressed himself to the Knife.  "The sept
you sent north with Sarga Veys needs disciplining.  See to it."

Marafice Eye scowled.  Iss turned his back, dismissing him.  Footsteps
shook the room and then the door was slammed with enough force to split
the frame.

Iss turned to Sarga Veys.

"I will not keep you idle for long."  The Halfman's cheeks glowed
prettily with spite; he had very much enjoyed the dressing-down of
Marafice Eye.

"I await your call, my lord."

Standing, he slipped the gold piece into a fold in his robe.

"I trust my lord was pleased with the duties I performed in the North?"

All this and praise, too?  Iss' dislike for the Halfman deepened.

Smiling, he crossed to the door and opened it.  Splinters of wood fell
in great chunks to the floor.

"You have more than proved your worth."

Sarga Veys continued to glow as he walked through the door.  As soon as
he was out of earshot, Iss called to Caydis to bring back the Knife.

CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO.

Matters of Clan Pain rode with him like a second skin.  Boot-shaped
bruises marked his flesh, organs and soft tissue leaking blood beneath.
Wounds sewn closed with black thread punctured with soft hisses,
spilling pus.

Hurts riddled his body like pine beetles in wood.  His sliced lip
throbbed. His black eye turned every blink into an agonizing procedure
of weeping flesh and pain.  Crusted yellow stuff accumulated in his
swollen ear, and the blister on his right hand was fire upon the reins.

Miserable, cold, and tucked deep into a place well warded against
thoughts, Raif Sevrance rode at Angus Lok's side.  Bleak, gray light
shone upon a landscape glittering with frost.  A predatory wind stayed
close to the ground, content to let the terrible cold weaken its victims
before moving in for the kill.  Stands of hemlock, their trunks dulled
by rime ice, rose like a ghost army to block the advancing night.

Angus rode in silence, his back bent and his head sunk deep within his
hood. Although Raif could not see his uncle's face, he knew all about
the bruises and lesions there.  Raif shuddered to think of them.

There was even a bite mark.

How many days had passed since the night at Duffs Stovehouse was
difficult to tell.  Perhaps a week.  Maybe longer.  All days and nights
were the same in the taiga.  Raif could remember little about the night
of the fight.  Dimly he recalled Angus leading him away from the hacked
pieces of flesh that had once been the

Bluddsmen's bodies.  He remembered the looks of fear and horror on the
faces of the Dhoonesmen, then the coming together of Scarpe, Dhoone,
Ganmiddich, and Gnash to draw a guide circle around the six bodies in
the snow.

They couldn't wait to be rid of him.  Angus and Duff had taken him to
the stables and seen to his injuries there.  As soon as Duff finished
the stitching, Angus had forced a flask full of malt liquor down his
throat and hefted him over Moose's back.  Raifs last thought was that
one of Duffs famous teeth was now missing: He would never pull a sled
that way again.

Only later, much later, did he realize that he had been the cause of
Duffs missing tooth and the bite mark on Angus' cheek.  It didn't bear
thinking about.

Angus had told him what little he judged it necessary for him to know.
Raif knew he was holding back and was glad of it.  He didn't want to
hear all the details of the fight.  Angus himself had been strangely
quiet these past days, holding his peace around the stove at night,
speaking of little but the weather and journey by day.

Glancing over at the hunched, frost-dusted form of his uncle, Raif felt
a rough soreness press against his throat.

You are not good for this clan, RaifSevrance.

Now Angus knew the truth of it, too.

"Angus," Raif said, surprising himself by breaking the silence.  Angus
turned his head so Raif could see his face.  All the cuts and bruises
were heavily waxed; broken and damaged skin was an invitation to the
'bite.

"What?"

Raif felt his nerve waver so rushed on before he had chance to think.

"Why did you let me go?  You and Duff fought me all the way to the door,
but then you said somethingand both you and he pulled away."  A soft
grunt came from Angus' lips.  Turning his attention back to the way
ahead, he said,

"Aye.  You would ask that.  And you'll be wanting the truth of it, too."

He was silent for a while, guiding his bay around a thicket of frozen
thorns. Just when Raif had given up hope of an answer, he spoke again,
his voice lower than the wind.

"There came a point when I knew you couldn't be stopped, just knew it in
my old Lok bones.  To carry on fighting would have only brought Duff and
myself more harm.  Yet it was more than that."  Angus sighed heavily.
Bits of ice on his saddle coat slid into his lap.

"I have a trace of the old skill in me, Raif.  Just a wee bit, enough to
sense when others around me use sorcery, and a few small things like
that.

I'm not a magic user, don't hear me wrong.  I couldna shift air and
light if me own life depended on it--and if we're ever in a situation
where that sort of thing is called for, then remember Angus Lok isn't
your man.  As I said, though, I can sense things when I have a mind to.
And that night when you kept fightingand fighting, butting old Duff in
the teeth and kneeing me in the knackers, I felt something"" Sorcery?  "

"No.  Fate."  Angus held the word a long moment, then shrugged.

"Call it an old ranger's fancy if you like.  Call it bloody delirium
brought on by having my balls disbanded.  All I know is there came a
moment when I thought to myself.  As terrible as this is, it's meant to
be."

Raif took a breath.  Pain from his stitches and blistered hand made him
wince.  Fate.  He wanted none of it.  Yet even as his thoughts pounced,
ready to attack the idea, fragments of memory slipped through his mind.
A red lake, frozen, a forest of silver blue trees, and a lighuess city
without people: The places the guide stone had showed him.

"Fate pushes," Angus said, breaking through RaiFs thoughts.

"Sometimes, if you lie under the stars at night, you can feel it.

Children sense it--that's why they always get so excited at the thought
of camping out.  They know, yet can never put it into words.

As for myself, I've felt fate only a few times in my life, and always it
made me change my course.  The stove house was one such push.  " " Yet I
might have died.  "

"Aye.  And I canna say if I would have stepped in to save you."  Angus
turned and looked at Raif, his coppery eyes flecked with green.

"You know that word of what you did will reach every corner of the clan
holds To slay three Bluddsmen single-handed is a feat not long
forgotten."

Raif shook his head.  He hated what he had become when he'd walked
through the stove house door.  There was no pride in slaying men so; he
had been little more than a wolf tearing out throats.  It sickened him
to think of it.  He had a memory of the snow outside of DufFs saturated
with blood.

"Blackball will sing no songs in remembrance of me."

"Maybe not.  But thirty pairs of eyes saw what you did, and songs don't
always need to be sung to be heard."  Angus stared hard at Raif a
moment, then kicked the bay forward onto ground that had once been
marshy and wet and was now fast with ice.

Raif followed after.  Soon they came upon a frozen stream and took the
cleared and frozen path it offered them through the hills and ravines of
the taiga's edge.  By the time they left the ice to make camp for the
night, the trees surrounding them had stopped beinga forest and become a
loose collection of woodland instead.  A quarter moon rode low on the
horizon, making the stream ice glow like blue fire.  "What will happen
now between Blackhail and Bludd?"  Raif asked, banking snow against the
base of the tent to weigh it against the wind.  His hands ached as he
worked, yet the pain was a small thing.  This was the first night there
had been no stove house to stop at.  the clan holds were coming to an
end.

Angus had peeled off his gloves and was busy stripping wood.  His knife
never stopped dancingas he spoke.

"You know what will happen, Raif.  War.  It's in the clan holds nature
to make battle.  Look at your clan boast: We do not hide and -we do not
cower. And we will have our revenge.  And Dhoone's: We are Dhoone, Clan
Kings and clan warriors alike.  War is our mother.  Steel is our father.
And peace is but a thorn in our side.  Bludd claims that death is their
companion, Casdemilk swears they'll be fighting the day the Stone Gods
shatter the world, and even cursed Clan Gray holds that loss is
something they know and do not fear."  Angus sniffed.

"Quite brings a tear to a man's eye."

Raif frowned at him, yet he seemed not to notice.  Resting his blade, he
said,

"The point is, the clan holds have been at each other's throats for
three thousand years--probably more if you count the time before Irgar
drove them north across the Ranges.  Clan Withy and Clan Haddo keep the
histories, and believe me, those histories are grim.  Grim.  You've
fought yourselves, the Sull, the city men, the Forsworn,
Trenchlanders--anything you could see and shake a stick at and a few
things you could not.  The past forty years have been different, and you
have the old Dhoone chief Airy Dhoone and Dagro Blackhail's father,
Ewan, to thank for that.  Both grew up during the River Wars, both lost
kin on the banks of the Wolf and the Easterly Flow.  Airy lost his
sister Anne, whom he loved above all others, and Ewan lost two of his
three sons.  Such losses shape men. Airy rode the thirty leagues from
the Flow to the Dhoonehouse with Anne's body laid over the back of his
mare.  Her death fell hard upon him.  Some even say it turned him mad,
and that he kept Annes dried-up corpse on a chair made of willow wood
next to his bed."

Angus smiled softly, reached for another log to strip.

"With chiefs, who will ever know the truth?  But both Airy Dhoone and
Ewan Blackhail did withdraw to their roundhouses, ordered their clansmen
to retreat, turned their backs on their gains, and left their war-sworn
clans to battle amongst themselves.  Gullit Bludd did well by them, as
did Roy Ganmiddich and Adalyn Croser.  All got the land and water they
wanted.

"Five seasons went by where Ewan Blackhail and Airy Dhoone watched as
their war-sworn clans pushed north against their borders.  By this time
Dagro had grown to manhood and taken his first year man oath, and Vaylo
Bludd had put a dagger to his father's heart and taken over the lording
of that clan.  That was when Ewan and Airy began to see a future where
the clan holds were ruled by Clan Bludd.  They knew what sort of man
Vaylo Bludd was, that early, even before he started calling himself the
Dog Lord and braiding his hair in the manner of the Dhoone Kings.

"Vaylo Bludd shook Airy Dhoone and Ewan Blackhail from their mourning.
Both chiefs took command of their war-sworn clans.  They met at the
House on the Flow, with the river brown as mud beneath them, and brought
an end to the war by speakinga treaty there.  They met only the once,
yet both men spent the rest of their chief ships building bonds of
fosterage between their clans that have stayed in place to this day."

Raif nodded.  He knew this well enough.  Only two winters earlier Drey
had been set to leave for a year's fosterage at Dhoone.  Mannie Dhoone,
nephew to the Dhoone chief, Maggis Dhoone, had been set to come to
Blackball in Drey's stead.  But Mannie was thrown by his horse while out
hunting in the blue thorn grass south of the Dhoonehold, and both his
legs were broken, and the fosterage had never gone through.

Standingand brushing ice from his oilskin, Raif said,

"Dhoone will join with Blackball to defeat Clan Bludd, won't they?"

Angus let the last of the logs fall to the snow, then reached inside his
coat for his rabbit flask.  In no hurry to drink, he simply turned the
flask in his hand.

"I canna say, Raif.  Dhoone is scattered and broken.  Maggis and his
sons are dead, and no one knows when a new chief will be named.  They
lost three hundred clansmen and year men in that raid.  They lost their
forge, their stockpile of pig iron, their livestock."  Angus shook his
head.

"Dhoone is as close to being lost as Clan Morrow was on the eve ofBurnie
Dhoone's wedding."  Raif touched his measure of powdered guide stone as
all clansmen did when the name of the Lost Clan was spoken.  Clan Morrow
had once stood east of the Dhoonehold, rivaling Bludd and Blackhail in
size.  The Dark King, Burnie Dhoone, spent thirty years destroying the
clan when his young wife, Maida, left him for Shann Morrow, eldest son
of the Morrow chief.  Only outsiders such as Angus ever called Clan
Morrow by its name.  To clansmen it was always the Lost Clan.  Raif
remembered Tern telling him once how he and Dagro Blackhail had come
upon the ground where the Morrowhouse had once stood.  Nothing remains,
Raif, not even a caimstone, and no plants but white heather will root
there.

Angus took a swig from his flask, swallowed, then took one more.

"Blackhail will fight alone.  Dhoone has battles and demons of its own.
The war-sworn clans may help, yet I have a feeling that they'll be too
busy saving their own necks to worry about Blackhail and Dhoone."

Raif looked hard at Angus.  The wind had dropped, and the hard frost
turned each of his uncle's breaths into a spell of ice and light.

"What do you mean?"

"Naught except that in all wars it's every man for himself."  Slipping
the flask beneath his coat, Angus stooped to pick up the stripped logs.

"I'd better get a fire started or we'll be eating cold kidneys tonight.
And I don't know about you, but I've a fancy that once a kidney's been
left to cool overnight, it makes a better weapon than it does a meal."
He grinned.

"Put one of them in a slingshot and I'm sure we could bring down a bird.
A big one, mind.  Maybe even a goose."

Raif watched as Angus built the fire close to the tent's entrance.  It
wasn't worth restating the question.  Angus Lok said nothing he had no
mind to.  He knew more about the coming war, that was certain, but he
would speak it only in his own good time.  Bringing his hands to his
face, Raif blew on his cold, aching fingers.  It had been full dark for
several hours, yet he was still careful not to turn his gaze north. Clan
was behind him, and that was the way it had to be.  After a time, he
made his way to the tent.  As he crawled through the flap, he felt the
stitches on his chest pull at his skin.  It took him a moment to deal
with the pain.  He stripped off his oilskin and eased himself down amid
the blankets and elk hides He had no desire for food, neither hot nor
cold, and settled his body into the position that caused the least hurt
and waited for sleep to come.  Blackhail will fi^ht alone.

He did not rest easy, but he slept.

The next morning when he woke and crawled from the tent to relieve
himself, he caught a glimpse of a new landscape far below the southern
rise.  A massive, partially frozen lake stretched as far as he could see
into the distance.  Its shore was gray with grease ice, yet its center
was black, oily, and steaming with frost smoke.  "The Black Spill,"
murmured Angus, coming to stand at Raits side.  "The deepest lake in the
Territories.  Ille Glaive claims its shore to the east.  We'll be
headingaround its western shore, toward the Ranges."

Raif nodded, suddenly acutely aware of how far he was from home.  He had
never been this far south, never before stepped upon soil that did not
belong to a clan.

Effie, Drey .  .

Abruptly he turned and went to feed and water Moose.  They broke camp
soon after, heading southwest and then south toward the towering peaks
of Spire Vanis.  The weather warmed and the winds quickened and storm
clouds began to gather in the north.

CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE.

Vainpate Ash scratched her scalp.  Mites, she thought as she watched the
distant arch of Vaingate, got everywhere.  And no amount of wind and
frost could kill them.  She supposed she should be horrified at the idea
of things living on her body, but she hadn't eaten in over three days
and she was seriously beginning to consider them as a meal.  That
thought made her smile in a grim way, and that made the ice sore on her
lip crack open.  Seconds later she tasted her own blood, warm and briny
like salt water.  Eating snow wasn't a good idea.  She wished someone
had told her that before her mouth had gotten sore.  Still, it did have
its advantages.  Ash couldn't imagine anyone recognizing her now, not
even Penthero Iss.  Her hair was dark and greasy, her clothes were stiff
with mud, and her skin felt like somethinga carpenter might use to sand
a chair.  Heaven only knew what she looked like. She hadn't seen her
reflection in days and had now reached the point where she was quite
sure she didn't want to.

Her stomach rumbled noisily, pulling her thoughts back to Vain- gate.

It was early morning and the rising sun had turned the gate's
three-story arch into a bridge of golden light.  Just watching the
sunlight flow across the bias-cut limestone filled Ash with such
longing, it stopped her hunger dead.

Reach, mistressss.

So cold here, so dark.  Reach.

The voices jumped her, beatingagainst her mind like a flock of dark
birds.  Ash fought, as she always did, yet more and more these days she
had less and less to fight with.  A razor's edge of darkness cut her
thoughts, splittingand re splitting until there was nothing but a thin
line left.

She blinked awake.  Sunlight streamed into her eyes, dazzlingand making
her feel sick.  Pain squeezed along her forehead as she rolled sideways
and vomited onto the snow.  Wiping her mouth clean, she forgot about the
ice sore and winced as the edge of her hand knocked the scab.  When she
was ready, she looked at the sky again.  The sun was now high in the
south.  It was midday. She had lost four hours.

Four.

Frightened, she sat upright.  It's all right, she told herself.  No one
could have spotted me up here.

She was sitting on the flat roof of a broken-down and abandoned tannery.
Ever since she had discovered the buildinga week ago, it had become her
favorite place in all the city.  The area around Vaingate was crowded
with disused buildings, but all were carefully chained and boarded to
prevent anyone in need of shelter from breaking in.  The tannery's
windows were nailed shut, and it had enough chains around its doors to
contain a prison full of thieves, yet at some point the weight of snow
on the roof had caused a portion of the upper floor to collapse.  A
season of floods, frosts, and thaws had gone on to break the walls, and
it hadn't been difficult at all to find a way in.

Unlike most other buildings in the city that were built with sloping
roofs to shunt snow, the tannery roof was mostly flat.  Ash supposed the
flat sections had been used for pegging out tanned skins to dry.

She could still see some of the remaining pegs, poking up from the
rooftop like stone weeds.

It wasn't a very high building, yet its position a quarter league north
of the city wall afforded it a good view ofVaingate.  It soothed Ash to
come here and just look.  Yet now, glancingat the boarded-up buildings
across the way and the lifeless streets below, she knew she couldn't
risk coming here again.  This wasn't the first time the voices had made
her black out, and it wouldn't be the last.  They were getting stronger.
. .  and they had learned ways to reach her while she was awake.

Ash shivered.  Four hours.  What if she had not woken?  What if she had
lain here, unseen and undiscovered, all day?  One night spent outside
would kill her.  Last night it had been so cold that she had felt the
saliva freeze against her teeth.

A sound halfway between a grunt and a sob puffed from her lips.  She
desperately needed to drink, but the thought of eating more snow made
her mouth curl.  Slowly she struggled to her feet.  She tried not to
look at her body as she brushed the snow from her cloak, but bony edges
kept catching her eye.  Stupidly, ridiculously, it was her breasts that
worried her the most. Just two weeks ago they had been heavy and round,
growing so quickly they ached.  Now they were small again, barely there.
It was as if her body had reverted to childhood, leaving only her hands
and face to age.

Straightening her back, she turned into the wind and pulled the odors of
the city through her nostrils.  Saliva pooled in her mouth as she tasted
the scents of woodsmoke and charred fat.  She was fiercely hungry. Money
had run out five days ago, and unless she sold her cloak and boots she
had no chance of getting more.  Stealing scraps of food from the
charcoal burners who stood on street corners day and night, grilling
bacon and goose sausages over their dark-fires, was becoming
increasingly tempting to Ash.  Yet she knew from watching children
quicker and cleverer than she that being caught was another horror,
every bit as dreadful as starvation.  Whenever a charcoal burner caught
a child robbing, he would hold their hands over his grill and sear their
skin like a piece of meat.  At first when Ash had seen this happen,
she'd wondered why the children took the risk.  Now she knew.  The smell
of grilled fat and onions was enough to drive a starving child insane.

Walkinga little bit to test the strength of her legs, she felt her gaze
returning to Vaingate.  The gate tower looked so quiet--only one
brother-in-the-watch that she could see--and the portcullis itself was
up. It would be so easy to walk over there and slip through.  No one
would recognize her; that much was certain.

And she knew from watching the gate for the past few days that no
special arrangements were in place: just one sworn brother, occasionally
two at changing watches.  Even the beggars and street vendors never
changed.  Surely it would be safe?

Ash's stomach growled as she reached the roof wall.  Soft cramps had
begun to sound in her lower abdomen, and she wondered if her second
menses were due. She had to take the gate now.  The voices might come
back at any time, and she didn't know how much longer she could fight
them, didn't know if she could survive blacking out another time.  Two
hours yesterday.  Four today.

Ash shook her head.  It was now or never.

Decision made, she felt herself filling up with a splintery, last stand
kind of strength.  Once she had been through the gate and seen the place
where she had been found, everything would change.  She would be free to
leave the city and go where she pleased.  She could read and write;
those skills had their uses.  Perhaps she could find a position as a
ladies' maid or traveling companion or even a maiden scribe.  Maybe she
could travel east to the Cloistress Tower at Owl's Reach and ask the
green-robed sisters for asylum. If only it wasn't winter .  .  and so
cold that the wind blew your breath back as ice.

Ash drew her cloak close as she made her way down through the
treacherous landscape of the tannery.  She was Ash March, Foundling,
left outside Vaingate to die.  t t t "Er .  ..  nay, lad.  I think we'll
be taking the back door in."  Angus grinned at Raif in the way he always
did when he was about to do something that made no sense.

"A wee hike around the back of the city will do the horses a power of
good. Work the colic from their bellies."

Raif knew better than to argue.  He and Angus had been traveling
together for two weeks now, and Raif could spot one of his uncle's
diversions a league away.  Angus Lok seldom took the most
straightforward route anywhere.  As the blind crow flies, as the wounded
crow crawls, and as the dead crow rots were favorite sayings of his,
used to excuse his eccentric methods of getting from one place to
another.  If there was a road, Angus would not take it.  If there was a
bridge, Angus would not cross it.  If there was a city gate, Angus would
examine it from a distance and then shake his head.  "Come on, young
Sevrance.  Stare up at Hoargate any longer and the guards'll have us
pegged as a dimwit and his fool."

Raif continued to stare at the black and icy arch of Spire Vanis's
western gate.  It was massive, cut from a single blood wood as big as a
church.  The bark had been stripped away, and the remaining heartwood
had the smooth gleam of obsidian.  The carvings that chased around the
arch were thick with hoar frost yet all things the west represented--the
setting sun, the blood wood forests, the Storm Margin, the Wrecking Sea
and the whales that swam within it-- could clearly be seen etched
beneath the ice.  In all his life Raif had never seen such a thing.
Nothing in the clan holds matched it.  Ever since they had caught sight
of the city walls two days back, Raif had felt a cold chill of
excitement quickening in his gut.  The creamy white stone of Spire Vanis
glowed in every kind of light that shone upon it.  Sunrise, sunset,
moonlight, and starlight: The city took something different from them
all. Here, in the bright sunlight of late morning, the towering walls
shone like forged steel.  The entire city seemed to throb and breathe
like a living thing.  Smoke rose from the stone mass like exhaled
breath, and beneath his feet Raif felt the earth shudder and rumble as
if a dragon were sleeping in a chamber far below.

"That's Mount Slain," Angus said, grabbing Raif's arm, not gently, and
guiding him away from the gate.

"It moves year-round.  You'll get used to it after a while."

Raif nodded absently.  Spire Vanis.  He could hardly believe he was
here.

The journey around the Black Spill had taken a week.  The Bitter Hills
north of the lake marked the clan holds southern border, and it seemed
to Raif that as every new day passed the clan holds receded deeper into
the mist.  He had not seen a clansman or clanswoman in days.  The stove
houses they had stayed at were large and gloomy, not really stove houses
at all, rather places that sold ale.  If you had no coin to buy food and
drink, the stove master threw you out--in the cod--and when fighting
erupted, there was no talk of stove laws or due respect, only the cost
of broken tables and chairs.  Raif had sat in these new non clan stove
houses and watched these things happen and let the truth of them settle
against his skin.  Stoves were not sacred here.  Old laws did not bind.
The One True God of blind faith and fresh air had no love for the men
who worshiped stone.

Angus was as at home here as he was in the clan holds He knew many
people and had many different ways of associating with them.  Some men
he would laugh and talk with openly in full sight of all; others he
would simply nod to or happen to meet outside near the jacks or the
smokehouse and exchange a few words with as he pulled on his gloves and
hood.  Some men he pretended not to know at all, yet Raif had little to
do but watch his uncle these past weeks and he had seen things a casual
observer would not.  Angus had a way of acknowledging men without even
looking their way.  He could communicate a thought with the smallest
shrug of his shoulders or arrange a meeting with the slightest narrowing
of eyes.

Four nights back, when they were settling down by the fire in a dingy
stove house on the western shore of the Spill, Raif had discovered he'd
left his hand knife in his saddlebag.  When he'd run over to the stables
to retrieve it, he'd come upon a man slippinga square of folded
parchment under the bay's blanket.  Raif had pretended not to notice. If
a stranger wanted to pass a note to Angus, it was nothing to him.  The
man, a toothless birch eater in a moose coat, was one of a group of five
drovers who were driving their cattle upland in search of graze.  Angus
had not once looked his way all night.

Although Angus liked to visit stove houses he seldom chose to spend the
night there, and more often than not he and Raif camped out under the
stars.  The warmer temperatures in the city holds made it bearable, yet
the open farmlands and clear-cut hillsides made cover increasingly hard
to find. Angus liked cover, Raif had noticed, and often traveled several
hours past sunset in search of a dense stand of basswoods, a bank cut
low into the hillside, or a favorable cluster of rocks.

Angus set a hard pace, and Raifwas glad of it.  There was a lot to be
said for falling into an exhausted sleep each night.  Long days in the
saddle, battling the wind, the ice storms, and the aches and pains of a
mending body left Raiftoo tired for thought.  He rode, ate, stripped
logs for the morning cook fire melted ice, skinned hares, plucked birds,
and took care of Moose. He did not hunt.  The blister on his right hand
was purple and bloated with blood.

Pain was something he lived with.  The stitches on his chest itched and
burned as the skin knitted itself together.  The urge to tear off his
clothes and claw the healing flesh was overpowering, and he would have
scratched his chest raw if it hadn't been for the sheer number of layers
between his fingers and his skin.  It drove him mad.  He cursed his
mitts, his oilskins, his soft skins his elk coat, and his wool shirt. To
make matters worse, Angus had insisted that the wounds be covered in
purified butter and he now stank like something kept a day too long in
the sun.  By comparison, the cuts and bruises on his face were bearable.
A scab the size of a leech clung to the cheekbone directly below his
left eye, and a hairline split on his lip made smiling more trouble than
it was worth.

"This way.  We'll make better time the farther we travel from the wall."

Raif followed Angus' direction, leading Moose through the bald and
rutted ground that surrounded the west wall.  A sharp wind blew down
from the mountain, hissing in his ears and driving ice crystals into his
face.  Ahead, the north face of Mount Slain rose above the city like a
frozen god, its cliffs and high plains blue with compacted snow, its
skirt black with pines. The air smelled of something Raif couldn't put a
name to, some faintly sulfurous mineral that belonged deep beneath the
earth.  Underfoot, the ground snow was hard and unforgiving, harboring
no shadows to reveal its depth.  The city itself tantalized Raif with
brief glimpses of iron spires, blazing watch towers, and stone archways
as smooth and pale as the bones of a long dead child.

Angus was quiet as they made their way south along the wall.  He had not
applied any protective waxes or oils this morning, yet his face looked
as pale as if he had.  Leading the bay at a brisk pace, he grew
impatient whenever snowdrifts slowed them.

Raif glanced at the sky.  Midday.

"Do you come often to this city?"

Angus sent Raif a sharp glance.

"I have no love for this place."  It was the end of the subject as far
as Angus was concerned, for he turned his attention to trotting the bay
through the tangle of weeds and mud ice that lay in the storm channel
ahead.  Raif knew his uncle expected him to say no more, but his chest
was itchingand the devil was in him, and he was getting tired of Angus
and his evasions.

"Why come here, then?"

Angus' shoulders stiffened at the question.  He pulled hard on the bay's
reins, causing the gelding to whiffle and shake his head.  Raif thought
his uncle wasn't going to answer, yet when they reached the first in a
series of giant buttresses that supported the main wall, Angus turned to
face him.

"I come here because I have people I must see and others I must take
heed of. Don't think, Raif Sevrance, that you are the only one in this
world who is troubled and hard done by.  The clan holds are just the
start.  There are people who would see more than Clan Bludd and Clan
Blackhail at each other's throats.  Some of them are in this city, some
of them scheme in bed each night and call themselves clansmen when they
wake in the morning, and others are hidden in vaults so deep that even
the sun can't find them.  There is danger here for me, and that means
there is danger for you also.  Soon enough you will attract enemies in
your own right.  For now be content that the burdens of danger and
protection fall on me."

Angus took Raif by the shoulders and held him at arm's length.  His face
was grim.

"I am your kin, and you must trust me.  Save your questions for a place
far away from these walls.  There's nothing but ill memories here for
me."

Raif looked at his uncle carefully.  He could see him shaking, feel the
heat of his body through his sealskin gloves as he waited for Raif to
speak.  Raif wanted to know more.  How was it that Angus knew so much
about the Clan Wars? Was Mace Blackhail one of the clansmen he
mentioned?  Who were the men whom no sun could reach?  Raif frowned.
Although he didn't much want to, he said,

"I'll hold my questions for now."

Angus nodded back at him.

"That's favor enough for me."

The sky darkened as they led the horses around the buttress walls and on
toward the mountain.  Snow clouds were rolling south and the sun was
soon hidden from view.  Two tall structures rose against the city's west
wall, one dark and ringed with metal outer work the other as pale as ice
and so tall that Raif could not see its peak.  "The Horn and the
Splinter," Angus said, slapping his coat in search of his flask.

"That's Mask Fortress on the other side of the wall.  Home of the
surlords of Spire Vanis."

Raif could not take his eyes from the tower called the Splinter.  It
wasn't merely the color of ice, it was ice.  A rime of it covered the
stonework like fat around a skinned carcass, gleaming yellow then blue
in the light.  Raif shivered.  He was cold and empty, and he needed a
drink.

Angus handed him the rabbit flask.  The alcohol had been spiked with
birch bark, and it tasted sweet and earthy like newly turned soil.

One mouthful was enough.  Thumping the cork in place, Raif said,

"Does anyone live in that thing?"

"The Splinter?  Nay, lad.  It was flawed from the day it was built.  Too
high, you see.  Milks the storm clouds.  By all accounts it's little
more than a broken shell inside.  None except Robb Claw ever lived
there, if living's the right word for it.  Holed himself up one winter,
he did, and never came out.  They found his corpse ten years later.

Took five men to carry it to the light of day, as it had turned as hard
as stone.  " Angus sniffed.

"That's the story, anyhow."  Raif looked away.  He knew little of the
Mountain Cities and their history.

Some of the border clans had dealings with Ille Glaive, but few clansmen
had words, good or otherwise, to spare for the cities and their closely
guarded holds.

"Who was Robb Claw?"

Angus slowed his pace as they reached the southwest cornerstone of the
city and the bay was forced to pick its way through the rocks, dead root
wood and loose shale that had rolled down from the mountain.  The path
steepened and narrowed, and then there was no path at all.  Raif felt
sweat trickle along his stitch lines.  "Robb Claw was the great-grandson
of Glamis Claw, one of the Founding Quarterlords of Spire Vanis."

"Was he a king?"

"Nay, lad.  No king's ever ruled in Spire Vanis, though it's not from
want of trying.  The Founding Quarterlords were the bastard sons of
kings; their fathers ruled lands far to the south, and each king had
enough true sons to ensure that neither lands nor titles would ever cede
to their bastards.  This pleased the Quarterlords not at all and there
were many battles fought and many knives slipped into prince flesh Two
of the four were the brothers Theron and Rangor Pengaron, and they
joined with Glamis Claw and Torny Fyfe to raise a war host and march it
north across the Ranges.  Theron was their leader, might have even
crowned himself a king if it hadn't been for the other three lords at
his back.  As it was, he led the host against the Sull, founded the
city, and built the first strong- wall of stone and timber where Mask
Fortress lies today."  Angus wagged his head toward the Splinter.

"Though it was Robb Claw who built the four towers."

As Raif followed his uncle's gaze, the mountain shivered beneath his
feet, sending chips of shale rolling down the slope.  The ice on the
tower made a soft, knuckle-snapping sound as a hairline crack ran down
along the rime.

"Why don't they just knock it down?"  he heard his voice say.

"Pride, lad.  The Killhound of Spire Vanis is said to roost upon the
Iron Spire that caps it.  Five hundred years ago they'd haul traitors up
there by a great contraption of metal and rope and impale them on the
spire.  The winged beasties were said to gobble them up for breakfast."
Angus squinted into the clouds that wrapped themselves around the tower.

"Or was it supper?  I forget now."

They led their horses away.  Raif grew hotter and more uncomfortable as
they hiked across a shoulder of pitted limestone and then down into a
ravine. Massive stone conduits built to divert the runoff around the
city had to be crossed with care, as the ice was unstable and wet.

Moose tore his left hock on a jagged edge, but Angus refused to stop and
bind it, and they left a trail of horse blood in their wake.

An hour later, when the gate finally came into view, Raif felt nothing
but relief.  His stitches itched like all the hells, and so much fluid
had leaked from his blister to his glove that the hide had hardened to
armor and set itself in a permanent curve around the reins.  Raif wanted
to go to some dark stove house and sleep.  He was tired enough that he
would not dream or, if he did, not remember it later.

Angus gave the gate a name and struck a path down from the mountainside
toward the wall.  It was smaller than Hoargate, made of plain stone that
arched as gracefully as a drawn bow.  No road of any kind led from it.
No one stood waiting for admission--indeed, there was nowhere for anyone
to stand as the gate opened directly onto a grassy slope.  As they drew
level with the first gate tower, a hoarse cry split the air.

"Get her!"

A child stepped through the gate.  A girl.  Hearing the cry, she
hesitated, glanced back, then started to run.  Two men, dressed like
beggars but carrying swords of bloodred steel, emerged through the gate
and ran straight for her.  The girl was weak and very thin, and they
caught her in less than ten seconds.  She fought them in a quiet, almost
animal way, not making a sound, but kickingand jerking furiously, making
it difficult for the men to hold her.  Her hood was torn off and then
her gloves.  Her shoulder-length hair was caked in dirt.  An ice sore
cast a shadow across her lips.

More men came.  One man was massive, with hands that swung at his side
like lead weights.  His small eyes glinted like iron filings.  Raif
watched in growinganger as the big man approached the girl and smacked
her full in the face.  The girl's neck snapped back, and she stopped
struggling.  Blood trickled from her nose to her lip.  The big man said
something to the others, making them laugh in an excited, nervous way
that seemed more to do with fear than amusement.  He struck the girl
again, casually this time, with a half-closed fist.

Raif felt his blood heat.  He stepped forward.

Angus put a hand on Raifs arm, barring him from takinganother step.

"There's trouble here we want no part of.  That's Marafice Eye,
Protector General of the Rive Watch.  If he chooses to torment a beggar
girl outside one of his own gates, there's nothing you or I can do about
it."

Raif continued to press forward.  The man named Marafice Eye tore off
the girl's cloak.  Fabric ripped.  A breath of fear puffed from the
girl's lips.

"Easy, lad," warned Angus, fingers digging deep.

"We canna afford to draw attention in this place.  More than your life
and mine depend on it."

Raif glanced at his uncle.  Angus' face was grave, the lines around his
mouth as deep as scars.

"If it were just you and me alone in this, I would save her.  Believe
that. I would not lie about another's life."

Raif did believe him.  He saw what was in his uncle's eyes.  Angus Lok
feared someone or something greatly in this city .  .  and he was not a
man who feared lightly.  Raif stopped pushing.  Angus released his grip.

A group of six armed men now surrounded the girl.  All but two were
dressed in muddy cloaks and ragged pants, yet Raif began to realize that
none of them were beggars.  Their steel gleamed with linseed oil, their
hair and beards were trimmed and clean, and their arms and necks were
corded with the sort of hard muscle that was built during long practice
sessions on a weapons court. The one named Marafice Eye was dressed in a
rough brown robe, like a cleric or a monk.  Despite his size he carried
only a hand knife All the men deferred to him.

The girl had lost the sleeves and collar from her dress.  She was being
held by three men, only one of whom was dressed in the same oiled and
supple leathers worn by the guards at Hoargate.  The girl's body was
twisted so that her skirt rode up around her thighs and her head hung
down, unsupported.

"Let her drop."

Raif heard Marafice Eye's words clearly.  Immediately the three men
released their hold, and the girl slumped to the ground.  She remained
silent as Marafice Eye poked her with the toe of his boot.  "Thought
you'd run away, eh?  Thought you'd made a fool of the Knife?"  He jabbed
her twice in the ribs.

"Thought you'd get away with leaving one of my men to die."  Bringing
the heel of his boot down on her hand, he drove her fingers into the
snow. Something snapped with the soft click of rotted wood.  Still, the
girl did not cry out.  Raiffelt the anger come to him.  He imagined
killing the six men in slow and hideous ways.  Clansmen would never do
such a thing to a woman.  A small voice whispered, What about the
Bluddroad?  but he cut it from his mind.

"Go on.  Run.  Let's see just how far you'll get."  Marafice Eye shoved
his foot under the girl's back, raising her torso off the ground.

"Run, I said.  Grod here has a fancy for the hunt.  You remember Grod,
don't you?  You left him a lock of your hair."

The girl tried to struggle to her feet.  She was so thin; Raif wondered
where her strength came from.  Making the mistake of putting her weight
on her damaged hand, she inhaled sharply and collapsed back into the
snow.

That was when she spotted them.

The six armed men had spread out, allowing her room to stand, and the
space between her and Angus and Raif was now clear.  Raif got his first
real look at the girl free from shadows and darting bodies.

Something in his throat tightened.  She wasn't as young as he had first
thought.

Storm clouds parted and sunlight streamed down onto the girl's face,
illuminating her skin with silver light.  Raiffelt his body cool.  One
by one the hairs along his spine lifted, and the skin beneath them
pulled as tight as if ghost fingers were laid upon it.  Even as he shook
the chill from him, something hardly important and yet at the same time
vital fell into place inside his head.

She was not looking at him.

She was looking at Angus Lok.

Gray eyes drew Angus' coppery ones to her as surely as if they were
connected by a thread.  A second hung like dust in warm air as they
locked gazes.

Everything stopped.  Wind and cold and sunlight died.  Raiffelt like a
shadow, like nothing.  Angus and the girl were all that counted.

Then he heard his uncle draw breath.  A word was spoken--Raif heard it
clearly but did not understand its meaning.  Hera, Angus said.  Angus
Lok drew his sword.  Plain it was, steel as gray as sleet.  He stepped
forward, and as he did so, something shed from him like old skin.  He
grew larger and taller and more terrible.  His eyes stopped being copper
and became golden instead.

"Hold the horses," he murmured without once looking Raifs way.

"Hold them and wait."

Raif took the bay's reins instinctively.  Fear filled the hollow spaces
in his chest.  He didn't understand.  Did Angus think he could fight six
armed men?  What was happening here?

Angus walked forward, his fist curled around the leather grip of his
sword. He was shaking intensely, almost vibrating.  The girl was still
on the ground.  Marafice Eye was shoving her with his boot, in the
manner of a hunter who wasn't quite sure whether or not the game he had
just brought down was dead.  The guard dressed in black leathers noticed
Angus first.  Raising his red blade, he nudged the Knife.

Marafice Eye looked up.  Angus was about thirty paces away from him.

Slowly Marafice Eye wiped the spittle from his lips.  His eyes
brightened.

"Drop the gate," he shouted to some unseen guard in the gate tower.

"I think I'll take this fight inside."  Without once taking his eyes
from Angus, he gestured to his men to gather up the girl and carry her
into the city.  Three men dealt with the girl, while the other two moved
to flank their leader.  Marafice Eye held his position, watching Angus
approach. Above his head, metal gears whined, then the gate shuddered
into life.

Raif pulled the horses toward a dead birch and tethered them.  His eyes
were on the gate, watchingas spiked gratings black with mud began to
descend with a stop-and-start motion.  The moment his hands were free of
the reins, he broke into a run.

Angus stepped onto the gate platform.  Marafice Eye smiled tightly, then
backed away, allowing the two men flanking him to cut first steel.
Swords, red as if blood were already upon them, angled upward toward the
light.  Pulleys screeched overhead, spinning out of control, and the
gate began to plummet.

Angus leaped forward, dodging the iron spikes by a hair-thin slice of a
moment.  Raif ran and ran and ran.  He had to get to Angus.

Too late.  The gate crashed to the ground as he stepped onto the
platform. Clumps of greasy snow fell onto his head and shoulders as he
grabbed the grille and rattled it with all his might.

"Angus!"

Paces away on the other side, five armed men formed a baiting circle
around his uncle.  Angus' face was dark and still.  His blade edge was
already tipped with one man's blood, and as he cut a defensive circle
around his position, he wounded two more.

Three men in black leathers rushed from the gate tower and attended the
girl, dragging her back from the fighting.  Raif counted nine red blades
in all. Marafice Eye stood off to the side, watching.  His small lips
twitched as Angus took a cut to the ear.

Raifs heart hammered in his chest.  He had to do something.  Wildly he
looked around.  He saw Moose and the bay nosing snow to get at the tufts
of fat thisuegrass buried beneath.  A wing-shaped piece of leather
riding high on the bay's back caught his eye: Angus' bow case

Raif raced for it.  A soft cry sounded at his back: Angus had taken a
second hit.  Raif took a short breath.  He couldn't risk thinking about
that now; it would only slow him.  As he fumbled with the brass buckle
on the bow case his hands had never felt so big or so clumsy.  Grease
from the gate made everything slippery, and his fingers wouldn't bend.

Bracing the bow seemed to take hours.  The waxed string was cold and
stiff; it kept breaking free of the knot.  He had to use his teeth in
the end, pulling the thread through with a violent snap of his jaw.

Running his shaking fingers along the belly of the bow, he tried to calm
himself.  The bow was exquisitely carved, deeply inset with silver and
midnight blue horn.  Touching it helped.  He had drawn it before; he
knew its measure and its hand.

Turning, he slid Angus' quiver around his waist and sprinted back to the
gate.  The iron grating was densely woven.  Bars as thick as a man's
wrist crossed at right angles, leaving two-inch squares in between. Raif
drew an arrow from the quiver.  Its leaded head was heavier than he was
used to, and in a deep, instinctual part of his brain he knew it would
take more pull and height to aim it.

On the other side of the gate, one man was down, floored by a gash to
his shoulder, and another two men were bleeding from snipe cuts to the
arms and legs.  Only one guard looked after the girl now, twisting her
arm behind her back to keep her close.  The seven remaining red blades
were all focused on containing Angus Lok.  Angus was clearly frustrated
by their baiting tactics. If one or two swordsmen had come forward to
engage him, he would have bettered them; Raif saw how swiftly his uncle
moved, how certain he was with his plain journeyman's sword.  But the
red blades preferred to play a waiting, tiring game.  They knew Angus
was dangerous.  It was easier and safer to wait for a mistake.

Marafice Eye watched from his position on the periphery, jabbing only
occasionally with his crab-hilted knife.  Unlike the men under him, he
chose his moments with care, and his blade always came away wet.  A
ribbon of blood, dark and slow as molasses, ran down Angus' right cheek
and across his jaw.  He kept pushing forward toward the girl, but the
red blades kept him back.

Raif swallowed a mouthful of saliva.  What had driven Angus to attack?

It was madness.  Standing back from the gate, he nocked the lead-packed
arrowhead and raised the bow to his chest.  The stitches across his rib
cage burned like new wounds as he drew the string.

Fighting the pain and the hot salty tears it brought, he concentrated on
picking out a target.  He had counted five arrows in Angus' quiver.

Five.  None could go astray.

Focusing his gaze beyond the steel-rimmed eyelet, Raif chose the man who
presented the most immediate threat to Angus: a thin, dark-haired weasel
dressed in sackcloth and stewed leather who had grown impatient with
baitingand was gradually working his way under Angus' arm.  He was fast
and vicious, and he reminded Raif of a Scarpeman.

Raif aimed for his upper chest, sighting him purely through the notch on
the riser.  He wanted no heart kills, nothing to sicken or stain him.
That was one madness he would not bring to this fight.  As he searched
for the still line that would lead his arrow home, the blister on his
hand cracked open and a line of yellow fluid oozed along his wrist.

He released the string.  The arrow shot ahead.  The bow recoiled,
slamming in his hand like a bird.  Thwang.  Metal slammed against metal.
Orange sparks sprayed through the grille.  Raif cried out in frustration
as he watched his arrow nosedive into the snow beyond the gate.  The
arrowhead had hit the iron grating.  One of its flight feathers was
lodged in the grille like elk hair on a fence.  "Aargh!"

Raif focused his gaze on the fighting beyond the gate.  The weasel man
jerked his blade free of Angus' shoulder.  Blood pumped from a dark hole
in Angus' buckskin coat.  His face was gray and twisted with pain.  The
red blades needled him, drawing pinpricks of blood.  Angus roared.
Swinging in a mighty turning circle, he severed one man's hand and
sliced deeply into another's hip.

Raif glanced down at his quiver.  Four arrows left.  Seven men.  Gods
help me, 1 can't miss another shot.  Cursing his shaking hands, his
weeping blister, and the fierce burning in his chest, he drew the second
arrow from the quiver.  Angus was slowing; his left arm was draggingand
he was taking hard, frothing breaths.  Watching him, watching muscles in
his cheeks pulse with anger and some other unknowable emotion that lay
between sorrow and dread, Raif knew what he had to do.  It wasn't a
matter of choice anymore. It was a matter of shared blood.

The arrow was nocked and primed in less than an instant.  Raif held it
fast against the plate as he drew the bow.  The weasel man grew large in
his sights, big as a giant.  Raif called him nearer.  The space between
them contracted, and then suddenly there was no space at all.

Raif smelled sweat and the secret scent of blood and waste that lay
trapped beneath the skin.  Then nothing mattered but the heart.

Engorged with blood, heavy with life force, driven by the one thing that
the gods had no power over, the heart filled Raif's sights like a glance
into the sun.  Things became known to him, small things about the body
that surrounded the vital, pumping core.  The weasel man's blood ran too
fast, rushing through his body like hot steam in search of release.  His
liver was hard and dimpled, dark with disease, and only one testicle
hung from his groin.

This and more Raif knew in less time than it took for a used breath to
ascend from his lungs.  It meant nothing.  Nothing.  The heart was his.

He kissed the stringand released the arrow, and by the time his
shoulders had dealt with the recoil, the weasel man was dead.

Heart-killed.  His legs dropped beneath him, his bladder failed, and he
was gone.

Metal flooded Raifs mouth.  A pain, like the sickening wrench of a bone
pulled from its socket, worked its way through his chest.  Js this what
lam? Cold killer of men?

It was a question he had no time for.  Another arrow was already in his
hand, though he had no memory of drawing it, and he brought it to the
plate and pulled once more upon the string.  His powers of
discrimination had gone--blasted away by pain and madness--and he set
his sights on the first red blade who crossed his plate.  The heart came
to him, faster than an eye focusing on a distant object.

Young and strong, this heart, with a body only lately visited by
disease. Something dark grew in the deepest under level of the lungs, a
lobe of quiet flesh.  He spared it no thought as he released the string.
The thrum of the arrow merged with the soft gurgle of a stopped breath,
and then another faceless body hit the snow.  Raif drew the third arrow.
Pain blurred his vision, saliva corroded his gums.  On the far side of
the gate, Angus was takingadvantage of the fear spreading through the
remaining men.  As Raif pulled his bow, Angus slid his steel into kidney
flesh, and a red blade fell to the ground, screaming and clutchingat his
gut.  Behind the circle of armed men, the black-cloaked guard in charge
of the girl was beginning to panic. He threw her onto the ground and put
the point of his sword against her neck. The girl's chest rose and fell,
rose and fell.  Her fingers scratched the snow.

Even before he was aware of what he was doing, Raif called the guard's
heart to his sights.  It happened so quickly he barely got an impression
of the man before he released the string.  The arrowhead shot through a
break in the fightingand entered the guard's heart from behind, pinning
his cloak to his spine.

Raif swayed.  His head rang with pain.  Dimly he was aware of objects
hitting the metal grating, as knives and missiles were flung his way.

None got through.  He could see little now, only sharp edges and
glimmers of light.  He saw a moving blur that he knew to be his uncle,
and three or perhaps four figures surrounding him.  His thoughts came
slowly, clumsily, floating in his mind like pieces of driftwood.  One
arrow, that was all he knew.  One arrow.  One shot.  Must take it.  He
couldn't see, but he could feel.  As he drew the bow, something within
him fastened on to the nearest heart.  It happened with the speed and
certainty of a stone dropping in a well.  .  .  and it made Raif sick to
his gut.  His arms adjusted their positions and his bow hand ceased
shaking and he knew with utter confidence the exact instant to release
the string.  Dead, he thought dully, gone the moment I found his heart.

After that, someone else went down: one of the red blades dressed in
shabby stripes.  Angus landed a blow that made another man squeal like a
pig.  Raif swayed.  Stumbling forward, he grabbed hold of the grille for
support.  His eyes cleared for a moment, and he saw Marafice Eye looking
straight at him. Raif took a breath.  The Knife stood apart from his
remaining men in the shadow of the east gate tower, his eyes as pale as
gristle in a piece of meat.  As Raif watched, he turned his gaze first
to the girl, then to Angus Lok, deciding what he would do.

The girl was thirty paces away from him, and even as Marafice Eye
stepped toward her, Angus moved to block his path.

Raif felt himself failing.  With his last scrap of strength, he focused
his eyes hard on Marafice Eye, holding the man in his sights, willing
him to turn and look.  When the Knife shifted his gaze and their eyes
met, Raif released his hand from the grille and reached down toward the
quiver at his waist.  In that moment Marafice Eye knew he was going to
be shot, heart-killed like four of his men.  Raif saw the realization in
the man's eyes, saw the understanding that he could not reach the girl
before the arrow reached him and that it was better to withdraw than
die.  As Raifs hand closed around fresh air, Marafice Eye barked an
order and fled.

Raifs legs collapsed beneath him, and he slid down to a place where the
walls were formed from darkness and the edges creased with pain.

CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR.

The Gods Lights here were twelve secret uses for whale blubber, and this
night Eloko, widow to Kulahuk and mother to Nolo and Avranna, had
promised to show Sadaluk one of them.  Eloko was a fine woman, with
teeth as tiny as a baby's and the belly of a fat snow bear.  She was not
young, but Sadaluk was not fussy about that.  When a tribeswoman offered
comfort to an old man, it was something to be celebrated, not picked
apart like a whale carcass after a kill.  Eloko had been widowed for ten
months, and it was fitting that she had chosen to break mourning with an
elder of the tribe.  It showed respect.  The Ice God could not fault her
for that.

The Listener permitted himself to think about Eloko and her plentiful
supply of whale blubber for only a short while longer.  Eloko had waited
ten months. Sadaluk himself had waited that and more.  It would do
neither of them much harm to stand at opposite sides of the village, one
in a house made of driftwood and clay and the other in a ground dug from
hard earth and braced with whalebone, and watch the Gods Lights for a
few hours more.

The sky was clear tonight, dark and brilliant as the hole in the center
of a man's eye.  The Gods Lights raged to the north like flames from a
wildfire burning beyond the horizon.  Pink and green, the lights
flashed, the colors of all living things.  Every winter the Gods Lights
unfurled like banners in the clear night sky.  Their slow, languid
movements reminded Sadaluk of seaweed floating in deep water, limbs
unfurling with the grace of weightless things.  If you listened very
hard, you could hear them.  The noise sounded like the crackingand
ripping of wind in the sails of a ship.  Some said it was the same noise
you heard before you died, but Sadaluk did not know about that.

He did know that the lights were a message from the gods.  Look at us,
they proclaimed.  See how beautiful and terrible we are.  See how we
come to you in full winter, when your sons and daughters need us the
most.

It was impossible to look upon the northern lights and deny the presence
of the gods.  Lootavek, the one who had listened before him, said that
the Ice Trappers would know when the end of the world was coming, as the
lights would burn red.

"The gods will give us warning," he said one night as they camped on the
sea ice, butchering seals.

"They will send us a sky filled with blood."  Sadaluk remembered looking
down at his own wet and bloody hands and asking, "How do you know this?"

Lootavek had given him one of his looks.

"You ask the wrong question, Sadaluk.  How is not important, it is the
why that counts."

 "Why, then?"

"So that we will be the first to know."

Sadaluk had finished the butchering in silence, not really understanding
what the Listener meant but unwilling to ask any more questions.  He had
been young then, in awe of the Listener, as was right and proper for a
young hunter in the tribe.  Now, tonight, watching the Gods Lights dance
in the northern skies, he wished he had asked more.  The lights seemed
darker than he remembered them, the pinks deeper, the greens
flickeringand strangely distorted.  Sometimes he thought he saw flashes
of red in the farthest reaches of the corona.  It's nothing, he told
himself.  There have always been streaks of red in the lights.

But surely tonight there were more?

Frowningat the wildness of his own thoughts, he turned his back on the
sky and entered his ground.  Eloko would be getting impatient and might
yet close the door in his face.  A woman's pride was a fierce thing, and
making her wait was one thing, but making her wait too long was quite
another.  And it would be good to feel warm arms around his back and the
touch of another's hands on his face.  Why, then, could he not get
Lootavek's voice out of his head?  So that we will be the first to know.
There had been pride in that statement, Sadaluk realized that now.  Ice
Trappers were always the first to know.

"We live on the edge of the world,"

Lootavek had said another time, during summer, when swarms of blackflies
formed clouds in the sky and even the dogs stayed indoors.

"We pay a great price in hunger and death, and for this we bear the
messages of the gods.  We are closest to them, Sadaluk.  Never forget
that.  After I am gone, you must listen to your dreams and wait for the
messages to come." Sadaluk tsked.  If he were a sane man, he would be
reaching for his bear coat and gloves; he would march across the village
and take himself quickly to Eloko's door.  An offer had been made, and a
short walk would secure it, and he would be an ice-rotted fool if he let
the opportunity pass.  But he wasn't sane, and the Gods Lights worried
him, and thirty days and thirty nights had passed and still Black Claws
had failed to home.  The Listener did not think the raven would be
coming back.  The thought pained him, for he had loved Black Claws the
most, and the idea of the raven lying dead on some glaciated cirque or
frozen lake was upsetting in strange new ways.

Had he been attacked by other birds or the hand of man?  Had he
delivered his message before he went down, or had the small strip of
spruce bark fallen into unwelcome hands?  The Listener shook his unease
away.  It's only a raven, he told himself.  One less bird to find scraps
for through the long winter's night.

Stretching his hard old hands upon the door frame, he prepared to go
inside. It was high time that another message was sent.  The Old Blood
had to be told that the dance of shadows had begun.  They must send Far
Riders to him and make bid upon the future and stand upon the sea ice
and see the Gods Lights for themselves.

Pullinga strip of birch bark from a peg near his door, Sadaluk took one
last look at the sky.  Red, he saw, a world flickering red.  t t t Iron
chains rattled.  Metal groaned.  Feet thudded over compacted snow.

"Drink.  Drink."

Raif instinctively shied away from the cold, stinging fumes that rose
from a nozzle thrust toward his face.  He did not want to drink.

Fingers, neither clean nor fragrant, thrust themselves into his mouth,
forcing his jaw apart.  Liquid was poured.  A moment passed while the
open cavity of his mouth was filled, and then the liquid streamed down
his throat. Raif gasped and spluttered and raised his head.  Spitting,
he cleared his mouth of the foulness.  Angus frowned at him.

"You must drink your fill, lad.  I know it tastes like lamp fuel, but I
swear it will do you good."  Raif glanced around.  The sun had sunk
behind the mountain, and the sky was dark and silvery, transforming
itself into night. He was lying in soft snow by the gate.  The grating
had been raised, and six bodies lay in the plowed field of blood, mud,
and slush on the other side. His hand rose to feel for his raven lore.
The horn was as smooth as a pulled tooth, hotter than his skin.  He
drank more of the liquid.  Already he felt his body working, tingling,
as if it had been whipped with dry birches.  His mind sharpened.
Suddenly he realized that Angus was wounded; blood was gouting from a
hole in his buckskins.  Raif began to rise.

Angus put a hand on his shoulder and forced him back down.

"Easy, lad.  Give the ghost meal chance to work."

"Ghostmeal?"

"Medicine to you."  Angus looked over his shoulder, wincingas muscles in
his chest were stretched.

"Come.  Please.  We will not hurt you."  It took Raif a moment to
realize his uncle was speaking to someone else.

The girl.  Edgingaround, he saw she was standing by the far gate post,
watching them.  Ragged bits of her dress blew in the wind, and her pale
hair sparkled with ice.  Dried blood formed a black line around her jaw.
She did not speak.

Angus stood heavily and at great cost, pressinga hand to his chest.

"You must come with us, with Raif.  They will be back soon.  You are not
safe here anymore."

"Who are you?  Why did you help me?"

Raif was surprised by the calmness of the girl's voice.  Her gray eyes
were cool, and there was an air of confidence about her that he had not
expected from a beggar girl.

Angus' gaze flickered to the city behind her back.

"I am Angus Lok of Ille Glaive, and this is my kinsman Raif Sevrance.
We helped you because you were in need.  We would help you again if you
will allow us.  You need food and clothingand protection.  Come with us
and we will take you to a safe place."

"Where?"

Raif almost smiled.  The girl wasn't about to be fobbed off with one of
Angus Lok's typically vague replies.

Strangely, Angus smiled too.  His entire body strained toward the girl
as he said,

"We head for Ille Glaive."

The girl nodded slowly.  She looked at Raif.  Shouts and horse thunder
sounded within the city.  Her face stiffened as she listened.

"Please," Angus murmured.

"I swear on all that is precious to me I will not harm you."

Raif had never heard his uncle speak so quietly before.  It disturbed
him. Why had Angus risked his life to save this thin scrap of a girl?

"Will we leave through Vaingate?"  The girl's calm demeanor was wearing
thin as the thud and clatter of armed men grew louder.  Her shoulders
twitched as a voice bellowed,

"To the gate!"

"You and Raif will.   I'll drop the gate behind you so it looks as if
you're still within the city with me.   Then I'll lead the Rive Watch on
a fair chase and meet you on the east road past midnight."   "No.   You
can't stay in the city alone."   Raif struggled to his feet, battling
pain and nausea with clenched fists.

"I'm coming with you."

"No.   You must stay with the girl.   A party outside the city gates is
too easily found.   Someone needs to draw the Rive Watch away."   All
the hearty redness drained from Angus' face as he spoke, and suddenly he
looked like a stranger to Raif.

"You must go now.  As your uncle I command it."  Without waiting for a
reply, he turned and walked toward the gate.  Raif thought he would
touch the girl as he passed, for his hand jerked awkwardly toward her,
yet he didn't.  Turning, he headed for the gate tower instead.

Pulleys creaked a moment later as the brake was kicked free of the
crankshaft, and then the gate descended with a crash.  Spikes rattled in
their sockets like bones in a jar, and plates of ice that had quickened
over the limestone arch above the gate fractured and fell, revealinga
carving of a great winged beast.  The girl began to walk toward Raif.
Her eyes were bright and hard, and they stirred a memory within him . He
tried but could not place it.  Shrugging, he slipped the flask
containing the last of the ghostmeai into his coat.  He felt
light-headed and full of false strength. What in all the gods' names is
that stuff?

Angus emerged from the gatehouse seconds later.  The bloodstain on his
buckskin coat had spread, and the great mass of his body pitched
unevenly from step to step.

"Ride, do not walk," he said to Raif.

"The ghostmeai only gives so much; you'll feel worse for having drunk it
come dark.  Head southeast.  In about an hour you'll cross a game trail
above a stand of hemlock.  Follow it.  It should keep you out of sight
of the wall. When you come to Wrath- gate head east.  I'll find you
along the road."

Let me go in your place, Raif wanted to say.  Yet he guessed his uncle's
argument even before he spoke it: Angus knew Spire Vanis; he did not.  A
clansman with no knowledge of the city couldn't hope to evade the red
blades. Looking into his uncle's copper eyes, Raif knew he could do
nothing but nod and say,

"Until midnight."  Anything more would have cost Angus time.

The clatter of hoof irons grew louder.  A series of orders were shouted,
and the scrape of steel against leather told of weapons being drawn.

"Take care of the girl," Angus warned.  Before Raif had chance to
answer, he was gone.

Raif turned away from the gate.  Four dead men had his arrows in their
hearts: It was not a sight he wanted to dwell on.

The girl was no longer at his side.  She had stepped clear of the
platform and was now walking through the grainy snow and loose rocks on
the slope. Raif ran to fetch the horses.  He caught up with the girl on
the far side of the gate and forced her to step back against the wall.
Night was rising in the east, sending shadows spilling over the snow
like black oil.  The limestone was cold against Raifs back, smoother
than any stone ought to be.  As he pulled the horses to him, the ground
shook as an armed force descended upon the gate.  Breath ached in his
throat as he listened to the red blades rein in their mounts.  It would
be so easy for someone to raise the gate.  For the longest moment all
was quiet and still. Raif imagined the red blades standing in silence
over the bodies, their gazes moving from heart to heart.  Moose
snuffled.  Raif sent Orwin Shank's horse a look to silence the dead.
Booted feet crunched snow.  The gate grille chimed softly, moved by
either hands or wind.  Make them turn, Raif thought.  Gods, make them
turn.

A call sounded from within the city, high like the howl of a wolf.

Angus, Raif knew in an instant.  A cry went up.  Horse leather cracked
like whips, and then the ground shook once more as the red blades
charged from the gate.  Hunting.

Raif took a breath.  Anger toward the girl welled up inside him.  She
was the reason Angus was running through the city alone.  He turned to
face her .  . .  and saw that she was kneeling in the snow.  Her chin
was resting on her chest and her face was curiously still, the muscles
relaxed as if she were sleeping.  Raif pulled the horses forward.  What
was wrong with her?  Was she half-witted?

The girl didn't raise her head as he approached.  For the first time he
noticed how pale she was, like a statue carved from ice.  As he opened
his mouth to speak, her arms began to rise, gliding up through the air
like weightless, boneless things, reaching for something he could not
see.  Raif felt a pulse of fear beat close to his heart.  Her eyes were
closed.

He didn't know what made him act.  He just knew that something was wrong
and he had to stop it, and he reached out with his blistered hand and
grabbed the girl's arm.

Reach far us, pretty mistressss.  Break our chains of blood.  So close
now . so cose.  Reach.

Voices crowded Raifs mind.  Terrible, inhuman voices, insane with need,
panting with the cold hiss of gases escaping from decaying flesh, A
landscape of black ice opened before him, a wasteland of jagged peaks
and gleaming edges and dark, dark, trenches.  Raifs lore flared hot
against his chest.  His first instinct was to pull away, sever whatever
connection held him here: This was no place for him to be.  Yet the
girl's presence held him.  Her heart beat in a way he recognized
immediately, and she stopped beinga stranger and became known to him
instead.

Suddenly his raven lore was white-hot steel.  It burned through his
skin, to the muscle that lay beneath.  Raif gasped for breath.  It felt
as if the girl were entering him, boring through his chest along with
his lore.  She opened her eyes.  Gray eyes.  And he knew then that he
had seen her before: The guide stone had shown her to him.  The memory
was like cold water on his skin.  Usingall the false strength the ghost
meal had given him, he wrenched his hand from the girl's arm.

Air snapped as they parted.  Droplets of Raifs blood formed a red arc
between them.  The girl swayed, reached back in the snow to steady
herself.  Raif stumbled forward, bringing his blistered hand home to his
chest; it felt as if it had been dipped into the substance of another
world.

The girl moaned.  Raif paid her no heed.  Turning from her, he tugged
his oilskin apart.  His undamaged left hand fumbled with clothing,
desperate to get at skin.  The raven lore was unchanged, dark and cool:
a bloodless piece of horn from a bird long dead.  Even his skin seemed
unaffected.  There was redness and a shallow pressure mark, but no great
open wound, no tortured purple flesh.  Raif frowned.  But he had felt
it!  He could feel it now, whatever it was, a burn, a presence, a taint.
It was as if a red hot poker had been inserted beneath his skin.

Fear brought back his anger.  He wheeled around to face the girl.

"Get up.  We must be gone."

She looked at him with eyes that were impossible to read.  With her
right hand she cupped the portion of her arm he had touched.

"How long?"

Raif did not understand the question.  He made no answer.  "I said how
long? How long was I kneeling here before you came" --she struggled for
words"--and woke me?"

Woke?  Raif thought it an odd word to use.  He said,

"Only minutes."

The girl nodded.

After a moment, when she made no move to speak further or rise, Raif
said,

"We must leave now.  The red blades will be back."

She made a small gesture with her head toward the gate.

"Will he be all right?"

He wanted to say no, tell her that Angus was in grave danger and it was
all her fault, yet he found himself saying something else instead.

"Angus is no fool.  He can take care of himself.  If there's a safe way
out of the city, he'll find it."  The words were little enough, but he
felt better for saying them.  He almost believed they were true, The
girl's face relaxed just a little.  Brushing snow from her ruined skirt,
she struggled to her feet.  Raif moved forward to help her, then stopped
himself at the last instant.  He didn't know if he wanted to touch her
again.

"Please, could you leave me alone for a moment?  I'll come and join you
by the horses as soon as I... I'm finished."

Raif made a point of glancing to the gate.

"Be quick."  Purposely he kept his back toward her as he walked the
horses away.  He was curious about her request--and he didn't think she
meant to relieve herself in the snow--but he wouldn't question her or
spy on what she did.  He made himself busy fetching things from Angus'
saddlebag: blankets, a spare pair of gloves, a day-old roasted plover
packed in a greased cloth, a cake of sheep's blood and whey, a skin of
snow melt kept liquid by its nearness to Moose's rump, a little jar of
Angus' beeswax.  Things for the girl.

By the time everything was pulled out and ready, the burn in his chest
had subsided to a mild ache.  His hand throbbed, but that might have
been blister.  Shuddering slightly, he set his mind away from what he
had seen and heard.  That was the girl's business, not his.

"I'm ready to go now."  She stepped alongside him.

He had not heard her coming.  He covered his surprise by asking her if
she could ride.  When she nodded, he cupped both hands to take her foot
and hefted her onto the bay's back.  Her boots were thick, and when the
leather soles pressed against his palms he didn't feel as if he were
touching her at all.  That seemed like something to be thankful for.

He passed her the blankets and the beeswax first.  She accepted the jar
of wax in a way that made Raif think that she was accustomed to having
things handed to her.  Her calmness broke when she took possession of
the roasted plover, and she tore at the bird with gusto, eating skin,
gnawing on bones, licking her fingers for grease.

Raif smiled as he mounted Moose.  He liked her better now.

"What's your name?"

"Ash."

"I'm Raif."

"I know, the other man .  .  .  Angus.  .  .  said."

Raif felt put in his place.  He searched for something else to say, yet
the only subjects that sprang to mind seemed too dangerous to speak of
there and then.

"Raif.  You must promise to wake me again if... if I fall asleep."

Gray eyes met his.  Knowledge passed between them, and somehow she knew
all that he had seen and heard.  She touched her arm.

"They call me," she said.

"The voices."

Raif nodded.  That much he understood.  Knowing it wasn't his right to
question her, he passed her the whey cake and the water- skin.  Their
fingers touched over the creamy surface of the cake, but he felt
nothing, only the thinness of her skin.

"I'll watch out for you," he said.

Mount Slain's peaks vanished into darkness as they rode, claimed by a
moonless, starless sky.  Flames from the city's watch towers cast a halo
of red light upon their backs and set their shadows flickering.

No snow fell, yet the wind was white, shifting drifts from the high
slopes to the low slopes in quick, brutal bursts.

The deer path was easy to find and follow.  Raif had the feeling that
Angus' bay had traveled this way before, for the geldinganticipated
every twist and hook in the trail.  Raif was glad to let the horses lead
the way.  The fast, brittle strength that had filled him earlier was
gone, drained away as completely as if it had never been there at all.
Ghostmeal: It seemed important to remember that what it gave wasn't
real.  Raiffelt as if his body had been trampled by a cart.  The only
thing that kept him awake was the familiar torment of his stitches. That
and his promise to the girl.

He glanced over at her.  She sat hunched on the bay, her shape obscured
by blankets, her head upright, her chin nodding with the movement of the
horse. They had not spoken since earlier.  The shadow of Spire Vanis was
too great a presence between them.  It was unthinkable to Raif to speak
of small things to pass the time while Angus was trapped inside the
city.  The girl had her miseries and he had his, and there was
companionship to be found in shared silence.

Raif watched her as they wound through the pines.  It was impossible not
to. She had bewitched Angus with a single look, and with just one touch
she had . .  What?  Raif turned his hand so that his blister showed, fat
and purple like a tick gorging on his blood.  What had happened between
them as she'd knelt in the snow?

He would never forget the voices.  They were inside his mind for life.

Drey.  Longing for his brother suddenly overwhelmed him, making him feel
weary beyond knowing.  If Drey were here now, he would know what to do
and say.  He wouldn't have let Angus go off alone.  Raifs lips formed a
faint smile.  And even if he had.  Drey would have stood outside the
gate and waited until Angus returned.  Drey always waited.

Of all the traits a brother could have, that suddenly seemed the best
one of all.

"Wrathgate."

The girl's voice drew Raif back.  He looked at her, and she nodded
toward the shimmering mass of darkness that was Spire Vanis at night.

A ring of blue fire framed a portal three hundred feet below the deer
path.

"They keep the oil lamps burning day and night.  It's the most heavily
used gate."

"Does the east road lead directly from it?"

"I'm not sure."

Raif looked at the girl's face, Ash's face, he reminded himself.  She
lived in this city yet didn't know its roads?  Who was she?  What sort
of trouble was she in?  Shrugging, he told himself it meant nothing to
him.

"We'll head east a while, then start making our way down."  The girl, as
if embarrassed by her lack of knowledge, made no reply.

Raif turned his attention to breakinga path through the shifting snow
and loose scree of Mount Slain's northeastern skirt.  In his anxiousness
to find the east road and meet with Angus, he pushed on ahead of Ash.

The farther they traveled from the city walls, the darker the night
became. Spire Vanis felt like an enemy at his back.  He had not once
stepped inside it, yet he had killed men there.  Another four to add to
his tally. Bitterness trickled through his mouth, stinging like pure
alcohol, and he switched his mind away from what he had done and who he
was.  Getting to Angus was all that counted.  Lights appeared in the
landscape below, scattered over the rolling darkness like grain waiting
to take seed.  Some moved.  Carts, Raif realized with a small thrill.
The lights were torches burning on the guardrails of carts.

East road.  After glancing over his shoulder to check that Ash was still
keeping pace, he began weaving his way down to the moving lights.

Everything that grew on Mount Slain was crippled and hard formed.

Moose picked his path with care, hesitating whenever the mountain
shivered or twisted bits of dead wood poked rotten limbs through the
snow.  Raif was so tired his eyes ached.  Angus has to be here.  He has
to be all right.

By the time they reached the road, the lighted carts were long gone, and
the crowds of towns and villages had thinned, giving way to plowed
fields, fenced grazes, farmhouses, and unlit strong walls built from
rough-hewn stone.  A lone man rode a horse in the distance, but Raif
knew it wasn't Angus: too thin, too dark, too upright to be a wounded
man.  The road itself was wide and gently graded, the snow upon its
surface packed to the hardness of ice. To the north lay the Vale of
Spires, prime farmland and graze land that sloped gently for thirty
leagues.  Angus said that in its center lay a strange formation of
granite spires that most people believed had been formed by nature,
carved by a hundred thousand years of wind and hail.  A few claimed the
spires were the work of man, erected in the Time of Shadows by
sorcerer-masons who spent their lives working with stone. Fewer still
whispered about dark horse lords and dark beasts and things impaled upon
granite spikes.  Raif didn't know what to think of that. Sometimes he
swore Angus told him such things just to see how he'd react.

According to Angus, it was the granite spires that gave the city and the
vale their name: Spire Vanis.  Vale of Spires.

Raif waited for Ash to join him before turning onto the road and heading
west.  The relief of riding on cleared ground almost canceled out the
fear of being out in the open.  It was bitterly cold, and he could feel
the freezing air hardening the threads that held his stitches.  Ignoring
the pain, he began pulling food and drink from the nearest saddlebag. He
wasn't especially hungry, but eating gave him something to do.  The
wind-dried mutton Angus had purchased ten days ago had the taste and
texture of old string.  It was easier to suck than chew it.  Unwilling
to trust his body to alcohol, he washed down the meat with clear water.

As he wiped his mouth with the back of his hand, he was aware of a sense
of loss, almost as if he were driftingaway to sleep.  The muscle lying
directly beneath his raven lore wrenched softly, as if something had
pulled on it.

Without thought he turned to Ash.

Her eyes were closed, and her head was slumped forward onto her chest.

Raif pulled on his reins, leaping down before Moose had chance to halt.
He stilled the bay with a word and then reached up and pulled Ash from
the saddle.  She weighed almost nothing.  As his left arm slid beneath
her to support her legs, he felt something wet roll over his hand.  Let
it not be blood, he thought as he hefted her fast against his chest.

Pickinga spot fifty paces from the road's edge, shielded from casual
eyes by a grove of stick like birches, Raif laid her down on the
blankets she had been usingas a cloak.  Quickly he ran back for the
horses.  As he led Moose and the bay through the brush, he reached
inside his skins for his lore.  The horn felt cold, and heavier than it
had a right to be.

Ash lay where he had left her, perfectly still, breathing fast, shallow
breaths.  A dark stain on her skirt grew as he looked on, pluming
outward like dye poured in water.  The horses smelled blood.

Raif pushed up his sleeves and knelt in the snow.  He hesitated before
touching her again.  He had felt nothing when he'd pulled her from the
bay, but what if the voices had returned?  Swallowing hard, he reached
out and brushed the hair from her face.

Reach for us, reach.  We cannot wait much longer, we are cold, so cold,
our chains cut us, how they cut us, we want, we need.  Reach.

Raifs first instinct was to pull away.  Run, said something within him.

Run and never look back.  He didn't run, though he could not say why.

Instead he took Ash by the shoulders and shook her.

"Wake!"  he cried.

"Wake!"

No muscle in her face or body moved.  She was limp beneath his grip, a
doll made of rags.  Still he shook her; he didn't know what else to do.

Gradually, over the course of many seconds, her shoulders stiffened
beneath him.  Imagining she was coming round, he took his hands from her
and sat back in the snow.  He wondered why he felt no relief.  A long
moment passed, where the wind died and the snow settled, and then Ash's
arms began to rise, slowly, mechanically, like machines worked by
ghosts.

Gooseflesh lifted on Raifs arms.  Hardly aware of what he was doing, he
slammed his fists into her shoulders, forcing the muscles flat.

She would not reach out to them.  He would not let her.  It was madness
and he didn't understand it, but he had heard the voices call to her and
knew they loved her not.

Ash's body fought him, but not in a forceful way, more a slow relentless
push.  New blood flared over her skirt, soaking through to the snow
beneath. Raif didn't want to risk letting her go to deal with it.  There
was too much to be woman's blood, that he knew.  Then, suddenly, Ash
stopped fighting him. Her body stilled.  Raif felt a bead of cold sweat
trickle along his stitches.  All was quiet for a moment as the night
entered a new phase of darkness, then Ash's mouth fell open.

The stench of blood metal came out.  The same odor Raif had smelled the
day his father died.

Sorcery, and she was drawing it.

Raif howled Angus' name into the night.

CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE.

Tunnels of the Sull Penthero Iss was standing in the Rive Hall, in the
heart of the Red Forge, watching Marafice Eye snap a sword over his
knee, when the night came alive with sorcery.  The Knife's leathers were
stiff with mud and blood, his face smeared with soot, his fingernails
jutting from his fingertips with the pressure of wedged dirt.  Fury was
upon him, though he did not shake and he did not fume; he took things in
his hands and broke them.

"Six of mine dead.  Another three wounded in the chase.  And they got
away--all three of them."  Marafice Eye raised the two separate pieces
he had made of the sword.

"And this is all I got from Angus Lok.

This!  "

That was when Iss felt it: strong, metallic, reverberating with the pure
tone of a struck bell.  Sorcery, and it shot through the room like siege
fire. Iss' tongue wetted, and the glaze on his corneas dried in an
instant, leavinga scum of salt and dust that stung his eyes.  Fear
relaxed muscles in his lower abdomen, and he had to work quickly to stop
urine from dribbling down his thigh.  Yet even as terror took him and
his skin soaked up the aftermath like a rag dipped in oil, he probed the
nature of the drawing with small mental jabs.  Iss breathed through his
mouth, letting minute particles of airborne metal settle upon his
tongue.  Straightaway he learned things. The drawing was unfocused, the
work of a beginner.  It came from somewhere close and to the east.  If
he had been a stronger sorcerer himself, he might have forsaken his body
and tracked it back to the source.  Almost he didn't need to.  He knew
who had drawn it and where she was likely to be.

Asarhia.  The air tasted of her.  A small thrill fingered Iss' throat
and groin.  His almost-daughter was close by, probably on the east road
or traveling just above it, doing what she had been born for: reaching
from this world to the one that lay beyond.  Abruptly the flow of
sorcery stopped, halted so quickly that Iss was left snapping tongue
flesh.  He felt disoriented for a moment, as if he had been passing
through a doorway that was suddenly and unexpectedly shut.

Aware of Marafice Eye's hard blue eyes upon him, he worked to bring his
body and mind under control.  Only those who could use sorcery could
sense it.

"Trapped wind?"  Marafice Eye said, throwing the broken pieces of sword
onto the exquisitely woven rug that covered the length of the Rive Hall.

"Too many quails eggs at supper.  You should try eating real meat
instead."

Iss made no reply.  Marafice Eye's crudeness was nothing to him; he'd
had more than fifteen years to grow accustomed to it.  Takinga moment to
still himself, Iss regarded the vast stone- ceilinged chamber of the
Rive Hall. Row upon row of red swords armed the walls, hung from their
cross guards and pointing down toward the earth.  Blood steel, forged in
the great black furnace in the adjoining chamber, cooled in oil drawn
from the tar pits of the Join.  Only two people in the Watch knew the
secret of its making: the Iron Master and the Rive scribe.

The scribe kept a written record of the brazing.  The text was rumored
to fill three leaves of parchment and be written backward in the manner
of sorcerer's spells.  Iss turned to face the Knife.

"Asarhia is no longer in the city.  She's east of here, either on the
road or just above it."  Marafice Eye's mouth twisted unpleasantly.

"I'll leave within the quarter."  He turned to go.

"No."  Iss found himself strangely unsettled byAsarhia's drawing.  Its
aftermath still lived within him, running like fever through his blood.
He forced his mind to focus above the roar of the forge.

"Not yet.  I must know more about who we are dealing with.  This
stranger.  .

the one with the arrows"That bastard shot four of my men, dropped them
where they stood.  "

There was that hint of possessiveness again: my men, mine.  Iss wasn't
sure that he liked this new protective Knife.

"What did he look like?"

"Dark haired.  Rough clad, like one of those demon clansmen.  Had a
silver piece in his hair."

"A Hailsman, then."  Iss felt better for knowing that one small fact.

"And he shot the brothers through the grating?"  Marafice Eye stamped a
booted foot on a section of the broken sword and ground it into the rug.

"Space no bigger than a piss hole."  Iss ran a hand over the cleverly
weighted silk of his robe.  He had felt four jolts of power earlier:
rough, hard, and stinking of the Old Blood.  He had assumed it was Angus
Lok, an old dog who had learned new tricks.  Now it seemed it was
someone else.

"When you chased Lok through the city, did you catch sight of Asarhia or
the clansman again?"

"No."

So it was likely the two were together.  Now.  The thought of Asarhia in
the company of some rough-skinned clansman who could draw upon the Old
Blood turned him cold.  And then there was Angus Lok.  .  Iss' fingers
tightened around the silk.  Asarhia was his.  He had found her.

He had raised her.  She called no one else Father but him.  Armed men
were no longer enough.

"You must take Sarga Veys with you when you leave.  Asarhia must be
brought back."

"The Halfman."  Marafice Eye spat the word.

"Yes.  The Halfman.  He will be able to track Asarhia in ways you
cannot."

"I will not have him in any sept of my choosing."  "Don't be a fool.

If this clansman is a demon, as you say, then who better to deal with
him than a demon of our own?  " Marafice Eye grunted.

"And you do want them back, don't you?  All three of them.

Asarhia must be brought to me alive and unharmed, but the men .  .  .

"They slaughtered my own."

"Precisely.  Kill the clansman where you find him.  Angus Lok must be
brought to the Cask and tortured.  He's so full of secrets his skin will
likely burst the moment we strap him to the wheel."  Iss glanced quickly
at the Knife, then added,

"You can have him when Caydis is done."

"Don't make light with me, Surlord.  I'm not one of your grange lings

"No.  But you want Lok and the clansman, and it seems to me that Sarga
Veys is your best chance of getting them."  Iss' temper rose as he
spoke.  The thought of Sarga Veys tracking down Asarhia chilled him, yet
time was running out and new dangers had come into play, and Asarhia
must be found.  A dry sept might easily lose her, especially now that
she had the protection of a man who could heart-kill seven brothers with
seven arrows if he chose.  A fully formed sept was the answer: six armed
men and one magic user.  Such small, fast-moving forces had once been
the scourge of the North.

Marafice Eye glowered.

"Very well.  I'll take him with me, though I can't vouch for his good
health on my return."

Iss forced himself to smile.

"As you wish."  Perhaps things wouldn't be so bad after all.  The Knife
would keep an eye on Sarga Veys .  .

that and one of his dog-size fists.

"Send him to me before you leave."

"Here?"  The Knife snapped his head in a circle, indicating the walls of
red steel, the embossed shields and iron bird helms arrayed on racks,
the life-size statue of the Killhound standing at the foot of the great
fireplace, carved from marble so black that to look at it hurt one's
eyes, and the tapestries nailed to the ceiling for want of a better
place to hang them, tapestries depicting Thomas Mar, Theron and Rangor
Pengaron, the Whitehog, and a dozen other men armed to the teeth and
bathed in blood.

Iss saw the Knife's point.

"No .  .  .  tell him I'll meet him in the guardroom instead."

That made Marafice Eye smile.

"There are a lot of angry brothers there tonight."

Iss shrugged innocently.

"Then he won't be lonely if I'm a little late."  t t t "Keep the rag in
her mouth until she wakes."  Angus stood, grimacingas his muscles
stretched and twisted.  He thrust a fist against the wet sparrow-size
hole in his chest, counted twelve seconds under his breath, then spoke
again.

"You'd better take another draw of the ghost meal We have a long night
ahead."

Raif was kneeling over Ash's lifeless body.  Angus had found them an
hour ago, drawn by Raifs cry.  Shaking with fatigue, his fingers yellow
with the first sign of frostbite, and his face black with blood, he had
barely spared a glance for Raif before starting work on Ash.

After waddinga horse shammy into a ball, he had thrust it into her
mouth, then held her jaws together, until nothing, not even breath,
could leak out. Raif felt the sorcery stop as quickly as a candle
snuffed by hand.  Even before the stench of metal had dissipated, Angus
began working on something else.  He lit a small alcohol-fueled fire,
heated snow melt in a tin cup, then added dried herbs and roots to the
liquid once it had boiled.  The concoction soon turned yellowy green and
gave off an odor that reminded Raif of the Oldwood in spring.

"Bethroot to slow bleeding, valerian to calm her mind," Angus said.

As he turned back to tend Ash, Raif noticed that his uncle's sword was
gone. The sheepskin scabbard was limp and misshapen, striped with sword
cuts and dark with blood.  After a moment Raif looked away.  It was hard
to think about what Angus must have gone through to reach here.

When the green concoction was ready, Angus came and knelt at Raifs side.
Gently he eased the wadded shammy from Ash's mouth and dribbled steaming
liquid down her throat.  He said things, whispers too low for Raif to
understand, all the while rocking her back and forth against his chest.
When he was satisfied that she had swallowed enough of the liquid, Angus
glanced at Raif.

"Turn your back."  It was fiercely said, and Raif obeyed immediately.
Sounds of fabric being lifted and torn followed.  Water was poured. Rags
were wrung dry.

"Hand me the clean shirt from my pack."  Raif did so without once
glancingat Ash.  He wondered how Angus could continue working with his
chest wound still open and leaking.  The hole needed to be cleaned and
stitched, yet Raif knew his uncle would welcome no reminders.

The sound of fabric being knotted was soon followed by a series of
commands.

"I need grease.  Warmed wax.  The silver vial from my pack.

Whatever spare clothes you have must be cut to a size to fit her.

Beat the ice from my buckskin mitts, then take the chill from them over
the fire.  Quick now.  There is little time.  "

Raif didn't know how long it took to fetch all the things Angus needed,
yet the steady drop in temperature made him aware of time passing.  The
night had turned as dark and still as the inside of a sealed cairn.  The
fierce blue flames from the alcohol fire gave off more heat than light,
and Raif wondered how his uncle could see to work.  When Angus was done
with tending to Ash, he returned the shammy to her mouth and bade Raif
watch her while he saw to his own hurts.

He was a good deal harder on himself than the girl.  Tippling frequently
from the rabbit flask, he cleaned and stitched his own flesh.  There was
a lot of blood, and Angus was by turns anguished then impatient.  He
swore like a ham merman When he was finished he had.  an ugly mass of
black stitches on his chest.  Raif thought they looked like a heap of
dead spiders, yet didn't say anything.  Angus stamped out the fire.

"Get the horses ready.  I'll wake the girl.  Have you taken that ghost
meal yet?"

Raif shook his head.  Ghostmeal was as false as the twin landscapes that
hovered above the earth on cold, bright days in the badlands.  It fooled
the senses, nothing more.  Raif preferred to be exhausted and know he
was exhausted.

Brushing snow from his dogs king pants, he rose and made his way to the
horses.  Moose welcomed his approach by snuffling gently and nudging
Raits chest with his head.  The gray was a good horse, well suited to
long treks through deep snow.  Raif brushed him down, cleaning ice from
his eyelashes and nostrils.

"It's been a long day for you, too," he said, thinking of Orwin Shank
and all the fine horses he had bred.

"Not much farther to go tonight."

A faint groan sounded, and Raif looked over Moose's shoulder to where
Angus was crouched over Ash.

"Wake now, little lass.  You're safe.

Safe and amongst friends.  "

Ash opened her eyes.  A wary, animal expression crossed her face, and
she shied away from Angus' touch.  Angus let her go, yet Raif sensed he
did not want to.

"It's all right," he said softly.

"I'm Angus, and that's Raif, and we're taking you somewhere safe."

"How long was I... asleep?"  Ash frowned as she spoke, her mouth
twistingas if she'd tasted something unpleasant.

"A wee nonce, nothing more."  Standing, Angus held out his hand for her
to take.  Once she was upright she glanced around, at Raif, the horses,
their surroundings.  Last, she looked down at her clothes.

"Your dress was as stiff as a board when I got here, so I had little
choice but to strip it away."  Angus met Ash's eyes, and after a moment
she looked down, suddenly finding a leather strap that needed retying
beneath her chin. Angus did not share her embarrassment.  Clapping his
hands together, he said,

"Well then.  We'd better make a start.  Raif.

Roll the blankets.  I'll take Ash on the bay wi' me.  "

Despite Angus' casual tone of voice, they broke camp quickly, burying
the remains of the fire and filling the empty waterskins with snow.

As Raif turned Moose, ready to head back onto the road, Angus stopped
him with an almost imperceptible nod in the direction of Spire Vanis.

"I think we'll take the high road," he said.

Which meant they took no road at all.  Angus made his own trail through
the gorse and malformed pines above the road.  Ash pale and silent at
his back. Raif took up the rear.  From the pace his uncle was setting
and the small gesture he had made toward the city, Raif knew there was a
good chance they were being pursued.

The thought did not make for an easy ride.  Raif found himself wishing
he had reclaimed the arrows from the dead men at Vaingate. Angus' sword
was gone, the bow was useless without sticks to fire, and between them
they now had nothing more deadly than a pair of belt knives and a half
sword Neither of them was in any fit state to fight if it came to it,
and fleeing in haste was no longer practical, as Angus' bay was loaded
with weight.

Frowning, Raif turned his attention to Ash.  She was now dressed in a
blue wool shirt donated by Angus and a tanned hide coat and pants that
had once belonged to Drey.  Raif had to admit that they suited her well
enough. Strands of hair peeking through her fox hood flashed silver in
the snow light Why had Angus risked everything to protect her?  And what
would have happened if he hadn't come along in time to halt her sorcery?
Deciding the answers didn't bear thinking about, Raif turned his mind to
following the path instead.

The slope above the east road was heavily canted, mined with bog holes
and draws.  Snow made the uneven ground difficult to read.

Bitter cold made breathing, moving, even looking, an ordeal to be
endured. No one spoke.  Angus appeared to have a destination in mind, as
he picked each step with a deliberateness that Raif found vaguely
reassuring.  Angus always knew a back way, a hidden path, a break
between the rocks.

As they rode through a stand of limber pines, Raif became aware of
noises sounding in the road below.  The drum of hooves, the tinny clink
of tack, and the rough bark of someone coughing wafted up the slope
along with a growing tide of mist.  Angus said nothing, merely increased
his pace.  Most of the metal on Moose and the bay was covered with
sheepskin to prevent frostbite in the colder temperatures to the north,
so the horses made little sound as they trotted.

Eventually the ground began to level off and a path of sorts opened up
before them, narrow and soiled with deer droppings.  The going became
easier, and it took Raif some time to realize that they were actually
back on some distant eastern slope of Mount Slain.  The steady pace of
the horses rocked Ash to sleep, and her head came to rest against Angus'
shoulder.  Strangely, Raif wasn't worried about her; she wasn't absent,
as she had been earlier.  She was simply exhausted and sleeping.

After a while Raif risked speaking to Angus.

"Where are we headed?"

"Aye.  You would be wanting to know that."  Angus' voice was softer than
the mist at his heels.

"If your old uncle's memory serves him well enough, there's a bit of a
tunnel somewhere along this path that leads down from the mountain and
under the east road."  Raif wasn't sure how he felt about tunnels.

"Won't those following us simply take the tunnel, too?"

"Nay, lad.  The sept'll likely stay on the road and wait for us to come
down. They know we can't stay up here forever.  It leads nowhere."

"They know we're up here?"

"If they're usinga fully formed sept, they will."  "Fully formed sept?"

"Six blades and one magic user.  It's the way sorcerers have been hunted
for centuries.  Irgar the Unchained, the Red Priest Syracies, Maormor of
Trance Vor, and Asanna the Mountain Queen all used them.

It takes a magic user to find one.  Force isn't enough.  Some with the
old skill can stir air and water and earth.  They can crack ice that a
squad treads on, fuel storms that they ride through, and shake earth
they sleep upon in the dark hours of night.  They can turn hunting dogs
mad and make them attack their own pack brothers, and ignite tiny sparks
of sorcery inside a stallion's heart.  " Angus glanced over at Raif.

Raif felt his cheeks heat.  He pulled hard on the reins, treating Moose
roughly.

"A trained sorcerer is capable of great subtlety.  They can do more with
less.  They are taught how to deflect and contain powers greater than
their own, how to shield those around them by setting blood wards and
hook their claws into others like themselves, and leech the power from
them bit by bit. They can confuse and disorient an enemy, weaving a fine
mesh of sorcery called a fret."  Angus frowned into the mist.

"And they hunt magic users like dogs."  Raif shivered.  The mist was
heavy and wet, like a shifting sea around them.  Suddenly it was
impossible to see more than ten paces ahead.

"How do they hunt people?"

"They hunt sorcery, not people, Raif."  Angus glanced over his shoulder,
pinning Raif with his coppery eyes.

"All sorcery leaves an aftermath that can be tracked.  Users can taste
the blood of a person who draws the old skill, smell the metal they feed
into the air.  Even weeks later residue can still cling to a user's hair
and clothes, leavinga trail as surely as a deer musking pines in a
forest."

 "So what Ash did .   .   ."

"Aye, lad.  A sept is likely tracking her aftermath as we speak."

"Then how can we hope to escape?  Even if we find a way down from the
mountain, they will know it."

Angus was silent a moment as he walked the bay through a crop of oily
rocks. Ash, disturbed by the change in motion, made a soft, snuffling
sound and resettled herself against Angus' back.  When Angus spoke
again, Raif had to strain to hear him.

"Tracking someone with sorcery is a risk unto itself.  Sometimes a
sorcerer must take drugs and forsake his body while he searches.  Such
skills never come cheap.  They use a man up completely, leaving him as
weak as a horse ridden clean through the night.  Sometimes those who
forsake their bodies never come back.  The firmament glitters for them,
tempting them out toward its cold, hard edge.  Secrets lie there, they
say.  All things become known at the moment of death.  Men who cannot
resist simply leave their bodies behind.  Their minds die the instant
their spirit touches the roof of the world, but their bodies waste
slowly over weeks."

Cold.  Raif felt so cold his lungs ached.  He found himself looking up
at the black arc of the sky.  Yes, J can see how a man might be tempted.

Angus saw where his gaze had rested.

"I can't say as we'll be tracked that way tonight, not with us being so
close to the city.  The cost is too high for it to be lightly done.  Any
time a man or woman draws upon the old skills it takes something from
them.  The body pays a price.  Different people weaken in different
ways.  I've seen some men bleed from the mouth, and others shiver as if
a fever is upon them.  A few lose part of their memories or their minds.
I knew a man once, one of the Storm Dogs who live on the high slopes of
the Join, whose body wasted in small portions every time he broke a
storm. The first time I met him I thought he'd been burned.  His arms
and legs were black and withered.  Dead."

Raif turned away.  He hated sorcery.  Clansmen would have no part of it.
Strength of mind, will, and body was what counted in the clan holds
Sorcery was the weapon of the weak and the damned.  Raif remembered
watchingas Dagro Blackhail and Gat Murdock clubbed a dark-haired girl
senseless one cold winter's morning on the court.

Raif couldn't recall who the girl was, perhaps a sister to Craw
Bannering or a daughter to Meth Ganlow, but he knew the girl had been
discovered callinganimals to her without speaking words.  She had died a
week later.  No one, not even her family, mourned her.  And then there
was Mad Binny, living in her ancient crannog over Cold Lake, exiled from
the roundhouse for thirty years.  She could make ewes drop their lambs,
people said, tell which winters would drive the hardest and cull the
most deaths.

"Most magic users need rest after a drawing," Angus said, pulling Raif
back.

"Many need to sleep.  Some take drugs to lend them strength."

"Like the ghost meal

"Yes, like the ghost meal

Raif looked round to find Angus watching him, and he suddenly realized
the purpose of everything his uncle had said.  Accept what you are, he
seemed to say.  You possess the old skills, 1 have shown you that.  I
have spoken of their dangers and forewarned you of their limits.  Now
you must learn to accept it and stomach your distaste.

Mist washed in and out of Angus' mouth as he breathed.

"Not all people condemn the old skills.  There are places that would
fail to exist without them, where they are woven so tightly into the
threads of history that you cannot separate the people from their
sorcery.

Perhaps you and I will travel to those lands one day.  "

Raif made no reply.  He didn't want to hear any more.  He longed for
clan, imagined ridingacross the thick white snow on the graze, shooting
targets with Drey on the court, and sitting so close to the Great Hearth
that its hot yellow flames burned his cheeks.

"The girl is waking," he said after a time.

Angus' eyes narrowed.  A fraction of a second later Ash moved against
his back.  Before he turned his attention to her, Angus searched Raifs
face, and Raif guessed he had given somethingaway.  He had known Ash was
waking before his uncle had felt a thing.  Abruptly he pulled on Moose's
reins, dropping back.

Angus and Ash spoke softly for some time, Ash turning once to retrieve a
parcel of trail meat and a waters king from Angus' pack.

Raif thought she looked little better for sleep.  Following her lead, he
drank some water himself.  The liquid was thick and icy, and it numbed
something within him for a while.

The landscape changed as they threaded through the upper reaches of the
tree line, becoming rougher and more inhospitable to plants.  Bare rocks
rose to either side of the path, swept clean of snow by persistent
winds.  Pines twisted close to the ground, their trunks smooth as bones,
their needles shriveled and gray.  The air smelled of resin, and the
mist was sticky, as if it had slipped into the heartwood and stolen the
sap from the pines.

Angus trotted the bay through a series of sharp turns and then surprised
Raif by calling a halt and dismounting.

"Wait here," he said, handing Raif the reins.  By the time Raif had
dismounted himself, Angus had disappeared into the mist.  Ash stared
after him.

Silence followed.  Raif had no desire to speak.  He felt a dull
resentment toward the girl; it was almost as if she'd stolen upon him
while he slept, slit the skin on his wrist, and made a blood kin of him.
He'd been given no choice in the matter, yet somehow he felt bound.  And
she was so young and thin, her face red with snow burn her hair matted
with many kinds of dirt. Only her eyes held his interest: huge gray eyes
that shone like polished metal, silver one moment, iron the next.

"Good.  You've both dismounted.  We're on foot from now on."  Angus'
voice emerged from the mist ahead of his body.

"Raif.  Cut a torch from that hemlock.  Strip it until the juices run."

Raif was glad of something to do.  He cut three sticks, hackingat the
branches until his dogs king mitts were soaked with sap.  Shaving the
sticks with his belt knife, he created a series of thin wood curls to
catch the sparks from his flint and hold them against the sapwood until
it kindled.

The business of making fires in snow and ice was something he knew well,
and it felt good to do something plain and honest with his hands.

The first torch was lit by the time Angus had brushed down the horses.
Ash had taken charge of Moose and was saying horsey things to him and
scratching behind his ears.  Moose seemed stupidly pleased, snuffling
and clucking like a hen.  Raif glared at him.  Traitor horse.

Angus led them into a deep draw between the rocks.  The pale, ice-riven
banks grew higher as they descended, and the path began to narrow and
steepen. Soon the walls curved overhead, and Raif got the sense that
they were traveling into the mountain.  The same kind of oily stone they
had passed earlier caught and reflected light.  When flames from Raifs
torch licked against the wetness, it hissed.  Mist rolled around the
horses' fetlocks like sea foam turning from gray to green with each
flick of the light.  The air became noticeably colder.

Then, suddenly, there was no draw.  The rocks fused overhead, and what
might have been a water channel during spring melt became a tunnel
instead.

Raif felt his stitches itch.  The raven lore was as cold as a fossil
against his chest.

"Easy now," Angus said.

"Stay close.  There are ways here that are not ours to take.  Raif.
Step forward with the torch.  Ash.  Keep an eye to Moose.  Don't forget
to tear a bit of rue leaf now and then and chew on it."

As he positioned himself at the head of the party, Raif was aware of the
ground changing beneath his feet.  What minutes earlier had been rough,
uncut rock now had the smooth shine of stone once tended by a chisel.
The walls were more lightly touched, hewn only to prevent sharp edges.
Something--mineral oil or water--tapped away in the distance like a
leaking roof.  All surfaces collected shadows as easily as ditches
filling with rainwater.

Raifs first thought was that Erne would have loved this.  No one knew
the caves in the clan hold like Effie.  The only time she ever came out
of the roundhouse in summer was to explore the sandstone caverns around
the Wedge.  Raif smiled.  He remembered taking her out one summer
morning and having to wait for /iours while she explored some odd bit of
a pothole not much wider than her own head.

He wasn't about to go in after her, and Tern would have given him a
beating if he'd left her to return home alone.

"What ;s this place?"  asked Ash.

It was hard for Raif to pull back from his memories.  For no reason
other than she wasn't Effie, he felt a tide of ill feelings toward the
girl.  She wasn't who she showed herself to be.  Her voice was clear and
insistent, and she sounded like no beggar girl in any story Turby Flapp
or Gat Murdock had ever told.

"It's just a wee tunnel, nothing more."  Angus took a slug from his
rabbit flask.

"It was cut many thousands of years ago, before Spire Vanis was even
built."

Ash reached out a hand and touched the wall.

"Who built it?"  "The Sull."

Raif sucked in air and held it in his lungs.  This was the third time
Angus had mentioned the Sull, yet the word sounded no better for
repetition.  The Sull were enemies to all.  They hated the Mountain
Cities and the clans.  And even though they protected the Trenchlanders
with their lives, they hated them, too.  Hiding in their vast forests,
amid their cities of blue and silver stone, they refused to trade and
treaty.  Rumor had it they emerged from the Racklands only to defend
their borders and reclaim their dead.

"What use is a tunnel here, in the west, to the Sull?"

"Do you think, Raif Sevrance, that this land has always been held by the
Mountain Cities?"  Angus' tone made Raif wish he hadn't asked the
question.

"Before there were cities, before even there were clans, there were the
Sull. Clan Blackhail might call itself the first of the clans, yet it's
a poor claim when compared to the Sull's.  They call themselves the
First Born, and they do not mean solely in the Northern Territories."

Ash spoke after a moment of silence.

"The Sull were the first men in the Known Lands?"

"So legend says.  The same legends that tell how they were driven first
from the Far South, and then the Soft Lands of the middle, finally
making a home of the North.  All of it, not just the Boreal Sway and the
Great Snake Coast and the Red Glaciers they claim today.  All of it,
from the Breaking Grounds in the farthest north, to Old Goat's Pass in
these Ranges."  Angus' voice was hard, his eyes dark.

"So this small tunnel, cut so the Sull could cross the mountains and
descend Mount Slain without being sniffed out by the Mountain Queen's
septs, or scented by Wetcloaks and their hounds, may not be much use to
them now.  But it once was, and there are a score of others like it in
the Ranges."

"Who is this Mountain Queen?"  Ash said.

"And the Wetcloaks?  I've never heard of them."

Angus shook his head.

"People and forces from another age, before the Red Priest and the
Founding Quarterlords were born, before religion took its hold on the
Soft Lands to the south, when the world was ruled by emperors and kings,
and sorcery was their weapon of control."

Raif held the torch away from his body.  The damp air was making it
crackle and spit.

"You said the Sull could use sorcery.  So why didn't they build an
empire of their own?"

"Once they did," Angus said quietly.

"Once they did.  Now .  .  ."  He shook his head.

"Now they seek only to survive."  Frowning, Raif walked deeper into the
tunnel.  What Angus said didn't fit with clan beliefs about the Sull.

"But the Sull are the fiercest" -- "Aye," Angus said, cutting him short.

"The Sull are the fiercest warriors ever to raise their banns over the
North. They have to be.

They are a people unto themselves, deeply private and self sustaining
and every king, emperor, and warlord in the Known Lands for the past
thirteen thousand years has feared them.  The Sull have been driven
north and east through three continents, and now all that's left to them
is the Racklands. " Angus' voice quieted and turned oddly cold.

"And I pity anyone who tries to take it from them ... for they have
nowhere else to go."

Raif and Ash exchanged a glance, both affected by Angus' words.  Ash's
eyes looked almost blue in the cave light.

"We must leave something for the journey," Angus said, working to regain
his good humor.  "" Tis an old custom and doubtless seems foolish to do
so when none but dark-winged bats will likely collect it.  But Darra
would have my earlobes for salt dishes if I failed to pay my due.  "

"Darra?"  asked Ash.

"My lady wife."

Ash made no reply, and silence grew around them.  Reaching back behind
his neck, Raif felt for the band of silver that bound his hair.  With
one swift movement he tugged it free.

"Here," he said, offering it to Angus.

"Take this for the journey."  Angus closed his large red hand around
Raifs.

"Nay, lad.  That's a clan token.  Keep it.  I'll pay this passage."

"Take it."

There must have been something in his voice, for Angus looked at him
hard a moment, then nodded.

"As you wish."

No one spoke for a while after that.  Angus took the silver band in his
fist and began kneading the metal as he walked.  The tunnel grew
narrower and the rock ceiling dipped, so both Angus and Ash had to be
careful where they led the horses.  Moisture wept from cracks in the
stone, forming oily pools that everyone avoided.

Raif lit the second torch, and the fresher, brighter light illuminated
markings on the stone.  No, not on the stone, he corrected himself, in
it. Drawings of the moon and stars, inked in dark blues and liquid
silvers, shone through a layer of rock as thin as the membrane on a
fish's eye.  Somehow the artist had inserted the pigment below the
surface, like a tattoo.  Raif thought back to Angus' bow; that had an
inlay beneath the wood too.  Angus has a Sull bow?  Raif held on to the
question as they entered a section of tunnel partially collapsed by
flood damage, trying to decide what it meant. Every so often, turnoffs
would present themselves: black holes in the rock face that always led
down.  Angus insisted that everyone stay close to him as they passed
them.  The largest was as dark and steep as a mine shaft cut with a
thousand narrow steps that seemed to lead straight down to hell.
Raiffelt cold air kiss his cheeks as they passed it. Ash looked as if
she felt something else.  When Angus reached out to hold her arm, she
made no effort to pull away.  "Take a bit of the rue leaf and chew on
it," he said.

"Remember what I said?"

"You said scribes use it when they work through the night.  You said it
would clear my head."

"That's right.  Yes, chew, don't swallow now.  What does it taste like?

I've quite forgotten.  "

Raif listened as Ash spoke her reply, quite aware that Angus' main aim
was to keep her talking.  After a while Raif joined in, and together
they nursed Ash through the deepest sections of the tunnel.

At some point during the process, when the conversation had shifted to
long winters--one of the few subjects they could share without prying
into anyone's past--Rait began to feel something himself.  At first it
was just a knot of tension in his shoulder blades, a strain he put down
to lack of sleep, but the sensation spread to his chest, where it
pressed against his heart and lungs like a secret, inner rib cage
growing quietly beneath his own.

It happened so slowly, over hours, that Raif didn't immediately
recognize it as fear.

Even when the tunnel's end came in sight and Angus halted the party
while he performed a small ritual around the silver band from Raifs
hair, Raif still hadn't worked out what he was afraid of.  Then, over
Angus' bent back, he locked gazes with Ash.

She knew.  She knew what it was.

"Mount Slain runs deep," was all she said, yet it was enough for Raif to
begin to understand.  Something was within the mountain with them.
Something knew they were here.

"Ehl hal is Mithbann rass ga'rhal."  Angus' words seemed to come from a
long way away.  Raif did not recognize the language.  After placing the
silver band on a spur of rock, Angus sprinkled it with the last drops of
alcohol in his rabbit flask, then lit it.  Blue flames leaped for the
briefest moment, then died, leaving the silver with a dusky tarnish,
patterned like tree mold.

"There," he said

Raifand Ash exchanged a glance, both affected by Angus' words.  Ash's
eyes looked almost blue in the cave light.

"We must leave something for the journey," Angus said, working to regain
his good humor.  '"Tis an old custom and doubtless seems foolish to do
so when none but dark-winged bats will likely collect it.  But Darra
would have my earlobes for salt dishes if I failed to pay my due."

"Darra?"  asked Ash.

"My lady wife."

Ash made no reply, and silence grew around them.

Reaching back behind his neck, Raif felt for the band of silver that
bound his hair.  With one swift movement he tugged it free.  "Here," he
said, offering it to Angus.

"Take this for the journey."

Angus closed his large red hand around Raifs.

"Nay, lad.  That's a clan token.  Keep it.  I'll pay this passage."

"Take it."

There must have been something in his voice, for Angus looked at him
hard a moment, then nodded.

"As you wish."

No one spoke for a while after that.  Angus took the silver band in his
fist and began kneading the metal as he walked.  The tunnel grew
narrower and the rock ceiling dipped, so both Angus and Ash had to be
careful where they led the horses.  Moisture wept from cracks in the
stone, forming oily pools that everyone avoided.

Raif lit the second torch, and the fresher, brighter light illuminated
markings on the stone.  No, not on the stone, he corrected himself, in
it. Drawings of the moon and stars, inked in dark blues and liquid
silvers, shone through a layer of rock as thin as the membrane on a
fish's eye.  Somehow the artist had inserted the pigment below the
surface, like a tattoo.  Raif thought back to Angus' bow; that had an
inlay beneath the wood too.  Angus has a Sull bow?  Raif held on to the
question as they entered a section of tunnel partially collapsed by
flood damage, trying to decide what it meant.

Every so often, turnoffs would present themselves: black holes in the
rock face that always led down.  Angus insisted that everyone stay close
to him as they passed them.  The largest was as dark and steep as a
mmeshaft, cut with a thousand narrow steps that seemed to lead straight
down to hell.  Raiffelt cold air kiss his cheeks as they passed it.  Ash
looked as if she felt something else.  When Angus reached out to hold
her arm, she made no effort to pull away.

"Take a bit of the rue leaf and chew on it," he said.

"Remember what I said?"

"You said scribes use it when they work through the night.  You said it
would clear my head."

"That's right.  Yes, chew, don't swallow now.  What does it taste like?

I've quite forgotten.  "

Raif listened as Ash spoke her reply, quite aware that Angus' main aim
was to keep her talking.  After a while Raif joined in, and together
they nursed Ash through the deepest sections of the tunnel.

At some point during the process, when the conversation had shifted to
long winters--one of the few subjects they could share without prying
into anyone's past--Raif began to feel something himself.  At first it
was just a knot of tension in his shoulder blades, a strain he put down
to lack of sleep, but the sensation spread to his chest, where it
pressed against his heart and lungs like a secret, inner rib cage
growing quietly beneath his own.

It happened so slowly, over hours, that Raif didn't immediately
recognize it as fear.

Even when the tunnel's end came in sight and Angus halted the party
while he performed a small ritual around the silver band from Raifs
hair, Raif still hadn't worked out what he was afraid of.  Then, over
Angus' bent back, he locked gazes with Ash.

She knew.  She knew what it was.

"Mount Slain runs deep," was all she said, yet it was enough for Raif to
begin to understand.  Something was within the mountain with them.
Something knew they were here.

"Ehl hal is Mithbann rass ga'rhal."  Angus' words seemed to come from a
long way away.  Raif did not recognize the language.  After placing the
silver band on a spur of rock, Angus sprinkled it with the last drops of
alcohol in his rabbit flask, then lit it.  Blue flames leaped for the
briefest moment, then died, leaving the silver with a dusky tarnish,
patterned like tree mold.

"There," he said

softly.

"That should please the Sull gods.  The offerings they like best are
blood and fire."

Straightening, Angus reached for the bay's bridle and began walking
toward the tunnel's end.

After a moment Ash followed, and Raif was left alone by the rock.  The
desire to reach out and touch the silver band one last time was great,
but he fought it.  Instead he ran his hands through his loose,
shoulder-length hair.  From now on when people saw him they would not
immediately recognize his clan. It's for the best, he told himself,
unhooking his belt knife and cuttinga leather tie from the neck of his
oilskin.  He didn't believe it, but perhaps belief would come later.

Tying back his hair with the leather strap, he followed the others from
the tunnel.  A pair of ravens drawn to guard the entrance barely caught
his eye.

CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX.

Secrets in the Kaleyard the Sevrance sat cross-legged in her special
place beneath the stairs, and watched the raiding party return.  Great
big clansmen, their axes dripping chunks of frozen blood and muck onto
the stone floor, their faces grave and hard, crossed beneath the great
door and into the entrance chamber, bringing with them the quality of
silence that Effie knew meant death.

She tried not to be scared.  Her hand squeezed her rock lore as she
looked into the face of every man who crossed the threshold, searching
for Drey.

So many men, some dragging bloody legs behind them, others with fierce
bruises on their necks and faces, and many with their wounds hidden
beneath their oilskins, the slowness of their walk and the blue tint of
their lips giving their injuries away.  A few were brought in on drag
sleds and Erne's eyes scanned their clothing, searching for the
zigzagging pattern of Da's elk coat.  She knew Drey had worn it the day
he went away.

Raina, Anwyn Bird, and the other women with due respect moved among the
injured, tending wounds, bringing black beer and warm clothingand good
plain meat.  As always when Anwyn was in charge, there was no fuss or
wailing from the other women: Anwyn wouldn't allow it, saying that it
only upset the men. Raina didn't speak, though she did count, taking
careful note of each man who entered, keepinga tally of their numbers in
her head.  Her widow's weals were healed now, the skin pale and raised
like cornrows around her wrists.  She hardly ever spoke to Effie these
days.  She cared, making sure that Effie was fed and clothed and never
too long alone, but she seldom brought the food or the blankets or the
company herself.  Effie knew they shared a bad secret.  The badness made
it difficult to sleep some nights, and Effie ran off more and more to
the little dog cote.  The shanks hounds loved her almost as much as
Raina .  .  .  and they didn't look at her with dead eyes.

All thoughts vanished from Effie's head as she caught sight of a big
silhouette in the doorway.  Drey.  He moved slowly, a little bent at the
waist to relieve pressure on a wound.  His face was a mask of dirt and
blood, and there was a deep gash in his breast piece His eyes began
searching even before his foot hit the stone floor of the roundhouse.

Effie rose, her heart beating rapidly in her chest.  Drey.

He saw her the moment she was free of the stair space.  Something deep
and massed inside him relaxed, and for a moment he looked young, like
the old Drey, like he had been before all the badness had started and
Raifwent away. Without a word he opened his arms.  If her whole life had
depended on it, Effie could not have resisted him.  She wanted to hold
him so badly, her insides ached.

She didn't run; Anwyn didn't approve of that.  Instead she walked
forward with slow, deliberate steps.  Drey waited.  He didn't smile
neither of them smiled--just took her in his arms and held her for a
long time.

They pulled apart without speaking, Drey catching her hand in his.  He
turned his head for a moment and gave an order to a new- sworn year man
concerning the state and treatment of some men.  The year man a small
youth with a sword that was nearly as tall as he was strapped to his
back, was quick to do Drey's bidding.  Dent- headed Corbie Meese stopped
and asked Drey something. Drey thought before answering, as he always
did.  Corbie nodded his agreement, then left.

Anwyn Bird caught his eye, a question on her large horsey face.  In
answer, Drey held up both his and Effie's hand.  Effie didn't quite
understand, but Anwyn obviously did, for she nodded in a knowing

way, then changed her path, bearing the tray of beer and bannock she was
carrying toward a group of ham mermen sitting on the floor.

Drey tugged on Erne's hand.

"Come," was all he said as he led her across the river of clansmen and
clanswomen toward the guide- house.

"Clan Croser has been threatened by Bludd."

"... a hundred Dhoonesmen dead."

"We had to speak treaty before Gnash would let us pass."

"Corbie dragged him away from the body.  He hasn't spoke a word since.

His heart is with his twin.  "

"Nay, Anwyn.  See to Rory first.  This wound is naught but a ticking."

Erne listened to the soft voices of her clan she walked at Drey's side.
War was full upon them now, and raiding parties like the one led by
Corbie Meese left every day from the roundhouse.  Two nights back, a
squad of Bluddsmen had broken bounds near the lowlands strong wall and
slaughtered a dozen crofters.  Effie had seen the bodies.  Orwin Shank
and his sons had ridden out to bring them back.

One of the shanks hounds had found a baby alive in the snow.  Orwin said
the bairn's mother had swaddled the tiny thing in sheepskins and hidden
him in a drift at the side of her croft as the Bluddsmen approached on
their warhorses.  Jenna Walker was lookingafter the baby now.  Orwin had
brought the bairn straight to her, saying he had such a strong little
heart and such hard little fists that there must be something of Toady
in him.  Every nursing mother in the clan had come forward to offer
milk.

Effie thought about the baby a lot, thought of him trapped beneath the
snow. She wanted to ask Orwin which of his hounds had found him, but
Orwin was fierce and important, and she didn't have the nerve.

Drey pulled Effie into the smoky darkness of the guide house and bade
her sit at one of the stone benches while he approached the stone.

One or two other men from the raiding party already knelt by the guide
stone foreheads brushingagainst the hard, wet surface.  All were quiet.
Drey found a place and joined them.  He was silent for a very long time:
walking with the gods, as Inigar always said.

Effie knew the guide stone well, better than anyone else except Inigar
Stoop. She had spent much of her life in its presence, curled up beneath
Inigar's chipping bench, staringat the face of the stone.  It had a
face, that she knew.  Not a human face, for it had too many eyes for
that, but it could see and hear and feel.  Today the guide- stone was
sad and grave.  The deep, salt-encrusted pits that were its eyes
glistened with wept oil.  The dark gashes that were its mouths were
filled with gray shadows, and even the new flaw that ran the length of
the stone and everyone said was a bad omen and a sign of the coming war
looked like a deep worry line on the cheek of an old, old man.

Quickly Effie took her gaze away.  She couldn't look at the flaw without
thinking of Raif.

Her lore had told her he would go, pushed the knowledge into her through
the skin on her palms.  He had to go, the lore had said.  Even before
he'd returned from the Bluddroad she had known it was so.

Sometimes she wished she could tell Drey, to ease his mind, but she
didn't have the words.  Drey was angry at more than Raif.  He was angry
at Angus, too, for taking Raif away.  He didn't even call Angus uncle
anymore, just that man Angus Lok.  Effie frowned.  A week ago she'd
caught Drey standing outside the great door staring south.  At first she
thought he was checking to see if the latest storm had passed.

Then she saw the look on his face.  He was watching for Raif.  .  .
even though Raina had told him Raif wasn't coming back.

That thought made Erne's insides pull tight, and her hand crept up her
dress toward her lore.  The stone was asleep now, cool and lifeless as a
hibernating mouse.  It was better that way.  It never told good things.
She dreaded it telling her that Drey would go away.

"Come, little one."  Drey stood heavily and awkwardly, not once touching
the guide stone for support.  Walking with the gods had taken something
from him, and he looked tired and old and more troubled than before.

Effie went straight to him, her hand finding his through the smoke.

"Drey."

Both Effie and Drey looked around in time to see Inigar Stoop emerge
from the darkness at the far end of the guide house The guide's face was
gray with wood ash, the cuffs and hem of his robes scorched black for
war.  His dark eyes glanced only briefly at Effle, yet she knew he saw
her completely for what she was.  The guide knew all about the
Sevrances.

"Inigar."  Drey closed his eyes and touched both lids.

"Corbie says you fought hard and well, and took the lead when Cull Byce
went down."

Drey made no motion to reply.  Effie knew he was awkward around praise,
but it did not account for the hardness in his face as he looked at the
guide. She wondered how Inigar had managed to speak to Corbie Meese so
quickly; last she'd seen of the hammer- man he was battling with Anwyn
for more beer.

"You must put the past behind you," Inigar said.

"All of it.  Clan needs good men like you.  Do not let bitterness steal
your strength.

Things are as they are.  Dwell on what they might have been, and the
ghosts of the past will eat you.  They have sharp teeth, those ghosts;
you will not feel them bite until they start tearingat the marrow in
your bones.  You must put them behind you.  Bears do not look back.  "

"You don't know of what you speak."

Effie took a quick breath; no one spoke to the guide that way.  No one.

Inigar wagged his head, shaking the words away as surely as if they were
raindrops on oilskin.

"My lore is the hawk, Drey Sevrance.  I see much that a bear cannot.  Do
not suppose that I know nothing of what happened on the Bluddroad.  Do
not suppose that I pronounce you free of blame.  But know this: What is
done is done, it is what comes after that concerns me now."

Drey rubbed his hand over his face.  When he spoke he sounded tired.

"I must go, Inigar.  You must not worry about me.  I know my place is
with the clan."

Inigar nodded.

"Have you thrown the swear stone away?"

Drey turned his back on the guide before answering.

"Yes."

Effie felt Inigar's gaze on her and Drey as they walked the length of
the guide house Drey was silent as they made their way to the kitchens
and then picked bread and meat for them both.  Effie saw him wince as he
stretched a muscle that shouldn't have been stretched, felt his body
tremble for a moment as he dealt with the pain.

"Let's find somewhere quiet to eat," he said.

"We could go to the kale yard It's quiet there, and the walls are high
so there's hardly any wind."  Effie was pleased and a little bit anxious
when Drey nodded.  She dearly wanted him to like her choice.

The kale yard was a small square of ground at the rear of the roundhouse
that had been set aside for growing herbs.  Tall walls kept freezing
winds at bay year-round, and someone long ago had thought to build a
pair of brick benches so that two or three people could sit and take
advantage of the walled haven. The kale yard was Anwyn's territory now,
and every flake of snow that dared to land there was hauled away before
it had chance to settle.  Anwyn only had to look at Longhead to make him
start hauling snow.  She had that effect on a lot of men, Effie noticed.

Kale, which Effie classified in her mind as tough cabbage, was no longer
grown in the kale yard Dagro Blackhail had forbidden it, calling kale
"that foul leaf."  Effie rather liked it, though she did allow that it
took quite a chewing.  Now Anwyn grew herbs in its place, lots of them,
like leeks, black sage, and white mustard, all pulled up for winter so
that nothing but mulched-over soil remained.

Effie felt her heart race as she walked around the exterior of the
roundhouse.  She tried to keep her eyes on her feet and not look up at
the wide-open spaces, but sometimes she forgot and found herself staring
north toward the badlands and the Want.  .  .  places that had no end.
Only when the gate on the kale yard was closed and bolted and her world
was reduced to a size she could walk across in less than a minute did
she begin to feel safe.

Drey sat on the nearest bench.  Effie, still a little breathless from
the walk, chose to sit on the second bench, across from him.  She

watched as her brother took in the details of the kale yard trying to
decipher the look on his face.  A willow planted in the farthest corner
of the yard creaked like a loose shutter in the wind.

"Last time I was here I got a beating from Anwyn Bird," Drey said after
a while.

"I was out throwing spears behind the stables, and the wind caught one
of them, sent it clear over that wall.  Took the heads off a least a
dozen cabbages.  Of course, Raif tried to fix them.

Stuck the heads right back, he did, smearing them with mud to make them
stick .  .  .  " Drey's voice trailed away to nothing.  The hard look
came back to his face.

"Anyway, it's been a good many years since I was here."

Effie nodded.  She could think of nothing to say.

Abruptly Drey leaned forward.

"Effie, there is just me and you now, and we must look out for each
other. We must stay close.  While I was riding back with the raiding
party, I had time to think.  Arlec lost his twin.  Bullhammer lost his
foster brother.  . ."  He shook his head.

"I'm not much for saying things--1 don't think anyone in our family ever
was--but I see things, and I've stood and watched as you've grown more
and more into yourself.  I've known something was wrong, but I kept
saying to myself, Effie will be all right.  Effie's a good girl, she
won't come to any harm.  Now I think you must tell me what's wrong.
Every time I see you there's less than the time before.  Raina tells me
you take food, but she doesn't know if you eat it.  Anwyn tells me that
since the night Raina became betrothed to Mace, you only leave your cell
to visit the dogs.  What are you afraid of?  Has anyone said anything to
you?  Frightened you?  Please, Effie, I need to know."

Effie, who had been looking into her brother's brown eyes from the
moment he began speaking, looked down as he spoke the last few words.

It was the longest speech she had ever heard Drey make.  It made her
feel sad.  She made no reply.

"You went to the woods that day with Raina, didn't you?  That day when
she and Mace" -- Drey stopped himself.

"The day when they became betrothed."

A small shaking motion was all Effie could manage.  She didn't want to
think of that day.  Wouldn't.

Drey rose from the bench with great difficulty, his hand bracing his
lower abdomen as he moved, and came and sat next to her.

"You're frightened of something, Erne.  I can tell.  I saw you hiding
under the stairs in the entrance chamber.  You didn't want to be seen. I
know these past months have been hard, and I know you miss Da .  .  .
and Raif. But I think there's something different here.  A secret."

Effie looked up at the word secret.

"Please, Effie.  If something is wrong, I must know."

"Secrets have to be kept."

"Not bad ones.  Never bad ones."

Effie's hand found her lore.

"Bad secrets lose their power when they're told.  The badness is
shared."

"Shared?"

"Yes.  Between you and me."

"You and me?"

Drey nodded.  He looked so old, like a proper clansman in his
boiled-leather breast piece with its ribs of steel.  And he was hurting
so much--she could tell by the border of sweat around his hairline and
the uneven rhythm of his breaths.  She didn't want to disappoint him or
lie to him.  She didn't want to lose him, too, the way she had lost Da
and Raif.

A quick squeeze of her lore steadied her, and then she spoke.  She told
her brother everythingabout the day in the Oldwood: how Raina had woken
her and bade her come to check on the traps, how Mace Blackhail had come
upon them, his horse lathered and muddy, and told Effie to leave as he
wished to speak to Raina alone; how she had scrambled onto the cliff
above them and what she had seen and heard.  She told about the threat
Mace had made to her, and the dead look in Raina's eyes.  Effie wasn't
good with words, and sometimes there were no words to describe what had
happened between Mace and Raina, but she told everythingas best she
could, encouraged by Drey's silence and patience and the unchanging
expression on his face.

When she had finished, he nodded once.  He did not question her in any
way or ask her if she was sure.  He took her hand in his and sat and
thought.  Effie had started shaking sometime during the tellingand
continued to shake now as she waited to see what her brother would do.
She noticed that the sky was almost dark.  It was very cold, but only
her outsides felt it.  Inside she was hot and rigid.

After some time Drey rose.

"Come, little one.  Let's go inside."

Effie rose with him.  She hated how tired he sounded.  She hated how she
couldn't tell what he felt.

The walk back to the roundhouse took forever.  Effie looked down at her
feet, crunching frozen weeds from step to step.  They found the entrance
chamber much changed from when they had left it.  Torches burned,
clansmen were gathered in small groups, speaking in hushed voices and
drinking beer.  Four young boys were sittingaround a pile of mud- and
hair-matted weaponry, cleaning hammer and ax heads in silent awe.
Massive red-haired Paille Trotter was singinga song about the Clan Queen
Moira Dhoone and the Maimed Man she had loved and lost.  All the wounded
had been carried away.

Effie thought that Drey would lead her through to the kitchens or the
Great Hearth or even her own cell, but he cut left across the hall,
toward the little crooked stair that led down to the chiefs chamber.

Realizing straightaway what he meant to do, Effie pulled back, but Drey
held her firm and would not let her go.  They met man-chested Nellie
Moss on the stairs.  She was carrying a fiercely flaming lunt, which she
made no effort to shield as they passed.  Effie felt the heat of the
flames singe hairs around her face.

Clan Blackhail had no seat like Clan Dhoone.  No Hail chief had ever
called himself a king, though over time many had gathered items of
kingly power to them.  The Clansword was one such thing, known
throughout the clan holds as the symbol of Blackhail power.  Clan Bludd
had the Red Axe, which wasn't really red at all and was said to be older
than the clan holds themselves. Ganmiddich had a great plate of green
marble known as the Crab Lode, as it had a giant fossilized crab in its
center and had been quarried a thousand leagues from the nearest sea.
Effie could recite all the clan treasures and emblems.

Her favorite was Clan Orrl's; they weren't known by some grand weapon or
polished stone, rather a simple oak wood walking stick known as the
Crook.

Erne liked the thought of these treasures.  They seemed beautiful to
her. Precious.  Once, when she had been reciting the emblems of each
clan to Raina at the ladies' hearth, Dagro Blackhail had walked in.

She had stopped straightaway, but Dagro had bade her continue, and she'd
gone through the clans from Bannen to Withy, pausing only once to show
respect for the Lost Clan.  When she had finished, Dagro Blackball had
laughed heartily--but not in a mean way--ruffled her hair, and told her
that no one in the clan, not even Gat Murdock, could remember all those
things.  Dagro Blackhail had then thrust out his hand toward her and
said,

"You'd better come with me, young clanswoman, and I'll show you our
treasures firsthand.  That way if anyone ever makes offwi' them in the
dead of the night, we can send you straight to the smithy.  Between your
memory and Brog's hands, we'll have new ones forged within a day."

Effie had loved being called clanswoman.  She had loved going to the
chief's chamber with Dagro Blackhail even more.  Dagro had talked for
hours about the clan treasures, holding them up to the torchlight and
polishing them with the cuff of his sleeve before he'd let her look.

It was the last time Effie had been in the chiefs chamber, a year before
Dagro's death.

These thoughts and others passed through Effie's mind as she and Drey
descended the stairs.  It seemed a very long time since Dagro Blackhail
had been chief.

Reaching the glistening, tar-blackened door of the chiefs chamber, Drey
paused to push a hand through his hair.  He took a breath, then
shouldered open the door and forced his way into the room.  Mace
Blackhail, who had been sitting on a hide stool behind the square stone
table that everyone called the Chiefs Cairn, stood.  He was alone.  His
eyes flickered yellow and black in the torchlight.  As he looked from
Drey to Effie, his hand slid down to rest upon his sword belt

"What is the meaning of this?"

Drey tightened his hold on Effie's hand.  He took a breath, then said

"Effie told me what happened in the Oldwood.  You are not worthy of my
respect, Mace Blackball.  I call you out onto the court, here and now,
to settle this matter with swords."

Effie let out a choked cry.  No.  Drey couldn't fight with Mace
Blackball. Not now, while he was injured.  Not ever.  The sword was Mace
Blackhail's chosen weapon.  Drey's was the hammer.  Why had she told?
Why?  Why?  Why?

Mace Blackhail looked at Effie, his thin lips curling to something
between a sneer and a smile.  A finger came down upon the Chiefs Cairn,
casually, as if he were testing the surface for dust.

"So you would cross steel with me, Drey Sevrance?  Raina's honor means
that much to you?"

Drey made no reply.  His body shook him with every breath.

"Now I come to think of it, it was you who thought to bring my foster
father's last token back from the badlands.  You who tanned the hide,
making it soft for Raina's back."

Drey wrenched his head savagely.  Effie didn't understand what Mace
Blackhail was gettingat.  Of course Drey cared about Raina .  .

everyone did.  The chiefs chamber, which was small and coved like a bear
cave, suddenly felt as hot and dangerous as a fire pit primed with fat.

Mace Blackhail made a negligent gesture with his hand.  He was dressed
in wolf hides dyed black.

"No matter, Sevrance.  You're not the only year man who feels.  .  .
protective of my wife.  I know how highly she is regarded.  And while
your concern for her honor is touching, your rashness is a grave
mistake.  I" -- "This isn't about Raina's honor, Mace.  It's about
yours--your lack of it."

Effie swallowed air.  Part other wanted to cheer at Drey's words.  The
other part of her was deeply afraid for her brother.  Mace Blackhail was
dangerous in different ways from other clansmen.  He wasn't hot-blooded
like Ballic the Red, or fierce like Corbie Meese.  He was as cold and
sharp as the spikes of needle ice that formed on the bottom of melt
ponds in spring, impaling bears and dogs by the act of simply existing.

"I wouldn't be so foolish as to challenge my chiefs honor on the word of
a half-grown girl."

"My sister is no liar.  I would lay my life on that."

"I didn't say she was a liar, Drey.  She saw some things and heard some
things, but only through the eyes of a child.  She doesn't understand
what goes on between a man and a woman when they're alone and in
private.  Tern lived like a hermit.  She never happened upon him
lovemaking, that's for sure.  She doesn't even know what; lovemaking is.
Think, Drey.  When Effie spied upon me and Raina s in the Oldwood, what
did she see?  She saw Raina playing coy and S slapping me away--what
woman would not do that?  You know how they are.  We tussled in the
snow, I will not lie about that, and I daresay I pinned her down and she
cuffed me for my trouble.  A woman like Raina needs her love play rough"
-- "Stop it!"  Drey lashed out at the space separating him from : Mace
Blackhail, his face contorted with rage.

"I will not hear such ; filth about Raina."

"No.  And I wouldn't have had to speak it if it hadn't been for ] your
little sister here.  It's not her fault.  Of course what she saw
distressed her--all lovemaking looks like violence to a child."  '] "You
threatened her."  | "Yes, I did, and with good reason.  I didn't want
the truth of what J had happened coming from anyone's mouth but mine or
Raina's.  ; The child had no right to tell.  It was not her business." ^
"You're lying.  You have no honor."  ' "Don't I?  Perhaps we should call
Raina in and ask her the truth of it.  She was the one who agreed to be
my wife."  ; Effie saw something within Drey waver.  He didn't step back
exactly, but he let out a breath, and part of him seemed to withdraw asw
he did so.  Effie felt sick with relief She didn't care about Mace ^
Blackhail's lies--and she knew they were lies. Mace Blackball would kill
Drey in a fight.

"Drey, heed me in this.  I am your chief I will not stand by and watch
as you take the same path as your brother.  You are too valuable to me
and this clan.  I see how the year men respect you.  Corbie?  and Orwin
are full of your praises.  Just this past quarter, Corbie was telling me
how you saved Arlec's life at battle's end.  I need i^g you by my side.
Good men, whose honesty and loyalty I can rely on.

"What has happened here in this chamber need go no further.

Ynn heard somethingand acted from your heart; I cannot fault you for
that I respect your challenge to fight me on the court, and hope that if
the time ever comes when I'm in want of a clansman's justice you will
stand where you are right now and make that same challenge again.  "

Drey continued looking at Mace long after he had finished speaking.

Mace's expression did not change, but he brought himself up to his full
height and sent a hand out to trail along the wall where the Clansword
was mounted on wooden pegs.  His eyes were all darkness now; there was
nothing of wolf yellow in them.

After what seemed like hours, Drey turned to face Effie.  Kneeling on
one knee, he took both her hands in his.  His face was pale, and she
could see the uncertainty in his eyes.

"Do you think you may have been confused by what you saw, little one?
Did you actually see Mace strike Raina in a proper way, like I would
strike a man in a fight?"

Effie's chest was heavy with love and sadness.  She had brought this
mess upon him, and he had done what was right and proper and absolutely
good. Even now he would fight.  Even now, on just her say.

The thought was almost too much to bear.  Either way she harmed him.

Lie, and she became a conspirator with Mace Black- hail, leading Drey
away from what was right and true.  Hold to the truth, and he would end
up dead or gone .  .  .  like Da and Raif.

That could not happen.  Erne knew it in the deepest bit other insides,
yet it didn't stop her from hating herself as she opened her mouth to
lie.

"I'm not sure anymore, Drey.  Not sure.  I thought... but then what Mace
said" -- "Hush, little one.  Hush."  Drey hugged her to him, wrapping
his big arms about her like a cloak.  She shook with relief and a
dreadful kind of shame.  It was as if she had betrayed him.

I am glad in my heart this matter is settled," Mace Blackhail said,
moving out from behind the Chiefs Cairn and offering his hand to Drey.

"It is behind us now, and we shall not speak of it again."

Drey released his hold on Effie and stood.  He stepped toward Mace, and
the two clasped forearms without exchanginganother word.  Their gazes
held, and Effie could almost feel Mace Blackhail's will working upon
Drey, like when Brog Widdie took white-hot metal from his oven and
pulled it into the shape he needed.  Mace slapped Drey on the shoulder
as they moved apart.  "Get yourself to Laida Moon.  Have her take a look
at whatever injury you're nursing beneath that breast piece I need you
well.  I heard a rumor that the Dog Lord is set to march on Bannen, and
we ride south tomorrow to steal his thunder."

Mace Blackhail ushered Drey to the door.  Effie followed after.  As Drey
turned his attention to the first of the stairs, Effie felt Mace
Blackhail's finger slide across her throat.

"What did I say would happen if you went telling tales?"  His voice was
softer than the sound of Drey's boots against the stone.

CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN.

Dancing Ice kmned hands clawed her.  Faces burned by something darker
and more terrible than flames pushed against her, openmouthed and
pleading.

Seared tissue cracked, revealing pale pink flesh beneath.  Proud flesh:
raised and stippled and full of lifeblood The first sign of healing.

Reach, reach.  We must have it.  .  .  we need it.  .  .  give us what
we need.  .  .  you must.  we will make you .  we know ways to harm you
.  .  we have waited too long.  Reach!

Red eyes glowed with malice.  Lips spread, revealing night smiles.  She
turned, but there were more at her back.  She crumbled their substance
in her fists, breaking them down into ash and fire scraps, but for every
limb she broke, another dozen rose to haunt her.  Glancing into the
distance, through the charred and greasy timbers of their arms and legs,
she saw the wall of black ice.  The ice cave.  Suddenly it no longer
seemed like a-- "Wake up! Ash!  Wake!"

Hands of flesh and blood pulled at her, tugging her back through so many
layers of sleep that she felt like a diver emerging from water.

"Wake!  Please wake."

She opened her eyes.  Daylight flooded in like salt water, harsh,
stinging, and unwelcome.  It had been pitch dark in her dream, she
remembered.  She always dreamed of night.

"Angus.  She's awake."

Hands touched her forehead and cheek, warm hands, rough and gentle, not
like her foster father's hands at all.  A face appeared before her.

Raif, she thought, pleased at her ability to find names.

"It's me.  Raif.  You're safe.  Angus is here.  We're three days north
of Spire Vanis, in the spruce woods east of the Spill."

It took Ash much time to decipher what he said.  She looked into his
eyes: What color were they?  An inky blue?  A shade between midnight and
black? After a moment she asked the only question that mattered.

"How long?"

"All of last night and most of the morning."

Feeling she might be sick.  Ash tugged herself free of his hold and
twisted her head toward the ground.  Haifa day!  How long will it be
before no one can wake me?  Aware of Raits eyes upon her, she
straightened her spine.  She decided she would not be sick in front of
him.  After a moment she felt well enough to sit.  The action made her
hurt in new ways.  The third finger on her left hand felt big and sore,
tucked away in its splint.  Her shoulder ached, and her mouth tasted of
saddle leather and horses.

"Here.  Drink this."

Ash took the offered waters kingand let some of the icy water run over
her face.  Raif watched her as she opened her mouth to drink.  He knew
about the voices.  She didn't know how it was possible, but he knew.

"I felt you ... go last night, just before we made camp.  We tried to
wake you, but you were far away.  Angus thought it better to let you
sleep."

"He bound my mouth?"

Raif nodded.

"And your hands."  They both looked away.

Ash scanned the surrounding territory.  Camp had been made on a hillside
above a wooded valley.  Great columns of black spruce, weighed down by
ton upon ton of new snow, rose up like a city around them.  To the south
the blue giants that were the Southern Ranges floated above the horizon,
shimmering with ice.  Overhead the sky was thick with snow clouds, and
it was impossible to tell where the sun lay.  Ash shivered.  She had no
memory of coming here.

As she turned back to face Raif, she heard hounds howlingand barking in
the distance.  Following the sound with her eyes, she looked down across
the valley and into the deepest depths of the spruces, whose needles
shone black as night.

"I think we'd better be on our way."  Angus strode into her line of
vision, his big red-stubbled face as calm as if he had heard sparrows
singing, not hounds.

"Ash."  He held out a gloved hand for her to take.  Ash grasped it, and
he pulled her off the ground as effortlessly as if she were made of
twigs.

"Raif.  Saddle the horses.  I'll see to the remains of the camp."

"What should I do?"  Ash forced a calmness into her voice that she did
not feel.  She didn't like appearing weak before Angus.

"Fill the skins with snow."  Angus fished inside his buckskin coat and
took out a package wrapped in linen.

"Take this and eat every scrap of it, even the fat around the eggs.  I
know you don't feel much like it, but you must force yourself.  You
haven't eaten in over a day."

Unable to think of a reply, Ash nodded.  In a strange way Angus'
vigilance reminded her of Penthero Iss; they both wanted to feed and
watch over her.

The past three days had been a new kind of nightmare for Ash.  Her life
had changed absolutely and forever the moment she had stepped into the
shadow of Vaingate.  Marafice Eye had conjured himself up from a pile of
beggar's rags. Two charcoal burners attendinga brazier had peeled red
blades from their sides like strips of skin.  An old drunk lying in the
snow had shaken off his years and infirmities like a leper touched by
the gods, and one guard standingalone in the gate tower had suddenly
turned into three.  Ash had seen it as a kind of magic, the sort used by
street corner magicians, all misdirection, mirrors, and smoke.  She had
continued running for the gate anyway.  To be that near and not cross to
the other side was unthinkable, a failure of the worst kind.

After that, madness took her.  She remembered only fear and death.

When it was over and the man who called himself Angus had asked her to
travel with him and his kinsman to Ille Glaive, all that had mattered to
Ash was getting through the gate.  That was why, in the end, she had
agreed to go with them: They were heading her way.

She had not counted on what had happened next.  Somehow, as she'd sunk
to her knees in the hard snow outside of Vaingate, she had lost herself
to the voices.  They hadn't even allowed her a moment alone with her
mother's memory .  .  .  simply stolen her mind clean away.

Raifhad pulled her back.  He had touched her arm, and as he'd done so
knowledge had passed between them.  Ash shook her head.  It was more
than that, almost as if something inside her had reached out toward
him--an invisible tentacle probingand binding--yet the idea of that was
so distressing, she shied away from it.  They were connected now, that
she knew. And it was her doing, not his.

Ash frowned as she scooped snow into the horn nozzle of the waters king
The cry of the hounds was louder now, more insistent.

Almost against her will, her gloved hand rose up to the part other arm
Raifhad touched.

"Ash.  To the bay."

Hauling the waterskins over her back, she obeyed Angus and crossed to
where Raifheld the horses.  Raifdid not speak as he took the skins from
her.  He was not like Angus; he never made conversation for the sake of
passing time.

Mounting the horse wasn't easy for Ash.  The quick movement made her
head spin, bringing back flashes of the dream.  Surely there had been
something . .  .  some revelation, something she had to remember?  As
quickly as she thought of it, the idea flitted away.

As soon as she was settled behind the saddle, Angus came striding
over--not running, exactly, but moving more quickly than was his wont.
His copper eyes kept flicking to the valley below.  Following his gaze,
Ash saw a blur of movement glidingacross the packed snow.

Unconsciously she squeezed the bay with her thighs.  The sept had caught
up with them at last.

The Sull tunnel had given them a quarter day's start.  Angus had kept
them traveling through the night and on into the next day.  His
knowledge of the roads and ways helped, and the nearer they drew to Ille
Glaive, the greater his knowledge became.  He could read snow and ice
like other men read books.  He knew when snow lay over ice, not solid
ground, where drifts were deepest, and where pond ice was thinnest and
liable to crack.  He could spot an animal trail lying beneath two days
of snowfall and could tell when a hard frost was coming just by sniffing
the wind.

He always seemed to know when it was time to move on.  Ash had sat
behind on the bay and felt as his shoulders stiffened for no reason that
she could hear or see.  Always at such times he'd kick the bay into a
canter or send Raifto high ground to check the trail.

Angus knew lots of things for a man who claimed to be a humble ranger.
Ash was sure he knew who she was.  He never asked what she had done to
warrant being chased and tormented by Marafice Eye.  Nor did he show any
curiosity about her second name, her position in the city, or her life
before she had met him.  It wasn't politeness that halted his tongue,
rather a desire that nothing be said until they reached Ille Glaive. Ash
went along with this because it suited her.

The longer she could put off telling either of these two men anything
about herself, the better.

Angus Lok was no fool.  It might suit him to play one now and then, but
that wasn't who he was.

"Northwest through the trees, Raif.  Then hard along the stream."

Angus gave the bay its head, and they took off after Raif at full
gallop.

Ash held on tightly as the bay charged through the spruces.  Behind her
she could hear the high, excited braying of the hounds.  A horn blared,
brash and triumphant, growing louder and louder as seconds passed.  The
hair on Ash's neck prickled.  Was Marafice Eye one of the seven?

"Hounds are a quarter league ahead of the sept," Angus said, perhaps
speaking to calm her.

"And likely they've been traveling through the night."

Ash struggled for his meaning.

"So their horses will be tired?"

"Aye.  Unless they've been given false strength."

"Like the ghost meal

"As close as damnation would have it."  Angus kicked the bay up a bank.
White breath pumped from the gelding's nostrils in thick bursts. Raifhad
already gained the stream and was now waiting for them to catch up.

"Damn the lad," hissed Angus under his breath.  "He gets that from his
brother--infernal waiting."

Ash watched as Raif turned the gray, a strange tightness pulling at her
chest. She hadn't known Raif had a brother, hadn't thought of him as
havingany family other than Angus.  For some reason she had thought he
was an orphan . .  .  like her.

Raif reached over Moose's dock and slid his bow from its soft leather
case. With practiced movements he strung and braced the bow, rolling the
twine between his fingers as he tied a series of knots.  His face was
gray with shadows, his eyes focused on the road below.  Can he see the
sept from where he's sitting?  Ash wondered.  The thought turned her
cold.

She had seen what he could do with a bow.  That day at Vaingate, while
Marafice Eye and the others had watched his arrows.  Ash had watched his
face.  Even through the grating she had seen the hunter's glint in his
eyes, recognized death as a presence behind them.  Even now, days later,
the memory chilled her like cold breath upon her spine.

"No?"  Angus screamed.

"No arrows.  Not at the men."

Raif, who had taken an arrow from his case and was in the process of
raising it to his bow, halted in midnocking.  Ash frowned.  She had
thought he had no arrows left.  Where had they come from?  As the bay
drew nearer she saw the arrow was crudely shaped, whittled from pine,
not hardwood, fletched with horsehair and tipped with flint.  He had
made it himself.  But when?  Ash answered her own question: while she
had slept through the night.

"Do not target the men.  Any of them.  Understand?"  Angus' voice was
harsh as he flanked Moose.

"One of them is a magic user--we have no way of knowing which.  Sight
his heart and you give him a weapon to kill you."

"But-"

"No, Raif.   Do not question me on this.   There's no time to explain.

When the dogs get close, shoot at them if you must.  For now, though,
put the arrow away.  Distance is our best protection.  " With that Angus
kicked on ahead, leaving Raif to the ridge top and the stream.  Moments
later Ash heard Moose gaining speed behind them.  She breathed a sigh of
relief.

Below the ridge, the spruces rippled like things made out of water, not
wood. Ash tried to spot the sept, but every tree and brush moving in the
wind looked like a horseman.  Ahead, the ground began to level off.  The
stream slowed, and cords of ice smoke rose from its partially frozen
surface.  The impact of the bay's hooves along the bank was enough to
crack shore ice as they passed.  Ash's heart beat fast in her chest.
There was a fierceness in her, and she wanted to ride and ride and never
stop.

She still couldn't believe she was free.  Sixteen years she had lived in
Spire Vanis.  Sixteen years of being watched, cosseted, and confined.
All she knew was within the city; all her dreams had ended five paces
south of Vaingate.  When she was younger, Penthero Iss had taken pains
to teach her about the world in which they lived.  He had brought her
books, beautiful fantastic books, painstakingly written in High Hand,
illustrated by master engravers, and colored by oath bound scribes.  Ash
had seen the tall spiraling form of the Cloistress Tower at Owl's Reach,
surrounded by its ring of petrified trees; she'd studied the ruins at
Morning Star, the giant steps that led nowhere, and the runners of
silver ivy that climbed them year by year; she'd gazed upon the vast
stone fields of Trance Vor, the iron cairns sunk deep into the soil of
Hanging Valley, the Towerlode at Linn, the sheer cliffs that rose around
Raven Head, and the golden walls of Ille Glaive with their windows
shaped like tears.  She had seen the world from those books, yet she had
never once dreamed she'd be part of it.

Spire Vanis was her home.  Mask Fortress was her home.  Now she was
ridingaround a lake she had only read of in books, on her way to a city
she knew only through lines of ink.  She supposed it felt like freedom,
if freedom was a fall into the unknown.

"Cross the stream!"  Angus called.  Raifwas ahead of them again, leading
Moose along the bank with a tight rein.  On Angus' word, he descended
the shallow slope to the water's edge.

The stream was frozen along its banks, yet green water still ran at its
center, frothing over unseen rocks.  Ash feared for Moose.  She saw his
hooves break rotten ice, watched his momentary hesitation as he fought
his natural instinct to back away.  Raif stroked his neck, spoke soft
words that Ash couldn't hear.  Slowly Moose moved forward through the
shore ice into the center of the stream.

The bay, who as far as Ash could tell had a name that Angus preferred no
one to know, knew no such fear.  It was almost as if he had been ice
trained, for he seemed to test the ice before he broke it.  When they
came to a small runoff pool where the water was mostly undisturbed by
the stream's current, the bay made no attempt to break the ice at all:
He simply knew it was thick enough to take the combined weight of
himself and his riders.  Angus said nothing during the process, but Ash
could tell he was proud of his horse as he scratched the bay's neck and
shoulders continually.

As they scrambled out of the ice on the far side of the stream, the lead
hound broke from the trees.  Snapping and snarling, it made for the
bank, its orange-and-black body humped with ribs, its docked tail
quivering like a second snout.  A second emerged a moment later, then
another.  Suddenly the sound of their calls was unbearable.  The pitch
changed, growing higher and more frenzied.  They had the quarry in their
sights.

Angus turned the bay in the last of the ice.  Freezing water splashed as
high as Ash's face.  The bay's tail whipped against her thighs.

"Carry on along the bank!"  called Angus to Raif.

"They'll cross long that way.  If we're lucky, we'll lose some to the
water."

Ash didn't understand what he meant, but Raif did and he turned Moose
quickly, stayingas close to the stream as he could.  With Moose's hooves
barely a pace above the shore ice, horse and rider broke into a gallop.
Angus followed suit, the bay keeping perfect pace.

Ash risked glancing back, then wished she hadn't.  Half a dozen dogs
swarmed like wasps on the far bank.  Yellow teeth glinted in
ice-reflected light. Pink-and-black gums wet with saliva reminded her of
scorched flesh.

As Moose and the bay picked up speed, the dogs began to shadow them
along the bank.  Soon Ash didn't need to turn her head to see the does,
as they pulled level with Moose within a matter of seconds.

Only the stream separated them now.  Then, as Ash looked, the first of
the dogs scrambled onto the shore ice.  Ash dug her fingernails into
Angus' buckskin coat to stop herself from crying out.  The dog skidded
over the ice effortlessly, its weight not great enough to break the
surface.  Others followed, howlingand shaking their heads like things
possessed.

Only when they entered the water did Ash begin to understand what Angus
had meant by "crossing long."  The dogs, seeing how their quarry was
racingahead of them while they splashed in the water, actually began
swimming upstream, rather than take the shortest route across.

If Angus had simply ridden away from the stream and out of the dogs'
sights, the dogs would have crossed in a straight line.  This way he
tormented them into trying to keep pace.

Not all the dogs were fooled, and some began to swim through the froth
toward the far bank.  Seeing their sleek wet heads bobbing toward the
shore ice, Raif reined in Moose.

"Keep going!"  he shouted to Angus as he kicked Moose onto the rise
above the bank.  Already he had one of the pine arrows in his hand.

Ash felt Angus' body stiffen.  He drew breath to speak yet stopped
himself at the last moment, perhaps deciding it was better not to repeat
his earlier warning.  Despite Raifs cry, he pulled on the bay's reins,
slowing the gelding to a trot.

"How many dogs?"

It took Ash a moment to realize Angus was speaking to her.  She glanced
over her shoulder at the stream.  One dog had already reached the far
shore and was shaking its body viciously, sprayinga fine mist of water
droplets into the air.  Another two dogs were skating over the shore ice
toward the bank. A fourth was trying to scramble onto the ice from the
water but was obviously tired, as the current kept tugging it back.  A
fifth dog was still in the free-flowing water at the center of the
stream, paddling furiously.  The sixth had fallen back.  Ash watched as
its small head went under, saw panic in its amber eyes as it emerged
once more from the froth.

Thuc.

Glancing in the direction of the soft, knuckle-snapping sound, Ash saw
Raif sitting high in his saddle, his left arm absorbing the shock of the
recoiling bow, his eyes focused on the bank below.  The first dog was
dead.  Ash pressed her hand against her mouth, holding her breath. It
was a terrible thing .  .  .  terrible .  to be able to kill another
being so surely.

"Five dogs," she heard her voice say.  Even as she spoke, Raifs second
arrow found another heart.

As the third dog tore toward Raif, the spruces on the far bank came
alive with noise and movement.  Branches thrashed air, snow spewed
upward in a glitteringarc.  Seven silhouettes came into view.  Swift
moving, dark as beasts that hunted by night, they rode in a close V
formation with only the space of a child's hand between them.  The Rive
Watch.  Ash had seen them ride that way before, watching them from the
high windows of the Cask as they drove a wedge into an armed and angry
mob.  A man had been hung, a popular rogue and ladies' man, and the
people of Spire Vanis had taken offense at his death.  Not the fact of
his death, rather the manner of it, for Penthero Iss had ordered his
handsome face cut off and then stitched on backward.  Ash swallowed
hard.  Sometimes her foster father did things like that just to see what
such horrors would look like.

The riot had been quelled within an hour.  Marafice Eye had spearheaded
the first sept.  Just the rumor of his presence had been enough to take
the fight from the crowd.  No one in the city, not even Penthero Iss,
was stupid enough not to fear the Knife.

"No, Raif!"  Angus screamed at the top of his voice.

"No more shooting!"  He spun the bay, depriving Ash of her view of the
sept.

Ash lost sense of what was happeningas she was forced to hang on to
Angus as they crashed through shore ice and frozen reeds toward Raif.

Suddenly a dog exploded from nowhere.  Ash felt air pump against her
thigh, then the dog's muzzle sprang open, ripping hair and skin from the
bay's rump. The horse screamed and bucked.  Angus bunched the reins in
his fist.

"Take the knife from my belt."

Ash did as she was told.  The dog danced around the bay's rear hooves,
then launched itself once more at its rump.  Ash's only thouglit was for
the bay. Already she could see two holes full of blood where the dog's
canines had bit deepest.  Anger made her lash out violently, uselessly,
at the dog's snout.  Angus whipped the bay's head back, making the horse
wheel so quickly, the dog was left snappingair.  Ash cursed her own
uselessness.

"Wait until its snout touches horseflesh."  Angus' voice was low, almost
threatening.  His teeth were clenched.

Ash readjusted her grip on the knife.  The hilt was carved from root
wood but some unseen metal at the center made it heavy in the hand.  As
she waited for the dog to attack, she risked glancing back across the
stream.  The sept was clear of the trees now.  The lead rider shouted an
order, and the V bore down upon the stream.  The leader was huge,
dressed in the black and the red of the Watch, with the Killhound sewn
above his heart and a black iron bird helm forming a cage around his
face.  Ash looked into the shadows behind the helm, and slowly, so
slowly, her belly shrank to the size of a fist.

Marafice Eye rode at the head of the sept.

Something dark streaked below her.  A muzzle packed with teeth came
straight for her thigh.  Ash shifted back in horror.  Small orange eyes
closed in self-protection as the dog sank its fangs into her thigh.

Shock and pain tore through her like a jolt from a lance.  Hot tears
filled her eyes.  Rage drove the knife.  She hardly knew what she was
doing, hardly bothered to place the blow, yet she drove the blade in
with all the force she possessed.  Bone split with a wet crack.  The
dog's eyes opened, and its jaws sprang apart.  As the creature fell away
from her body, Ash yanked the knife back.  She wasn't about to lose her
blade to a dead dog.

"I said horseflesh.  Not girl flesh Angus seemed angry.  He drove the
bay up the slope in silence, making his way toward Raif.  Ash held her
hand to her thigh and pressed.  She was angry herself.  She had expected
Angus to praise her.

Raif waited for them at the top of the hill.  He had stowed his bow and
now had a short double-edged sword in his hand.  Two dogs lay butchered
by Moose's hocks.  Both Moose and Raif were scratched and bloody.  Raif
was breathing heavily, and his face was all angles and grayness.  It
takes something from him, she thought with cold certainty. Killing the
things he does, the way he does, hurts him in some way.

Catchinga glimpse of something dark and sparkling over his shoulder, Ash
strained to see more.  The Black Spill stretched out in the valley below
them like a beast under glass.  Ledges of ice crusted the shoreline,
supporting great frozen piers that extended toward the heart of the lake
and the black steaming water that ran there.  A haze of mist
floatingabove the surface mirrored each curve and break of the shore,
forming a ghost lake above the Spill.

Ash breathed softly, letting her hand relax against her thigh.  The
eastern shore of the Black Spill, where the Maker of Souls had shown
himself to the Condemned Man, Rob Ruce, who went on to take Ille Glaive;
where the Red Priest had washed his hands of the blood of the Five
Sisters, who saw visions and spoke in Old Tongue; where Samrel of Spire
Vanis had met to exchange hostages with the Clan King Hoggie Dhoone; and
where Sorissina of the Elms had drowned beneath the ice as she followed
her lover's calls into the mist. Ash sat, transfixed for the briefest
moment, and watched the play of light and shadow on the surface of the
lake.  She had always felt a kinship for Sorissina of the Elms: She had
been a foundling, too.

"Cut the saddlebags."

Ash was brought back to the present by the sound of Angus' voice.

Before she could decide whether or not he was speaking to her, he jumped
down from the horse.  His boots crunched snow as he moved to inspect the
wounds on the bay's rump.

"I said cut the saddlebags."

Ash exchanged a glance with Raif.

"Both of you.  Hurry.  Ash.  Move forward into the saddle."  Angus
opened the saddlebag on his near side and took out a handful of small
hide-bound packages, then slipped them beneath his tunic.  He moved
quickly, continually looking over his shoulder to check * the progress
of the sept.

Marafice Eye was clearly visible now, his gloved hands like twin ravens
at a kill as he reined in his stallion for the descent to the stream. As
Ash sawed at the pannier harness to release the bags, she noticed that
one man in the sept had broken formation and was now straggling behind.
Although he wore a black cloak like the others, he held no weapon and
obviously needed both hands for his horse.  As his cloak tails caught
the wind and ripped behind him, the white colors of a cleric or
anchorite were revealed at his chest.  Ash felt a small thrill of
remembrance.  She had seen the man before.  She recognized his pale skin
and the sharp set of his shoulders.  He was one of Penthero Iss'
creatures, one of those special people whom Caydis Zerbina brought to
his chambers after dark.

"Sarga Veys."  Angus plucked the name from Ash's tongue, making it sound
like one of Marafice Eye's curses.  For a moment his copper eyes turned
red, as if the metal there had been heated by a burst of flame.

"Raif.  Hand me the bow.  Now."

Raif, who had cut his saddlebags moments earlier, unbuckled the bow case
and quiver and handed them to his uncle.  Angus did not take his eyes
from the sept as he hooked the quiver to his belt.  "We must part now,"
he said.

"All of us.  There are seven of them and three of us, and our only hope
is to split them.  Raif.  You will follow the shoreline north.  Fight
only if you must.  Better to flee and be safe.

If you are pursued by many, cross onto the ice.  Moose is less laden
than the sept's horses and will be more readily borne.  Do not venture
farther from shore than the length of four horses.  " Angus waited for
Raif to nod.

"Good."  The sound of the small word was nearly drowned out by the noise
of Marafice Eyes horse fracturing ice as it entered the stream.  Others
followed, and the slim body of water became alive with dark, pitching
forms driving toward the bank.

Angus ran a finger over the bowstring, warming.

"Ash.  You must go directly onto the lake ice.  You're the lightest
among us" -- "No," hissed Raif.

"She'll be killed.  There's no telling how thick that ice is past the
shore- " "Do you not think I know the dangers, Raif Sevrance?"  Angus
asked quietly, a muscle pumping in his cheek.

"I know the Spill better than you know the graze around the roundhouse,
and the bay knows ice better still.  He will lead her safely across."
Angus turned to Ash.

"You cannot fight, lass.  You have only my belt knife as a weapon.  The
best way I can protect you is to lead you to a safe place.  No man can
follow you deep onto the ice--the Maker help them if they do.  The frost
smoke will shield you from arrows.  You must trust the bay. Old Blood
runs in his heart.  He will deliver you from harm.  I would not let him
take you if I did not believe this wholly."

Ash looked into Angus' eyes.  He was shaking slightly; the force of his
words still upon him.  She believed what he said absolutely.  She had
seen for herself the bay's knowledge of ice as they crossed the stream,
and if Angus had wanted to kill her, he could have done so a dozen times
before now.  No. He wanted her alive and safe .  .  .  the truth of that
was in his eyes.  But why?  What made him shake?  What emotion was he
controlling within himself when he spoke?  Did he fear her?  Thrusting
that thought aside, she glanced across the lake.  The Black Spill.  It
never froze completely, not even in deepest winter.

Sorissina of the Elms had taken that truth with her to her death.

Left outside Vaingate to die.  The words came to Ash, as they always
did, as a kind of prayer.  They were her life, those words.  They made
her who she was.

She took the reins.

Angus breathed heavily, showing no sign of relief.  His eyes flicked to
the stream.  Marafice Eye's spurs claimed horseflesh as he forced the
beast through the last of the ice.  His small mouth was clearly visible
now, pale and twisted like butcher's stringaround a roast.

"Go!  Both of you."  Angus smacked Moose's rump as he spoke.  "Raif.

Watch Ash as far as you can, but do not follow where the bay leads.

Moose is a good horse, but he's no skater.  Don't test him.  Ten leagues
north of here, where the lake bends inward like a quarter moon, you'll
find a grove of white oaks above the shore.  If I don't find you before
then, I'll meet you there after dark.  "

Raif nodded.  He did not look pleased.  Ash could tell he wasn't happy
about leaving her to ride on the ice.  Their gazes met, and Ash watched
as he raised his hand to his throat and touched the

Angus had hold of the bay's bridle.

"Tharra clan mis," he murmured.

Then quickly to Ash: "Trust him.  He'll lead you a fine dance.  When all
is quiet I'll call you back."

Ash jerked her head in something she hoped was close to a nod.  She
could not speak.  She wanted to ask him what he would do on foot but
there were only seconds left between them, and she feared to detain him
with thoughtless speech.  Sliding her feet into the stirrups, she took
control of the horse.

"Go," he said.

"Hold your mind in the now."

Ash turned the bay and let the gelding find his own way down the slope.
Already she could hear the whip of leather and horse tails as the sept
sloughed off water from the stream and re-formed themselves into a V.
When she glanced over her shoulder, she caught a glimpse of Angus
running down the slope away from her, making for the cover of a dense
island of spruces.

"Maker save him," she whispered, suddenly wishing she had spoken up
after all.  She should have told him to keep himself safe, asked him the
true name of the bay, found out why he'd taken the bow from Raifthe
moment he'd spied Sarga Veys.

"There she is!  On the bay!  Shoot the horse from under her!"

All thoughts were expelled from Ash's mind at the sound of Marafice
Eye's voice.  She felt as if she had been punched in the stomach.  Her
child's terror of him bubbled up from the past.  Clutchingat the reins,
she kicked the bay hard--harder than she knew she should.  A salvo of
orders followed her down the slope.  Marafice Eye was screamingat the
top of his voice.

"Thray, Stagro, with me.  Malharic, Hood, after the clansman.
Crosshead, to the trees.  Stagro, flank Veys."  He wanted her to hear
him.  He knew the quality other fear.

The bay cantered down the slope toward the hard-froze mud that formed
the lakeshore.  An arrow shot past his hocks, a second sailed wide of
his head. Ash ground her teeth together.  The world around her was a
blur of trees and harsh, ice-reflected light.  Which way had Raif gone?
North?  She looked that way but could not spot him.  The clansman, she
had heard Marafice Eye call him.  Some small part of her had known that
all along, recognizing the rough, almost barbaric manner of his dress
from descriptions she'd read in books.  Yet he'd never once mentioned
his clan.

The bay slowed his pace as he hit the lake ice.  Tugging his head
forward, he demanded more rein.  It was against all Ash's instincts as a
rider to allow him the freedom to choose his own path in such a place.
Trust him, Angus had said.  Ash frowned, slid her hands a small way down
the reins.  She was just beginning to realize how hard such a thing
would be.

The bay's iron-shod hooves made the shore-fast ice ring like a bell.

The water was frozen solid, offering no give, and Ash was jolted around
in the saddle as they entered the wall of mist.  The temperature dropped
immediately, making her cheeks smart as if burned.  The light changed
texture, and suddenly there were no shadows or highlights--no structure
for judging distance or depth.

Frightened, Ash looked down.  The surface of the lake shone beneath her:
wind scratched, snow encrusted, the color of diamonds and salt.

"Follow me!  Don't lose her!"  Marafice Eye's voice carried perfectly
through the mist.  Seconds later the lake ice began to vibrate as other
horses gained the shore.  Ash heard Marafice Eye spit a curse at the
mist.  Softly he said,

"Do your business, Halfman.  She : must not be lost."

Ash shivered.  The mist surrounding her was as ragged as rotten linen.

Could Marafice Eye see her?  She didn't want to risk looking back.

The bay's huge liquid eyes were fixed upon the ice, his entire being
bent upon the path ahead.  Ash could feel the blood hummingalong his
spine, see the rigid set of the muscles in his withers and neck.

Abruptly he changed his course.  Straightaway his hooves began to make a
flatter tone when they hit the ice, and Ash caught his ears twitching
accordingly.  He's listening, she thought.  The revelation filled her
with wonder.  Where had such a creature come from?

Behind her she was aware of other horses slowing.  They were ;"S close
now. Even the sound of their breaths carried.  | Ash gave the bay more
rein, squeezed his ribs with her thighs.|J She thought she smelled
something familiar, like copper or the stench of lightning duringa
storm.  The sensation passed as the bay altered his course once more,
turning into the wind.  They were very far out on the ice now.  Ash
looked ahead into the peaks and plains of frost smoke.  Was this what
Sorissina of the Elms had seen before she died?

This world of white, captured light?

Something prickled the back of Ash s neck, like an insect's touch or a
fingernail scored down her spine.  Fear came alive in her chest.

Everything was quiet.  When did 1 last hear the sept's horses?  She
found she could not remember.  She didn't want to turn and look behind
her.  Didn't want to see what was there.

"Stop where you are, Asarhia March," came a voice from close behind.

"Or we'll shoot the horse."

Ash looked back.  Four men rode on the ice thirty paces behind her.

Marafice Eye, Sarga Veys, a watch brother with a thin face and a nose
made ugly by scar tissue, and a fourth man farther behind.  Thin Face
had a cranked and loaded crossbow resting in the crook of his arm.

Marafice Eye was hunched low on his horse, his arms drawn close to his
body, his gloved hands knotted at the reins.  Beneath the wire of his
bird helm, his eyes glinted like lenses of ice.  Sarga Veys rode in the
middle, his pale and unprotected head rising from the leather plumage of
the Rive Watch cloak like somethingalready dead.  He was breathing hard,
and a film of gray sweat shone on his nose and brow.

Then it struck her.  There was no mist between them.  She shouldn't be
able to see them at all; the mist was too thick for that.  Ahead she
could barely see five paces, yet behind her a tunnel of clear air had
been created.

She swallowed hard.  It was an aberration, wrong in every way, like
water running upstream or the sun coming out at midnight.  The mist had
been held back, molded, forced to do the bidding of one man.  It made
Ash's flesh crawl.  So this is what sorcery is?  Not gaudy tricks and
flashing lights; control over nature.

The.  An arrow shot over the heads of the three men.  Even as Ash
recognized the crude shape of the shaft and the horsehair fletchings at
its tail, she kicked the bay into a gallop.  Angus must have fired high
because he couldn't be sure where she was and didn't want to risk
hurting her.  It wasn't much, but it was a distraction.  As she lowered
her body over the bay's neck, she heard the crisp thuc of the crossbow
discharging.  The bay was in the process of switching its path, and the
cross bolt scraped along his rump, taking hair and skin with it.

Ash pressed her lips together to stop herself from crying out.  Horse
blood spilled over her boots.  Beneath the gelding's hooves, the ice
began to creak.  Horses charged after them, tracing the bay's path.

Marafice Eye shouted an obscenity at Sarga Veys.  Ash heard metal rattle
as Thin Face cranked the bow for a second shot.

The bay galloped faster and faster.  Looking down, Ash saw where the ice
had grown darker as the deep, lighuess water began to shine through. Her
foster father had once told her that a man could stand on freshwater ice
as thin as a hen's egg.  But what about a girl on a horse?  She could
recall no wisdom to cover that.

Ash felt the ice move beneath her.  The bay veered keenly to the left.

One of his hooves broke the surface with a sharp, wet snap.  Crack lines
began to appear in the ice, running through the bay's legs like fast
little ants.  Lather foamed along the gelding's neck as he danced across
the fracturing plates.  Ash felt freezing water spit against her face.
Behind her, ice snapped with the force of a felled tree.

Someone screamed.  A horse squealed, high and terrible like something
being slaughtered.  Ice pitched and rolled, causing the lake water to
swell.  The shelf of ice the bay ran across bobbed like a raft in a
storm.

Ash risked a glance over her shoulder.  Frost smoke spewed from the
surface in a shower of blue sparks.  Horses and men plunged through the
erupting ice field, arms flung outward, eyes wide with terror, fingers
clutchingair. Marafice Eye's horse plummeted into the lake, its forelegs
kicking wildly, its rider clawingat its neck.  The last thing she saw
before turning her back was a pair of gloved hands struggling for a
handhold in the cold black water.

Ash rode across the ice, dancing with the bay.

CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT.

Strike upon Bannen he Dog Lord stood in silence as his fifth son,
Thrago, fastened his armor to him.  The plate was thirty years old,
bashed in places, its many punctures packed with solder, and its
pot-black finish scratched to hell.  Vaylo almost smiled to see it.  Two
stone of case-hardened iron .  . and it had been with him longer than
any friend.

"Not so tight, Thrago.  I'm not a chicken to be trussed for the spit."

Thrago Bludd looked at his father with eyes that were the exact same
shape and color as those of old Gullit Bludd.  It gave Vaylo a chill to
see them. Gullit Bludd was dead thirty-five years now, yet his likeness
was borne by all seven of his grandsons.  Sometimes Vaylo thought the
Stone Gods had arranged such a thing just to spite him.

He scowled as Thrago tightened the cinches around his waist.  Five
winters ago this armor had fitted him perfectly; now it rode over his
belly like a loose collection of bowls.  Damn the thing to hell!  Who'd
have thought iron plate could shrink?

"You should have Croda forge you some new plate," Thrago said, putting
his back into the task of making the runnels meet.  "Else use the Bludd
armor Gullit had made for his " "No."  Vaylo's voice was hard.  He would
not wear that man's armor.

Put the knife here, boy, so that it will enter the upmost chamber of my
heart.  Vaylo breathed hard at the memory.  He could still see his
father lying on his bench of old black wood, his face shrunk with
disease, his eyes bulging with swollen veins.  Do it!  For gods' sakes,
do it!  We both know you've dreamt of little else for the past seventeen
years.  Now, when 1 finally hand you the knife, you stand there with
your balls shriveled to hailstones and a bastard's fear upon you. What's
the matter with you, boy?  I thought you had more jaw.

That was when the knife went in.  To this day Vaylo truly didn't know if
he thrust the blade or his father moved forward to take it.  It hardly
mattered. His hands had been on the hilt.  His fingers were covered with
the red wetness that gushed from the hole.  So much blood .  .  pouring
over the bench and onto the floor, running between the cracks in the
stone.  And his father's eyes.  .  .  triumphant.  He had thought
himself rid of his bastard son.

Vaylo rubbed a hand over his face.  It had all gone as smoothly as any
epic sung by a hearth singer Right on cue Arno and Gormalic had burst
into the room.  He was still standing there, knife in hand, his father
choking on his last breath below him.  Vaylo hoped very much that he
hadn't seen his father smile then, that the stretching of Gullit Bludd's
lips was nothing more than a death rictus or a trick of that bloody
light.  Of all the things that happened that day in the chief's chamber
at Bludd, that was the one thing that haunted him the most.

That smile.

Arno and Gormalic had come at him with steel bared.  Two long swords
against a knife made for slicing fruit.  Yet Vaylo could honestly say
that there was not one instant when he'd thought he might die.  He knew
his half-brothers well.  Arno and Gormalic practiced for two hours every
day on the court. Vaylo practiced for four.  Arno and Gormalic were
filled with the rage of legitimate sons who had just seen their father
murdered by a bastard.  Vaylo was filled with a bastard's rage.

His father had tricked him!  Gullit Bludd had been dying for months, his
teeth rotting from the bone, his gut shrinking to a loose flap of skin,
and his fingers shriveling to bird claws.  When he called his bastard
son to his chamber, he was as good as dead.  He would not have lived out
the month.  Yet this was Gullit Bludd, son of Thrago HalfBludd, and his
pride would not allow him to die alone.  He had sought to take his
bastard with him.

Put me out of my pain, boy.  I cannot bear it.  It eats me, how it eats
me. Would you see it turn me into a shitting, drooling babe?

Gullit had readied the knife himself, Vaylo remembered.  He had it
waiting beside him on the bench.  Blue steel with a hilt of sacred ash.

With fingers so pale and wasted they seemed already dead, Gullit Bludd
had raised the point to his heart.

Vaylo closed his eyes for a moment.  It might have happened yesterday,
so clear were the memories.  By the time that day was over three
Bluddsmen lay dead in the chiefs chamber, and Vaylo could recount every
blow it had taken to send his brothers to the floor.

They called him the Death Lord later.  Legends grew, as legends always
did, and suddenly he was no longer a bastard year man celebrated for
stealing the Dhoonestone from Dhoone, he was a killer of men.  A
usurper.  A kin slayer A chief.

He had offered no explanations or denials.  Even then, thirty-five years
ago, he knew it was better to say nothing and let men think what they
would think. Who would have believed him, anyway?  It was well known he
hated his father and his half-brothers.  Who would have believed he had
killed his father as a mercy, that Gullit Bludd had directed the knife
himself and begged his bastard son to thrust it deep to cut the great
blue vein?

Touching his fifth son on the shoulder, Vaylo said,

"Enough.  I'll see to the helm and gorget myself."

Thrago nodded.

"I'll ready the horse."

Vaylo watched as his fifth son climbed the narrow stair that led up from
the chiefs chamber at Withy.  It was a strange place, this Clan Withy
roundhouse, built to confound outsiders.  It made no sense, what with
its maze of tunnels, mine holes, dead ends, secret chambers, and traps.
A man could lose himself, turn a wrong corner, and find himself falling
through a trapdoor and into a pit floored with spikes.  Molo Bean had
broken his ankle when a stone flag had given way beneath him, and Pengo
had taken a fall and ended up with a spike through his cheek for his
trouble.  Vaylo thought his second son looked no worse for the spike
hole, yet it had certainly darkened his humor.

They had taken over Clan Withy ten days ago for no other reason than its
roundhouse was southwest of Dhoone.  Pengo had led the assault, backed
by three of his seven brothers and nine hundred ham mermen and spear men
Vaylo almost pitied the Withymen.  The anger was upon Clan Bludd, and
the proud Withymen, who had lived in Dhoone's shadow for two thousand
years, must have thought the Stone Gods had deserted them.  Perhaps they
had; the Dog Lord claimed no knowledge of such things.  He did know that
Withy had received the fury meant for another clan.

Blackhail.  Vaylo's entire body stiffened at the word.  It was Clan
Blackball his four sons had attacked that day, not Withy.  It was Mace
Blackhail's face they saw in their minds as they smashed every bone in
the Withy chiefs corpse.  It was Raif Sevrance, he who stood at Duff's
and proudly admitted slaughtering Bludd women and children, whom they
imagined gutting with their three-bladed spears.

Pengo, Hanro, Gangaric, and Thrago had killed two hundred Withymen
between them that day, and another eleven hundred had died by other
hands.  Proud Withymen, who wore ring mail over coats stuffed with blue
fox fur, and boasted.  We are the clan who makes kings.

The boast was true enough.  It was a Withyman who had proclaimed the
first Dhoone Kingand a Withyman who crowned him.

Vaylo buckled his gorget to his plate.  If Withymen made kings, then it
was Blackhail who slew them.  Oh, people forgot that now.  Five hundred
years had passed since Dhoone last had a king, and in that time
Blackhail and Dhoone had cozied up like two blind men with sticks. Bludd
was the enemy.  Godless, ruthless Bludd.  Yet it wasn't a Bluddsman who
put an arrow in Roddie Dhoone's throat, it was the Hailsman Ayan
Blackhail.  Vaylo's blue eyes shrank.  Roddie Dhoone may have been a
mother-spoiled weakling with a cruel streak as deep as the Black Spill,
yet an arrow was no way to kill a king.  A Bluddsman would not have
killed Roddie Dhoone at distance; he would have walked straight up to
him and thrust cold steel through his Dhoonish heart.

No matter, no matter.  What does anything, matter?  Vaylo grabbed his
gray braids in his fist and held them down while he fixed his horned
helm in place.  Other men wound their braids beneath their helmets to
help buffer blows, but not the Dog Lord.  His braids streamed free in
battle.  It was a small thing, but such small things made men who they
were.  And when the battle was joined this night, two thousand
Bludd-sworn eyes would be looking toward his braids.

Vaylo touched the red leather pouch containing his measure of guide
stone before he tucked it beneath his plate.  Stone Gods, see my clan
through this night.

The Clan Withy roundhouse was only a tenth the size of Dhoone's, yet its
builders were artful and had shown a penchant for building down, not up
or outward.  The chiefs chamber was sunk far below the earth, perhaps
even to a depth of a hundred feet.  Vaylo could only wonder where the
Withy chief had dressed for war, for it hardly seemed likely that he'd
willingly climb the hundred and twenty steps to the surface while loaded
with two stone of plate.

Vaylo climbed and puffed and was careful where he put his feet.

Already all thoughts were falling from him.  He was the Dog Lord, and he
must lead his clan to battle as he had led them a hundred times before.
If the Stone Gods showed him grace, then dawn would find him one step
closer to taking the Hailhold.  If they turned their cold cheeks toward
him, then he would strike somewhere else another day.

For he would have Blackball.  He was the Bludd chief, and a hard life
long lived was his reward.  Gullit Bludd had died in his sixties, yet
Thrago HalfBludd had lived until he was eighty-two and Wolver Bludd
before him had seen out ninety-four years in the Bluddhouse.  Vaylo
expected he would live for another thirty years himself.  .  .  and by
his reckoning that was more than enough time to send Mace Blackhail to
hell.

"Vaylo.  The Bludd host waits upon your word."

It was Cluff Drybannock, crossing over from the boat-size piece of white
oak that formed the Withy door.  Drybone was dressed in armor only
marginally less battered and worn than his chief's.  A hand-down from
Ockish Bull, who had been dead these past five years and who had stood
second to every oath Drybone had ever spoken.  Oil lamps nickering in
the perfect circle of the entrance hall showed the hard bones in
Drybone's cheeks and the brilliant blue ness of his eyes.

A young scrap of a boy came running over with Vaylo's war hammer, the
metal all shiny and near dripping with oil.  Vaylo didn't have the heart
to tell him that he had not wanted it cleaned, that he liked it good and
worn to match his armor, his sword, and his horse.  "Strap it on me," he
commanded the boy, who might have been Strom Carvo's son.

It was an honor, and the boy's hands shook as he laid the great spiked
and lead-weighted hammer in its cradle of soft suede and fastened the
steel chains about it.  As always when the hammer was laid against his
back, Vaylo felt the first stirrings of battle fear.

So many battles, so many melees, yet in all this time he still hadn't
found a way to calm the turmoil in his stomach and the hammering of his
heart.

Thrago had the Dog Horse standing ready as promised, and as Vaylo and
Cluff Drybannock passed under the oak door and emerged into the late
afternoon light, he trotted the old black stallion forward.  Vaylo stood
on the steps a moment and looked out upon the sea of red that was his
men.  Pengo was there, on his great gray warhorse, his hammer as big as
his head.  Gangaric, Vaylo's third son, stood at the fore, dressed in
new-forged plate, a troop of Clan HalfBludd ax men surrounding him.
Vaylo recognized men from Clan Otier, with their maroon-colored battle
cloaks and clean-shaven faces, and men from Clan Frees with copper wire
braided into their hair, and the bones of their ancestors forming bosses
on their shields.  Even little Clan Broddic had sent sixty men, who sat
high upon their snowy horses, resplendent in oxblood leathers and
hound-skull helms.  All the Bludd-sworn clans had sent men, even cursed
Clan Gray who could ill afford them, and that

meant something to the Dog Lord.  No matter that of the two thousand
horsed upon the Withy great court fifteen hundred were Bluddsmen.  No
matter at all.

Ties of blood and battles bound Bludd to HalfBludd, Frees, Otier,
Broddic, and Gray.  Dhoone had more clans sworn to it than Bludd, but
ties didn't run as deep in the middle of the clan holds as they did in
its farthest reaches. All clans here today knew what it was to defend
themselves against the Mountain Cities, against Trance Vor and Morning
Star .  .  and against the cold quick arrows of the Sull.

Vaylo took a hard breath as he descended the steps.  He would not think
about the Sull.  .  .  not here, not now.

Using the bottom step as a platform, Vaylo mounted his horse.  The beast
was lively today and fought the reins the moment he pulled them.  Vaylo
fought back, and the Dog Horse screamed and reared and other horses
shied away to give it space.  Vaylo was not displeased.

Drawing his great sword from the hound's-tail scabbard at his side, he
looked upon the faces of his men and roared,

"South to Bannen!"

The howls of two thousand warriors followed him as he rode to the head
of the line.

The Dog Lord set a hard pace.  The day was cold and clear, and the wind
was changing, and there'd be a half-moon rising soon enough.  The
territory north of Withy was wooded with elms and white oaks, with many
groves cleared to provide forage for wild boars.  The grazing land and
wheat fields lay to the north.  To the northeast, the dull brownish
waters of the Easterly Flow could be seen, as they bow-curved north
toward Dhoone.  Southwest, toward Bannen, lay a landscape of gentle
rolling lowlands seeded with white heather, thistle grass and oats.

Vaylo pulled great quantities of air through his lungs as he rode,
savoring the coldness of the day and the ice upon the wind.  The snow
underfoot had a crust to it that snapped with a pleasing sound as the
Dog Horse claimed ground beneath him.  At his back, Vaylo heard the
thunder of his men, and the noise made the bloodlust rise within him.

Barmen.  They had once sworn oaths to Blackball, had fought beside the
Hail chief at the battle of Mare's Rock, yet that almost wasn't
important.  It was where they lay that counted.  The Banhold pushed far
into Blackhail's southern reach.  Take it, and Bludd would have a base
for attacking the Hail Wolf himself.  Vaylo had thought long on this and
knew that an attack upon Blackhail would be better coming from the
south, not the east.  Gnash could not be bested; the Gnashhold was
crammed with Dhoonesmen and its roundhouse was as good as a fort.

Bannen, though .  .  .  Bannen was something else.  Bannen could be
taken. Blackhail and Dhoone would be expecting the Dog Lord to strike
west, take Gnash or Dregg.  They would not think he would move south
instead.  Ban- Then herself would not be expectingan attack; her doors
would not be barred, her livestock would be afield, and the foot-thick
layer of sod that lay over her roundhouse could be doused and set
alight.

Vaylo arched low in the saddle, letting the wind stream his braids
behind him.  Once he had Bannen, he could begin taking Blackhail's sworn
clans. Scarpe first.  The Hail Wolfs birth clan No one would weep to see
them taken. Dregg next, though the Dreggs- men were hard-bred warriors
and Vaylo knew they would give him a fight.  Orri last.  Vaylo had
respect for Orri; like Bludd, they knew what it was like to live on the
far edge.

"Do you mean to outrun your army, Bludd chief?"

Vaylo looked around to see Drybone pullingalongside him on his gray.

In the fading light he looked little like a clansman, and Vaylo found
himself wondering why his Trenchland mother had sent him away.  Surely
he would have fit in well enough in Hell's Town?

The Dog Lord managed a grim smile.

"What's the matter.  Dry, frightened I'll get to Bannen ahead of you?"

Drybone shook his head.

"Just worried about an ambush, that's all."

"Cautious as ever."

"Tell me you haven't thought of it yourself."

Vaylo could not.  There was always chance of an ambush.

"Open ground between here and Bannen.  We'll be there before the moon
peaks."

"We're close to Gnash, Scarpe, Dregg.  .  .  even Ganmiddich.  The
middle clans are all pressed close."

With a small pull on the reins, Vaylo slowed his horse.  He knew better
than to trade words with Cluff Drybannock.  It was close to dark now,
the sun sinking in a red sky.  The dying wind smelled of cold things
from the north, of frozen lakes and ice fields and glaciers.  Vaylo
tasted old memories in his mouth, and the old desires rose with them.
Looking into the blackness beyond the setting sun, he said,

"Sometimes I wish I could just ride away, Dry.  Head north and never
come back."

"Join the Maimed Men?"

Vaylo laughed.

"It wouldn't be the worst thing.  I swear I thought of it a thousand
times when I was a boy.  To have the badlands and the entire Want as my
ranging ground, to ride with storms against my back and the Gods Lights
in my face and a hard frost beneath me."

"And to lose two ears, three fingers, and a nose to the 'bite?"

It was true enough.  The Maimed Men were an unhoused, unnamed clan who
wandered the farthest reaches of the badlands.  It was said that no man
or woman among them was whole, that all had lost limbs or appendages to
the frost.  It was also said that the Maimed Men had come into being the
year Morrow was wiped out by Dhoone and that many who rode their ranks
could trace their ancestry back to the Lost Clan.  Vaylo didn't know the
truth of it.  As a child he had started north to join them a dozen
times.  He was a bastard, and his father wished he had never been born,
and everyone knew the Maimed Men accepted traitors, exiles, and
bastards.

Suddenly sober, Vaylo said,

"We'll ride at trot to Bannen."

Two thousand men slowed to Drybone's shouted order.  Drybone himself
moved back into the ranks; he was seldom comfortable ridingat the head
of a line.

Vaylo rode south and then west as the terrain demanded.  The moon rose,
half of it, and silver light ran upon the snow.  Vaylo kept his mind in
the now as he rode, determined not to think of another night similar to
this one, of another ride upon the white.

The northeastern border of the Banhold was formed by a giant stand of
black spruce, each tree as tall as thirty men.  There were streams to be
forded and ancient glacier tracks to circumvent and pale stone ruins
where the horses feared to tread.  As they neared the trap rock cliffs
that protected the Banhouse, Vaylo sent six men forward as scouts.

Only one came back.

The man, a little red-haired bowman from Broddic, had taken a quarrel to
the meat of his upper arm--clean through the stewed- leather munnion he
was wearing.  Vaylo called a halt, and all his sons and warlords and the
warlords of his sworn clans gathered in a great circle around the
bowman.

"They know we're coming," said the bowman, still atop his horse.

"And there's more than just Bannen."

"Cawdo!"  shouted the Dog Lord to the Bludd healer who was far back in
the ranks.

"Come forward and see to this man."  Then to the bowman.

"Who else is present, and in what numbers?"

The bowman swallowed.  His face was ghastly pale.

"I saw Dhoonesmen .

.  I'm not sure of their numbers.  They were waiting below the cliff,
quiet as the dead.  What I saw had spears.  " He grimaced as the healer
bade him slide from the horse.

"A Blackhail bowman- " "Blackhail?"  The words fell like ice from the
Dog Lord's mouth.  A ripple of quiet, made up of held breaths and
unmoving limbs, spread through the company of two thousand men. Suddenly
it did not matter how the ambush had come into being, who among the
Bludd-sworn clans had given word to Bannen.  It mattered only that
Hailsmen stood in the valley below.

Cawdo Salt pressed hard fingers into the bowman's arm as he snapped the
arrow shaft near the base.  Wood broke with a sickening crack.  The
bowman swooned, but Cawdo held him firm.  Vaylo could not take his eyes
off the man's blood, black and shiny in the moonlight.

"How many Hailsmen did you see?"  he heard himself ask.

"Not many.  Less than two hundred.  Mostly it's Bannen and Dhoone."

Cawdo held a flask to the man's lips and bade him drink.

Pushingaway the flask, the bowman said,

"They've taken the best positions at the neck of the valley, along the
rise, behind the Banhouse.  All high ground except the cliff is theirs.
We'd have to ride through the bottleneck of the valley to reach them."

The Dog Lord nodded.

"Drink, man," he murmured.  Cawdo Salt had a silver-bladed knife in his
hand, and Vaylo knew the healer was readying himself to cut out the
arrowhead.

"We must turn back," Drybone said in a strange voice.

"We don't know their numbers.  They're well entrenched in their
positions, they know the ground, and they haven't just come off a
five-hour ride."

"We strike now, bastard," Pengo Bludd hissed.

"There's Hails- men in that valley, and I for one don't care whether
they hold all the ground between here and the Night Sea.  I'd ride
through wildfires and ice storms just to place my hammer into a single
Hailish skull."

Not one muscle in Cluff Drybannock's face changed as Pengo spoke, yet
Vaylo saw the anger in his eyes.  He was probably the only one among two
thousand who did.

"We can split up," Thrago said, his ham merman chains rustlingas he
kicked his mount forward.

"Take the cliff from two sides.  Have the Broddic archers cover us as we
go down."

Pengo was quick to nod, one of his black braids falling loose from his
helmet as he did so.

"And we can send a troop of spear men wide to attack the rear."

"Aye," agreed the HalfBludd warlord, "and post another west to flank
them."

"And hold two hundred pikes men in reserve" -- "Enough!"  roared the Dog
Lord.

"We will not split ourselves a dozen times over, like a leg of pork
carved at table.  We are Bludd and Bludd-sworn, and we are the Stone
Gods' chosen, and we will not ride like cravens to this or any other
fight.  Pengo.  You will take a hundred men only and ride wide.  Take up
position a league south of the Banhouse, ready to cover a retreat if
needed."

Pengo glowered.

"You said we would not ride like cravens.  Yet you talk of retreat in
the same breath."

"It's one thing to act bravely, another thing entirely to act like a
fool. There is danger here.  As CluffDrybannock said, there is much
unknown to us. I will not lead men into this battle without being sure I
have a way out." As he spoke, Vaylo was aware of Drybone, sitting his
horse at the far edge of the circle, watching him with Sull-blue eyes. I
know you are right.  Dry, he wanted to say.  This is not a wise thing to
do, but sometimes we must do things out of rage, not wisdom.  If you
were wholly clan, you would know that.  But you are not, and I would
have you no other way.  Instead he said,

"Dry, I want you and your swordsmen with me."

Drybone nodded.

It would have to do.  There was no time for anything more.  While Cawdo
Salt cut a cross into the Broddic bowman's arm, turning the circular
wound into something larger that could be more easily stitched, the Dog
Lord and his warlords planned their strike.  They settled on riding for
an extra ten leagues and approaching the valley from the west, not the
northeast as expected: Strike hard and fast and work their way south
toward Pengo's position.

A second silent strategy lay beneath the spoken one, and fifteen hundred
Bluddsmen knew it: Kill every Hailsman in sight.

Vaylo led the main body west.  The ground shook beneath the Bludd host,
and the night wakened to their calls.  Screams and terrible low bellows,
Stone Gods named and named again, wolf howls, and desperate low keening
thickened the air like smoke.  Vaylo pulled his hammer from its slingand
whirled it high above his head.  Three stone of lead, lime wood and
steel, yet it moved like a goddess in his hand.

The bloodlust was upon him, and for the first time in eleven days and
eleven nights, he allowed his mind to settle in the place where he kept
his losses.

Seventeen grandchildren dead.

When he descended to the valley floor and the Dhoone host rose to meet
him, he saw fear in their gray blue eyes.  His hammer smashed into a
iron-helmed skull, unhorsing the first foe that he met. Sword blades
licked him like cold fire.  All around, black spruces bent and rippled
in the quickening wind.  Torches circling the Banhouse burned red, but
the half-moon stole their glory, turning the fields of snow blue.  Vaylo
smelled resin and sword metal and the stench of his own fear.  Ahead he
saw the Dhoone fore guard and the wing of spear men that flanked them.
The Bloody Blue Thistle had been raised above the black dome of the
Banhouse, and the standard blew straight and true and to the south.

Blackhail arrows rained from the sky, their shafts black as night, their
arrowheads bound to their nocks by cords of silver wire.  Vaylo swatted
them from the air with his hammer, furious that the men who sent them
were out of sight.  The Dhoone fore guard felt his wrath as he rode upon
them, howling like the Dog Lord that he was.  Ranks of mounted Dhoone
swordsmen closed around him, yet any man who drew within hammer range
received a kiss of lead and steel for his trouble.

Dhoone steel screechingagainst his armor, braids lashingagainst his
back, Vaylo screamed for Blackhail to take the field.

At his back Cluff Drybannock killed men with a cool efficiency that
Vaylo found mildly disturbing.  Dry's long sword was sharp and heavy,
and its double-edged blade could pierce all but the thickest plate.

He was deadly silent as he fought, his face unmoved by fear or anger,
his eyes always looking two moves ahead.

With Drybone at his back, Vaylo felt safe to push farther into the
Dhoone line.  To the east, he saw the first of the Bannen swordsmen
moving to cut off the Bludd rear guard The Bansmen were dressed in
cloaks of gray leather trimmed with moose felt, and their swords were
things of clannish beauty, the steel burned with acid until it shone
black.  The Bansmen sang a slow metered death song as they marched down
the slope, wailingabout some ancient battle where the Wolf River ran
with blood.

The death song drove the Dog Lord to distraction, and he prayed that
some hawk-eyed bowman would put an arrow through the head singer's
tongue.  Vaylo was choked by Dhoonesmen, tantalized by brief glimpses of
Bailsmen on the far edges of his reach.

His ham merman chains rattled in fury as he swung his hammer in ever
widening circles.  His throat was hoarse from screaming. Dead men rode
past him, slumped over their horses' necks, blood oozing from cracks in
their plate.  A piece of a man's face was glued to his hammerhead, yet
he could spare no moment to pick it away.

This battle was madness, madness, yet he had no choice but to keep
moving forward.  A lance shattered against his breastplate, sending
splinters flying into his eyes and knocking him sideways in the saddle.
When a hand reached over to steady him, he didn't need to glance over
his shoulder to know who it was.

Mist began rolling north from the Wolf River, and soon the snow fields
were a sinking ground of scattered forces and unhorsed men.  Vaylo's
shoulder ached with a deep and terrible pain, yet he kept his hammer
swinging in spite of it.  There were Bludd swordsmen ahead of him now,
hackingat Dhoone spears. Vaylo saw one man with a spear rammed so far
down his throat that he had been impaled upon his fallen horse.

An axman from Clan Gray, the Dog Lord thought with a small shudder.

Truly, they are the cursed clan.

Finally they broke the Dhoone line .  .  .  and Vaylo did not fool
himself for one instant that it was his doing.  Yes, he had rage and a
hammer that never stopped.  But it was Drybone and his crew, going
one-on-one against the Dhoonesmen, that saved the day.  Cluff Drybannock
came alive in moonlight. His movements had a grace that all other
clansmen lacked, and once he found his rhythm he could strike or unhorse
a Dhoonesman with every blow.  When the mist came and Vaylo was
hard-pressed to see ten feet ahead of the Dog Horse's neck, it was
Drybone who forced a path in the whiteness, Drybone who stood upon his
stirrups and murmured,

"There's a break in the Dhoone line to the west."  Vaylo looked and
squinted but could see nothing but the arses ofBluddsmen's horses.

He let Drybone lead the flight to the south, where Pengo and his hundred
men were waiting to escort them off the field.  They would not stay and
fight. The Dog Lord knew a rout when he saw one.  Bannen would not be
taken this night.  .  .  and far too little Black- hail blood had been
spilled.

Unsated, the Dog Lord turned for home.

CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE.

By the Lake Raif sat within the circle of light created by the white oak
fire and cut arrows.  They would not be good ones, for the wood was
unseasoned and widely grained and would likely split upon impact, but it
was something to do.  He had a stone warmingat the base of the fire,
ready to heat and straighten the shafts when he was done.  Later, much
later, he would think of sleep.

It was dark, sometime past midnight, and moonlight came and went as the
wind shifted clouds overhead.  Angus was kneeling by the bay's forelegs,
rubbing them softly with a shammy.  His gloves were clotted with pine
sap and blood, but he was too caught up in tending his horse to clean or
care for himself. Ash sat on the opposite side of the fire, her face
made golden by the flames. Moose's horse blanket was wrapped around her
shoulders, and Angus' buckskin coat lay across her lap, yet neither
stopped her from shaking.

Raif had watched as she rode off the ice, her hair sparkling with frost,
her eyes fierce and full of light.  It was as if he were seeing her for
the first time.  Suddenly she wasn't a skinny girl in borrowed clothes,
she was a young woman with fine shoulders and a sure way of sittinga
horse.  The brightness within her had faded as they'd made their way
north to the campsite.  The reality of wet clothes and aching muscles
had set in, and by the time Angus found them an hour later, Ash was
crouched in the snow, shivering.  Angus had called her his "wee lassie
of the ice" and built up the fire to warm

her.  What destruction she had left behind could not be known.  All was
hidden by the mist over the lake.

At least two of the sept were dead.  Raif had killed one of them
himself.  It had been a nasty fight.  .  .  one he'd found he had little
stomach for. After he'd taken two fingers from the second red blade's
sword hand he had shown the man grace and let him live.

Shor Gormalin had taught him about grace.

"You must learn to recognize when a fight is won," the small fair-haired
swordsman had said one spring morning as he'd put Raif through his paces
on the practice court.

"Some wounds will take the fight from a man as surely as a dragon
breathing fire.  Others will just make him angry and want to hurt you
more.  The secret is knowing the difference."

Raif remembered waiting for Shor to continue, certain that the swordsman
would tell him to be on the lookout for spilled guts, bits of bone
poking through skin, or wounds that bled and bled and wouldn't stop.
Instead Shor had said,

"The truth of it's always in your opponent's eyes.  I've known ham
mermen who could fight from noon to sunset with wounds the size of rats
in their chests, and I've seen swordsmen turn tail and flee with nothing
but a fine set of scratches on their necks."  Shor had raised his hand
to his own neck, perhaps reassuring himself that there were no scratches
there.

"When you've wounded a man and looked into his eyes and seen for
yourself that you've taken the fight from him, then you must decide
whether to take his life or spare it.

"Grace is a matter between a clansman and the Stone Gods.  They give you
a choice--and make no mistake, they'll judge you for it--yet none but
they know the rights and the wrongs of it.  Never assume that leavingan
opponent alive on the battlefield will gain you entrance to the Stone
Halls that lie beyond. With our gods nothing is ever certain.  They
damned Bannog Tay of the Lost Clan for choosing not to kill his brother
at the Battle of the Verge."

Shor's words had run through Raifs mind as he'd looked into the red
blade's eyes.  The man's sword was lying in the snow alongside two fat
fingers and a pool of blood.  The fight's left him, Raif had thought, a
strange tightness pulling at his chest, and he'd turned his horse and
fled.

Raif felt that same tightness now. Abruptly he thrust the last of his
arrows into the fire and watched as the yellow flames warped the wood
then turned it black.  Truth was, he didn't really know if he'd shown
grace at all, not in the way Shor Gormalin meant, where one clansman
spared another out of respect.  It had sounded good in the telling, and
even Angus had nodded and said,

"That's your right, Raif, and I will not question it."  Yet Raif
wondered if he hadn't spared the red blade simply to prove to himself
that he could; that not every fight he fought and every arrow he loosed
was destined to end in death.

Watcher of the Dead.

Raif shivered, fed another arrow to the fire.

"Do you think Sarga Veys is dead?"  Ash's voice broke the silence of the
camp like a tree snapping under the weight of winter snow.  Raif
couldn't recall the last time she had spoken, and he and Angus exchanged
a small, worried glance.

Angus left the bay untethered and came and crouched by the fire.

Peeling his stained gloves from his fingers, he said,

"I will not lie to you, Ash.  I have an inkling he's still alive."

"But the ice.  .  .Isaw " "Aye, but did you smell?  I heard the ice
break, heard the horses scream, but I also smelled sorcery moments
later.  Sarga Veys is a clever sorcerer.  Powerful, too.  You may have
left him to the frozen waters of the Spill, but such a man is seldom
easily killed.  There are things he could have done, bodies he could
have robbed heat from, drawings he could have made to still and stiffen
the ice."

Ash looked down.  After a moment she said,

"What about the Knife?"

"Marafice Eye is Penthero Iss' right hand.  Veys would be a fool to
leave him to damnation.  Veys wants power in his own right, yet he knows
he won't get it by returning to Spire Vanis alone.  If there was any way
he could pull the Knife from the water, then we must assume that's
exactly what he did.  I doubt very much if there's any love lost between
those two, but Sarga Veys has a high opinion of himself, one that
doesn't allow for failure."

"You know Sarga Veys?"  Raif asked.

Angus fixed Raif with his copper eyes.

"Aye, you could say that.

We've crossed paths before in our time .  .  .  and I'd sooner not think
on it now.  " It was the end of the subject.  Angus made that clear by
standingand stretchingand turning his back on Ash and Raif.

Raif traced a line in the snow with the tip of an arrow.  His uncle had
as many secrets as Anwyn Bird had recipes for mutton.  Always there were
evasions, lines that couldn't be crossed.  After today there were more
mysteries than ever.  A sept led by the Protector General of Spire Vanis
had hunted them down like game.  Sorcery had been used out on the lake.
Raif signed to the Stone Gods, touching his closed eyelids and the tine
at his waist.  Angus might speak casually about sorcery, but as a
clansman Raif could not.  Some things were too deeply engrained.  Clan
was earth and stone and mud, things that could be held in the hand and
weighed.  Sorcery was air and light and tricks.

Raif sighed heavily.  Sorcery had been used in broad daylight, under an
open sky.  And for what?  At first he had thought Angus was the main
quarry of the sept, yet the magic user and the Knife had followed Ash
onto the lake, not Angus.  Glancing through the yellow needlework of
flames, Raif looked at Ash. Who was she?  The Surlord of Spire Vanis
wouldn't send his Protector General to track down a girl off the
streets.  Raif took a breath, drawing in the warm air and gray smoke
from the fire.  The newly knitted skin on his chest pulled tight as he
filled his lungs.  The stitches were gone now, wink led out by Angus and
his knife.  The scars left behind reminded Raif of widow's weals.

"Why did Marafice Eye come after you?"  Suddenly it seemed easier to ask
than think.

The question was meant for Ash, yet Raif saw Angus' shoulders stiffen as
it was asked.  For half a moment he thought Angus would speak up and end
the subject on her behalf, but he didn't.  Instead he busied himself
with his gloves, scrapingaway ice and pine needles with the edge of his
knife.

"You think he came after me?"  Ash raised her head from her knees.  A
sheen of sweat glistened on her brow, and even the smallest movements
she made seemed powerless and disjointed.

Raif was already beginning to regret the question.  Mist trapped in
Ash's clothes would turn to ice through the night. She needed fresh
linens, hot food, and extra blankets--none of which they had now that
the saddlebags were gone.  Angus had taken a few things-- some trail
meat and medicine, as far as Raif could tell--yet he had no clean cloth
to bandage Ash's thigh and the bay's rump, and only a splash of alcohol
to clean them.  Raif shook his head.

"No.  It doesn't matter."

Ash looked at him with large gray eyes.  After a moment she made a small
warding gesture with her hand.

"It does matter, Raif.  It matters because you don't know what you're
putting yourself in danger for.  Even if Marafice Eye and Sarga Veys
both died out on the lake, Penthero Iss will send more to replace them.
He wants me back .  . .

I'm his foster daughter, Asarhia March.  "

It took Raif a moment to understand the words.

"The Surlord's daughter?"  he repeated stupidly.

"His almost-daughter."  Ash glanced quickly at Angus.

Raif caught the look, understanding it immediately.

"You knew," he said to Angus.

Angus put down his knife.

"Yes."

"And that's why you moved to save her by the gate?"

"What do you think?"

"I think you won't tell me the whole truth."

"Why ask, then?"

Raif pushed himself to his feet.

"I asked because I'm sick of lies, because every time I get close to the
truth, you push me away.  We are blood kin, yet you do not trust me.  I
have followed you blindly, trusted you blindly, yet it's Ash who finally
speaks the truth to me, not you."

"I have told you no lies, Raif Sevrance.  Be sure of that.  If I have
held things back, it is to protect you.  If I have kept knowledge to
myself, it is because some things are better not known.  I have learned
many things and gathered many burdens.  Such truths as I hold come only
at a cost.  What sort of kin would I be if I passed all the horrors I
have seen and all the fears that I live with onto you?  Once something
is spoken it cannot be unsaid."

Angus' voice was low and dangerous, yet Raif hardly cared. He took a
step forward.

"Don't treat me like a fool, Angus.  You're content to let me share the
danger when it suits you.  In the past three days I've been hunted,
ridden down, and attacked.  What more has to happen before you'll
speak?"

"The less you know, the safer you are."

"Why?  Who are you protecting me from?  Penthero Iss' sept seemed more
than happy to slit my throat regardless of what I knew or didn't know.

No one slowed down between blows to ask questions.  "

Angus shook his head.

"Don't make the mistake of supposing that you are the only person I must
protect.  Some secrets are not mine to tell."

"Tell me what is yours to tell, then.  Why was it so important to visit
Spire Vanis?  What happens when we get to Ille Glaive?  How do you know
Sarga Veys? And why did you take the bow from me the moment you knew it
was him?  I had a full flight of arrows.  I could have shot the other
six."

"And the bay," said Ash, softly.

"Who taught him how to dance upon the ice?"

Both Angus and Raif turned to look at her.  In the heat of the exchange
she had been forgotten.  The Surlord's almost-daughter, cold and
shivering like a child.

Angus' face softened.

"The bay was given to me as a gift.  I saved a man's life once, a Sull
warrior named Mors Stormyielder.  He promised me then that he would
breed and train a horse in payment.  The Sull do not take such things
lightly, and the horse was many years in the breeding.  Mors' pride
demanded that he send me only the best of his stock, and it took eleven
years and two generations of foals before he was satisfied that a horse
fitting his debt had been born. He spent another three years training
the horse in the Sull manner, teaching it how to hold itself steady
beneath an archer takingaim, how to survive in white weather and keep
moving through thick drifts, how to endure the sudden pains of rocks and
arrows without throwing its rider, how to war in formation with other
horses, scent trails, read snow, and dance ice.  When Mors was finished
he sent the horse to me."

"Fourteen years seems a long time to repay a debt," Ash said.

"Mors was bound by his word, not by time.  The years that passed between
my deed and his repayment were nothing to him.  He is Sull, he sees
things differently from you and I."

"What's the bay's name?"

The bay, as if knowing it was being spoken of, whickered softly and
stamped snow.  The makeshift bandage covering its hindquarters had
already been thoroughly sniffed at, then chewed on for good measure.

"He has a Sull name, one that can't properly be translated into Common."
Angus smiled as he saw Ash's next question, already formed, in her eyes.

"Ehl Rhayas Erra'da Motho.  It means

"One Who Is Born for a Debt but in the Rearing Becomes More."

 " Ash smiled sleepily.

"It's easier to call him the bay."

"I see that now."  She yawned.  Closing her eyes, she pulled the blanket
over her chest and lay down in the snow.

"Ehl Rhayas Erra'da Motho," she whispered.  Then, a few minutes later,

"I'm so cold."

Raif and Angus exchanged a glance.  Raif began to tug apart the ties on
his elk coat.  He wasn't angry at Angus anymore.  They would speak later
when Ash slept--the look Angus had given him had promised that.

For now he had to look after Ash.  Walkingaround the fire, he braced
himself for the shock of cold air and then stripped off his coat.

Frozen leaves and forest matter crunched like glass beneath his feet.

As he knelt to tuck the coat around her shoulders, his hand brushed the
side of her cheek.  Her skin was as cool as ice.

Slipping beside her, he took her in his arms and pulled the elk coat
over them both.  He held her, shiveringand silent, until she fell
asleep.

Raif's mind drifted with the icy stillness of the night.  Angus kept
watch, occasionally walking between the horses and the steep bank that
led down to the lake.  Strings of mist from the Spill slithered across
the snow like snakes.  Overhead, the half-moon shone through a mesh of
clouds.  Raif thought of Drey, of the time Drey had fallen through the
ice in Cold Lake and Raif had held him as he held Ash now.  Tern had
been mad with anger, furious at Drey for running on thin ice.  It was a
month after their mother had died.  All the Sevrances had done wild,
dangerous things that month.

"Raif."

Raif looked up, surprised to see Angus crouching close.  He began to
rise.

"Nay, lad.  Stay where you are.  I'll stand both watches tonight."

Angus nodded toward Ash.

"Is she sleeping?"

"Yes."

"Resting in her mind?"

Raif nodded.  He couldn't recall at what point during the past four days
Angus had come to know about the connection between him and Ash, but he
did, and the question he asked showed it.  Unsure how he felt about
that, Raif was silent for a moment, thinking.  Finally he said, "About
what I said earlier" -- "Hush, lad.  Don't think for one moment I didn't
deserve it.  What you and Ash said was right and proper: You have a
right to know what you're putting yourself in danger for."  Angus slid
his hand inside his tunic and pulled out his rabbit flask; that was one
thing that hadn't been lost with the saddlebags.  He shook it in his
fist.

"Damn thing's empty--I'd clean forgotten."

Regarding the flask as a man might regard a beloved old dog who had just
turned around and bitten him, he said,

"First of all there are some things I'm hard sworn to.  I can't explain
how and why I know Sarga Veys, you must simply accept that.  Perhaps
later you will come to know.  What I can tell you is that Sarga Veys is
closely spun. He's dangerous and unpredictable, and if you'd sighted
that bow at any man's heart today, chances are he would have killed
you."

"I don't understand."

Angus sighed.

"Aye, well, you wouldn't.  A clansman would sooner prick his belly with
a pitching fork and soak himself in vinegar for a week rather than sit
and talk of sorcery.  You've got Hoggie Dhoone and a whole line of Stone
God-fearing Clan Kings to thank for that.  Don't give me that Sevrance
frown, lad.  Such is the way things are.  What you must come to accept
is that whenever you pick up a bow and sight it upon a man's heart,
you're drawing on the old skills.  I know it's not what you want to
hear, and I know we could both waste a lot of time talking ourselves
soft around the subject, but for now just listen to what your old uncle
says."  Angus' copper eyes twinkled like newly struck pennies: He seemed
to be fully recovered from the blow of the empty rabbit flask.

"The most important thing you'll ever learn about sorcery is this:
Enteringa man's body to cause harm is the most dangerous thing a
sorcerer can do.  Our bodies work to preserve us in a thousand different
ways.  The pain of touching hot coals will cause a child to snap back
her hand, fear will make a man move faster, fight harder, and cold will
make him shiver to warm his blood.  If we sicken with lung fever,
something within us battles the disease, and if we are fed tainted food,
our livers work to rid us of the badness.  There's a natural instinct in
all of us to fight anything that threatens our survival.  And when
sorcery enters our body, it meets that instinct full on."

Angus leaned over toward Ash and tucked the elk coat close around her
chin.

"Sorcery is an invasion of the worst kind.  It's unnatural in every way,
and a body will fight it tooth and nail.  Nothing can prepare a sorcerer
for the sheer force of a person's will.  It can sever the thread of a
drawing within seconds, sending it snapping back like a whiplash of red
fire.

"I saw the face burned from a man once, a sorcerer who thought himself
cleverer than most.  We were walking together in the Sluice--an old
section of Trance Vor that we were both arrogant enough to think we'd be
safe in despite the world of rumors that surrounds it--when a young
sharper lightened me of my purse.  I was for running the lad down, but
Brenn would have none of it.  Drew sorcery then and there on the street.
Whether he had a mind to kill the lad, slow him, or simply force him to
drop the purse, I canna say. It didn't really matter in the end.
Whatever he did it wasn't quick enough, and the young sharper's will
broke the drawing.  Sent it back to Brenn tenfold."

Angus closed his eyes.

"It was a long night.  Brenn's face and chest were burned black.  Black
...It was all I could do to end his pain."

Angus breathed softly for a while, then opened his eyes and looked at
Raif.

"That's one of the reasons I wouldn't let you target the sept."

"But I've targeted men before now without being harmed."

"That's part of your gift.  What you do happens in less than an instant.
Your mind enters another's body, joins with the heart, then leaves
within an eye blink You don't damage or interfere with the heart in any
way, you mark it.  It all happens so fast that the victim doesn't have
chance to respond. And even if they did, your arrow hits them a second
later and then they're dead.

"You use sorcery as your accomplice, not your weapon.  It's a subtle
difference at best, but that, and the sheer speed of what you do, saves
you from any backlash."

Raif tilted his head back and looked up through the clouds to the stars.
His heart was beating rapidly in his chest.  What Angus had said
disturbed him deeply; he'd described exactly what happened when Raif
drew his bow, right down to marking the heart.  "How do you know so
much?"  he asked.

"I know a man with nearly the same gift as yours" -- "Mors Stormyielder.
The Sull."

If Angus was surprised at Raifs guess, he did not show it, merely ran a
hand over the rough stubble on his jaw.

"Aye.  He's the one.  Can kill any animal he sets his sights on."

"And it's the same for him as well?"

Angus nodded.

"Close enough.  Animals have wills to survive just as you and I do.
They cannot be interfered with lightly.  Mors knows that.  I never knew
him to spend a moment longer than necessary in any beast."

"Yet he couldn't target people?"

"No."  Angus looked at Raif only an instant before lookingaway.

Raif waited, but the silence between them only deepened, and Raif
guessed he had touched upon yet anotlier subject that Angus

had no liking for.  Having little liking for it himself, Raif let it go.
Perhaps his uncle was right: Some things were no better for the knowing.

Shifting himself against Ash's body, he said,

"I still don't understand what this has to do with Sarga Veys.  If I can
target people as quickly as you say, where's the danger?"

Angus seemed relieved at the question.  During the silence he had taken
to looking longingly at the empty flask.

"It's simple.  You should never set your sights on any sorcerer.  Ever.
They'll know the moment you enter them, and if they're quick enough and
clever enough, they'll send your sorcery back home with a vengeance.  It
doesn't matter that what you do is little more than a sighting, a bowman
takingaim on his target.  The act of severing is where the power comes
from. By severing the thread between you, a sorcerer can take a small
insignificant drawingand whiplash it into a force."

Angus still wasn't finished.  Now that he had decided to speak, he
seemed determined to say the worst and have done with it.

"From the night we left Spire Vanis I knew we were being tracked by a
magic user, yet until I saw Sarga Veys on the ridge I couldn't be sure
who it was. If it had been another man, I might not have taken the bow
from you.  As long as you'd targeted the other sept members, chances are
you would have been safe.  But Sarga Veys isn't like most sorcerers.
Sorcery lives within him like the future lives within prophets and hell
lives within the insane.  He can do things that no one else can, clever
things, subtle things, things that people say canna be done.  As soon as
he realized you had a man's heart in your sights, he could have slid his
power in beside yours and sent your drawing snapping back like
hellfire."

Angus showed his teeth.

"And such a small thing like that, a little snapping motion, wouldn't
even weary him to the point where he needed a ghost meal

Raif held his body still, determined to show Angus nothing of the fear
that lived within him.  Suddenly he longed for Drey and Effie and clan.

"If Veys has so much power, why didn't he strike sooner, from afar?"

"Sarga Veys knows his limits.  More than likely he was saving his
strength for when he caught up with us, in case you used your trick with
the bow, or Ash did something that sent everyone running.  No matter
what happened, he would have left the killingand capture to the sept.
Sorcery is useful in many ways--you heard what happened on the lake, how
he pushed the mist aside so the Knife could follow Ash--but if you've a
mind to kill someone, you're safer usingan arrow or a sword."

Several things struck Raif about what Angus had just said, and he was
silent for a while as he thought.  Or Ash did something that sent
everyone running . .  .  The words had been spoken lightly enough, but
the idea behind them was hard to comprehend.  What could Ash do that
would make a full sept, half a dozen dogs, and a sorcerer run away?

Raif pressed Ash's body against his.  She was breathing steadily, no
longer shivering, relaxed in a deep dreamless sleep.  Penthero Iss'
almost-daughter. As soon as she had told him that, he had assumed they
were being hunted because the Surlord of Spire Vanis wanted his daughter
back.  Now it seemed there was more.

Raif glanced at his uncle.  With Angus there was always more.

Then there was the other thing that struck Raif.  Twice now Angus had
said that sorcery was no good for killing.  Yet he, Raif Sevrance, could
kill with it.  Oh, Angus would say that the arrow killed, not the
drawing.  But Angus was wrong.  Vaingate had proven that.  At some point
while he'd stood shooting men through the grating, Raif had realized
that as soon as a heart was within his sights the man whom it beat for
was as good as dead.  The arrow was just the medium, like wine carrying
poison; the act of killing had already been made.

So what did that make him?  Raif shook his head slowly, forbidding the
answer to come to him.  Inigar Stoop knew; perhaps even Angus knew: It
was better left at that.

Angus touched Raif's shoulder.

"You should get some rest.  I'll be waking you at dawn."

Raif nodded.  Suddenly he wanted very much to sleep.

"I canna tell you what business brought me to Spire Vanis," Angus said,
adjusting the elk coat around Raif and Ash so it let in no drafts.

"That city is alive with secrets, it was built on them, and you shouldna
blame your old uncle for holdinga few of them back."

"And Ille Glaive?"  Raif asked, barely able to keep his eyes open.

"Aye.  The City of Tears.  A man lives there whom I must visit.  He's a
tower-trained scholar and as stingy as a goat, but he does have a talent
for finding truths.  I remember once when I was coursing for gray foxes
along the Chaddiway .  .  ."

Raif drifted into sleep.  Perfect darkness folded around him, creating a
secure place where no dreams or thoughts could enter.  Time passed.

Sounds began to niggle at the back of his mind, and he turned restlessly
from them.  Still they pursued him, louder now, dream voices, begging
for something he did not have and could not give.

Irritated, he turned from them once more.  Couldn't they see that he
slept? At last they went, leaving him to a deep stupor that lasted
through the night.

When he awoke at first light it was pain, not voices, that stirred him.
He was lying on his stomach, and something cold and sharp pressed
against his chest.  Thinking it was a stone, he reached beneath himself
to push it away. As soon as his fingers touched the surface of the
object, he knew it was his lore.  Ash .  .

His eyes shot open and his hand reached upward, but already he knew it
was too late.  She was cold, motionless, lost to the world of voices.

He called Angus, and together they tried to wake her, but her eyes would
not open and her body lay heavy and unresponsive, and finally Angus
lifted her onto the bay, strapped her against his back, and set a grim
pace for Ille Glaive.

CHAPTER THIRTY.

Frostbite

Carga Veys opened his eyes.  Unlike other men who needed y time to come
around, put the dream world behind them ^^^r and recall the day ahead,
Sarga Veys knew all instantly the moment he awoke.  He never dreamed.
That was one human weakness he was free from.

The timbers above him were black and furry with mold, and the entire
ceiling bowed under the weight of accumulated snow.  The trout guddler's
cabin had not been lived in for at least two seasons, yet the stench
offish and old men remained.  Ancient oilcloths, now brittle and dusty,
hung from the walls along with snowshoes, rotten nets, and racks for
drying fish.  The oak floor was crusted with salt.

In the far corner, hiding behind cords of rotten firewood and split
crates, lay a small basswood shrine to the Maker.  Sarga Veys' lip
curled to see it. Fishermen, whether they manned trawlers on the
Wrecking Sea or sat upon a lakeshore fishing with their hands, were
always superstitious about God.

Gathering his strength to him, Sarga Veys raised his shoulders from the
floor.  Naked beneath the buckskins he had found folded in a pile near
the salt pit his entire body shuddered and worked against him as he
moved.  Sour liquid rose in his gullet, and he fought it by forcing his
lips against his teeth.  He would not vomit.

water.  The smell of his own body disgusted him, the drowned-man's
stench offish oil and algae and fear.

Veys exhaled softly.  He very nearly had drowned out there, in that
greasy body of water so rightly named the Black Spill.  The first shock
of the cold had been breathtaking.  He remembered freezing water seizing
his throat and his groin, and utter darkness robbing his thoughts.  It
had been a kind of hell.  Cold hell.  The screams, the cracking ice, the
horses.  .  Veys shuddered.  It had made animals of four grown men.

But, he thought.  But.  It had been a trial of ice and darkness that he
had passed.  Surely now he must be stronger?  He, Sarga Veys, son of no
man willing to claim him and a mother who had taken her own life by
slashing her stomach a dozen times with a jeweler's knife, had swum in
the Black Spill in midwinter and survived.

He should not have been able to do it.  Only minutes before the ice
cracked he had spent everything within him openinga corridor in the
mist.  Such drawings never came cheap.  Sarga Veys could do a hundred
things more showy and more impressive: little tricks with fire and smoke
guaranteed to make children and good wives fear him.  Yet parting mist,
which impressed no one, most especially not the Knife, had a cost far
above such japery.  For five long and excruciating minutes, Sarga Veys
had set his will against nature.

It had left him barely enough strength to breathe and think.  When the
ice cracked and day turned into night and black water rose to take him,
he had been as limp and powerless as a man made of straw.  Yet fear of
death had woken something in him.  A tiny spark of hidden strength had
ignited close to his heart.  It wasn't much, but he was Sarga Veys, the
most brilliant sorcerer born in half a century, and he could turn not
much into quite a lot.

The horse was close to death when he had taken it.  Bereft of strength
of will, it could do little to fight the drawing.  As its insides had
kindled and horseflesh had cauterized then cooked, the carcass had
floated upward toward the light.  Sarga Veys had ridden it to the
surface like a wraith riding his ghost horse from hell.  The heat from
its flesh had warmed him, and the buoyancy of its gas-filled body had
been more than sufficient to float his own.  Clinging to the black,
stinking flesh, he had paddled with his legs and feet toward the nearest
ledge.

Raped of power and strength, he had hauled himself onto firm ice.  How
he had crawled across the lake and up the bank to shelter was an ordeal
he would sooner forget.  The skin on his elbows and knees would grow
back.  Chilblains and frost sores would fade.  The burns on his hands
were another matter, but he had read the secret histories of all the
brilliant sorcerers, and such scars and deformities were common among
them.  All who were born to greatness were marked in some way.

Only when he had found the trout guddler's cabin and stripped the stiff,
icy clothing from his back had he given himself over to exhaustion.
Judging from the light slicing under the door, he had slept for close to
a day.

Overcome with thirst and the sudden need to relieve himself, Veys tested
his strength by extending his leg across the salt- encrusted floor.
Weakness made him cringe like a child.  Hate for Penthero Iss filled
him.  How dared that man send him north again!  His talents were wasted
here on the east shore of Black Spill, chasing the Surlord's errant
daughter and the Phage's trusty sheepdog Angus Lok.

Anger succeeded in rousing Veys sufficiently to the point where he could
stand, and he gathered the coarse hide around himself and stumbled
toward the door.  Of course, the very fact that Iss had sent him north
in a sept with Marafice Eye told of just how important the task of
returning Asarhia March was.  She was dangerous, that girl.

Veys had felt the truth of it the night Iss had summoned him to the Red
Forge and bade him travel from the city to find her.  Power had been
drawn that night.  Dark and unfamiliar, it had switched against his skin
like a draft of air from a mine shaft or the deepest, driest well.  It
had come from Iss' almost-daughter, and it excited him in ways he hardly
understood.

He had been following its aftermath ever since.  It wetted his tongue
even now.  She was moving north again.  He knew it without even probing
outside himself, so strong was the trail she left behind.

Reaching the door, Veys steadied himself against the jamb, taking a
moment to regain his strength.  He cursed the loss of his saddlebags.
Drugs, waxed bandages, oil of cloves, blood of the poppy, eyebright,
hand knives coiled wire, combs, wax candles, flints, honey, sweetened
milk, spare clothes, and clean linen had all been lost.  All things
except food he could do without, yet he had little liking for making do.
A childhood spent living in the filth and glossy mud of Dirtlake had
seen to that.

Glancing back at the frozen, greasy heap that was his clothes, he
shuddered. The action pulled muscles in his chest and groin.  He needed
a ghost meal badly.  He craved warm milk thickened with honey and the
soothing sap of eyebright dropped from a hollow needle into his eyes.
His eyes were not troubling him now, but they would soon enough.  Weak
eyes prone to redness and infection were his curse.

"It is their color," a man in Ille Glaive had once said.

"So unusual... startling, even.  In a woman they would be celebrated,
painted.  In a man they are considered ill luck.  Either way you will
have much trouble with them.  Purple is the color of the gods."

Not displeased by the memory, Veys unhooked the latch and stepped
outside.

Cold air blasted his face, and the sharp tang of snow filled his nose
and his mouth.  A white landscape presented itself to his watering eyes.
He saw the lake down below him, cloaked in mist, saw tall spruces and
white oaks glittering with hoar frost and his own bloody trail stamped
into the snow. He had not come as far as he'd thought.

The trout guddler's cabin was a mere forty paces from the water, set in
a crown of man-high birches above the bank.  Veys shrugged tightly.

He told himself the distance hardly mattered; it did not detract from
his feat.

Out of the corner of his eye he caught a movement.  Instinctively he
stepped back, into the shadows provided by the door.  Shifting his gaze
to the left, he saw the movement again.  There, down by the shore,
something gray moved. Sarga Veys licked dry lips.  It was a man .  .  .
no, two men.  One lying down on the shore ice, another kneeling, tending
him.  Veys' stomach twisted into a knot.  The kneeling man's outer cloak
wasn't gray.  it was black leather crusted with snow.  The Rive Watch.
He had thought he was rid of them.

A long moment passed where Veys contemplated the shore-fast ice,
speculated how thick it was and whether there would be sufficient water
underneath to drown two men.  Yet ice was a mystery he knew little of,
and he set aside the idea of murder before it was fully formed.

"Halfman!  Over here!"

Startled, Veys focused his gaze upon the kneeling man.  He had his hand
raised over his head, and Veys saw immediately that something wasn't
right with it.  Two bloody stumps waggled where fingers should have
been. Perceiving the weakness made Veys' heart beat more calmly, and he
stepped from the shadows into the light.

The man's name came to him as he treaded through the snow toward the
bank. Hood.  A filthy guardsman with dirt under his nails and shredded
food between his teeth, who claimed kinship to Lord of the Straw Granges
and as proof wore a grange lord insignia--arms set in a cruciform--at
his chest.  Veys detested him.  He was Marafice Eye's creature--all the
sept were--but he more so than the rest.  He could not open his mouth
without speaking filth.

"Help me get him to the cabin.  His foot is hard froze."

Veys paid little heed to Hood's words as he picked his way across the
rutted and frozen mud along the shore.  He now had a better view of the
second man, and his heart had started beating wildly once more.

The huge head, the fine light brown hair, and the shoulders the size of
sheep: It was Marafice Eye.  Sarga Veys' skin paled.  He had thought the
Knife dead, lost to the black waters of the Spill.

"Aye, Halfman.  You left me to the devil, and the devil threw me back."
A small eye, perfectly blue, regarded Sarga Veys with somethingakin to
satisfaction.  The Knife was lying on his side, half on the bank, half
on the ice.  The skin on his face was yellow and waxy, his cheeks and
nose split by tissue expandingas it froze.  Strips of flesh hung from
his small mouth, flappingas he breathed and spoke.

One eye was frozen shut.  One hand was curled like a bird's claw, yellow
and scaly and twitching.  The frozen foot was still booted, resting on
the ice like a shovel.

Marafice Eye smiled, a terrible sight to see on a frozen face.

"You may well look frightened, Halfman.  I saw you with Stagro's horse.
I clawed after you in the water, watched as you pulled yourself onto the
ice."

"I looked for you, but the ice was churning.  It was impossible to see"
"Save your lies for those who need them, Halfman."  Marafice Eye winced
as Hood began to cut the boot free of the frozen foot.  "The only thing
that matters to me is whether you acted from cowardice or spite.  Did
you wish me dead, eh?  Or were you so involved with saving your own skin
that you didn't give me or my men a second thought?"

Veys shifted ground.  He saw Hood slow down with the sheath knife,
awaiting his reply.  Marafice Eye breathed steadily, good hand clenched
to control the pain.  Two men, both injured but still dangerous.  Veys
swallowed bile then spoke.

"I do not wish you dead, Knife.  You cannot doubt that.  The ice was not
under my control.  It was the girl's fault it broke .  .  .  she led us
too far.  Her horse was more lightly burdened, and it knew how to dance.
When I fell into the water I had no mind but to get to safety.  I was
hardly thinking .  .  .

Stagro's horse was close .  I did what I had to.  By the time I crawled
from the water I had no strength for anything else.  "

"Yet you made it to the cabin," said the Knife.

"And stripped the frozen clothes from your back," added Hood.

"I did these things without thinking.  I" -- "Hush, man.  You bother me
like jiggers at my crotch.  You claim to be a coward, not a murderer.
Then you must prove that by using your foul magics upon me.  I will not
lose my foot and my hand.  I will not.  You will save them for me."

"But-" The Knife slammed his good hand onto the ice.

"I saw how you were with the horse.  You took its flesh and warmed it.
Now you must do the same for me, only gently, without scorching.  Hood
will stand by.  He will see you do no harm."

Hood smiled pleasantly, displaying filaments of trail meat packed
between his teeth.

"Devil help you if you hurt him.  Halfman.

Veys actually took a step back.  To perform a healing--on the Knife.

The idea was horrifying to him.  He was not a physician, he had not been
trained in the ways of blood and organs as some sorcerers were.

Sickness and disease were abhorrent to him.  Marafice Eye's yellow
swollen flesh repulsed him as surely as the sight of maggots at a
corpse.  And then there was the loss of strength.  How could he be
expected to draw power after all that had happened yesterday?  He needed
to rest, sleep.

"Come.  You must help Hood carry me to the cabin."

"I cannot heal you.  It's impossible.  Impossible."

Marafice Eye shook his head.  The strain cost him dearly, pulling tissue
and ligaments that should not have been pulled.

"Nay, Halfman, I'm not giving you a choice.  Four of my best men have
died. One with an arrow in his liver, another with a blade-sized hole in
his heart. The other two died here" --he punched the lake ice with his
fist"--in the Spill.  And if you'd had the balls, you could have saved
them.  Mind me well, Sarga Veys, for I know the blackness in your heart.
You meant to walk free from this place, travel back to Spire Vanis and
your master Penthero Iss, spin a tale with you as the hero and me and my
men as victims of the lake. That will never happen.

Hood may have lost two fingers, but he's still a better man with eight
than you are with ten.  He'd kill you now on my say, and do not think
I'm not tempted.  Your only use to me now is as a healer.  So heal me,
and perhaps Hood will forget the loss of his sworn brothers and let you
live.  "

Veys looked into the Knife's open eye.  Even lying prostrate on the ice,
he was a dangerous beast.  Veys believed him capable of any sort of
violence, and he was just the sort of man to survive if abandoned in
this frozen waste. He pulled himself free of the lake!  That act alone
told of the strength of his will.

"Ready to weep, Halfman?"

Veys glared at Hood and had the satisfaction of forcing the thick necked
badger of a man to look away.  This was not the first time one of the
sept had passed comment on his red and stinging eyes. Savagely he wiped
away the tears.

"Let's get him to the cabin."

The Knife said nothingas they carried him up the bank.  Hood took most
of the weight, and Veys was left to haul the legs and feet.  It was a
difficult journey and Marafice Eye must have suffered much in the
handling, yet he did not cry out or curse or show any but the briefest
signs of pain.  Veys supposed some men would call such stoicism bravery,
but he had little care for it.  Dread of the task that lay ahead weighed
like lead upon his chest.

When finally they arrived at the trout guddler's cabin, Veys became
aware of a new pressure pushingagainst his mind with the steady throb of
a sore tooth.

"Take him inside," he said to Hood, "and strip him.  Pry up the
floorboards for firewood.  We will need a quick fire."

"Don't settle yourself by the door, Halfman.  You're coming with us."

Hood dragged Marafice Eye across the threshold.  The Knife himself did
not speak.  Perhaps delirium had set in.  Veys hardly cared.

"My master calls me.  I must speak with him."

The words had a profound effect on Hood, who like all the barbarians in
the Rive Watch feared sorcery like the Skinned One himself.  His hand
rose to touch the grange lord insignia at his breast, and he muttered
the Maker's given name under his breath.

"Go," hissed Veys, pleased by the man's superstitious dread and well
aware that it would do him no harm to play to it.

"You would not want to risk standing here when his fetch appears before
me."

Hood worked the latch quickly for a man with eight fingers.  In his
haste he trapped his cloak tails in the door, and Veys heard a tearing
sound come from the other side as the man decided it was better to lose
a fistful of leather than reopen the door and risk seeinga fetch.

Veys smiled with spite.  Fetches, wraiths, scantlings: They were always
good for scaring children and witless men.

The smiled faded as quickly as it came as Veys steadied himself against
the cabin's exterior wall and laid himself open to the one who called
him.

Shock and pain took his breath.  Penthero Iss was there, suddenly inside
him like a new heart.  Every hair on Veys' body bristled, every pore
opened and exuded sweat.  How could he do such a thing? The power it
took to perform such a drawing from such a distance was unthinkable.
This wasn't simply far-speaking, this was the breaching of another's
flesh.  And then there was the threat of the backlash.

True, he had invited Iss in, but the mind and the body did not always
work together in matters of sorcery, and the instinct to protect oneself
was greater than any given thought.  What if the drawing snapped?

Calm yourself, Sarga Veys.  Did I not tell you that I would speak with
you along the way?

Veys shuddered so deeply bones cracked in his spine.  Fear burned with a
pure and fierce flame, like alcohol igniting on his skin.  What do you
ask of me?

Is Asarhia with you?

No.  She travels north to llle Glaive.  The Knife tried to take her
yesterday on the lake, but the ice broke beneath us and she escaped.

And the sept?

The sept is gone.  The Knife suffers from frostbite; Hood has lost
fingers on his sword hand The rest are dead.  It did not occur to Veys
to lie.  Iss was inside him; what else could he do?

1 will send another sept to you.  Make your way to llle Glaive and await
them there.

But we must return to Spire Vanis.  The Knife needs-See to him, Sarga
Veys. That is why you are there.  Asarhia must be followed north.  She
must be brought back.  Angus Lok's family lives near llle Glaive; he
will not pass that close without seeing them.

Find them for me also.

Veys knew he could not argue.  Penthero Iss seemed so much more than he
was. His power was potent, foreign.  It tasted of another world.

Do not fail me.  The words stretched southward across a continent as Iss
withdrew to Spire Vanis and the craven warmth of his flesh.

Veys slumped against the cabin wall, his shoulders scraping the skin of
rime ice from the timbers.  The vestiges of Iss' drawing had left a
gritty film in his mouth, but he did not like to spit, so he swallowed
it instead.  How did Iss get the power?  He was a weakling; Veys had
known that from the day they'd first met, when a discreet and gentle
probing had told him all he needed to know.  Now this.

Runninga hand across his jaw, Veys worked to calm himself.  A day's
growth of beard made his mouth shrink in distaste.

"Get in here, Halfman!"

Hood's call made Veys flinch.  Takinga series of fast, shallow breaths,
he pushed himself off from the wall and made his way inside the cabin.
Marafice Eye waited there, his foot made yellow by frozen bile, the
chilblained skin on his face shedding in strips as wet and slippery as
vegetable scrapings. Veys gathered power to himself, fear leaving him as
quickly as fear did leave a man who was angry and eager to prove himself
to those who considered themselves his betters.  So Hood would kill him
if he failed, eh?  Well, who was to say that one day Hood wouldn't wake
to find his remaining eight fingers gone the way of the other two?  And
who was to say that one day Penthero Iss wouldn't wake to find his own
body invaded and the secret source of power he tapped into taken over by
a better man than himself?

Such thoughts stayed in Veys' mind only long enough to calm him.  He had
a job to do, and although he hated Marafice Eye with bright malice, his
pride demanded that he perform no drawing that wasn't equal to his best.

Suppressinga shudder of revulsion, Veys entered the frozen canals of the
Knife's frostbitten flesh.

CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE.

Ille Glaive Raif recognized the Dhoonesmen at five hundred paces.  War
dressed in the blue and copper of Dhoone, mounted on fully laden shire
horses, spears so highly polished they shone like glass, they rode south
along the Glaive Road, forcing farmers and cart boys from their path.

Two men only, there were, yet they had a power to them that drew the
eyes as surely as a mountain made of steel.  They sat high in their
saddles, backs straight, eyes forward, left hands on the shafts of their
couched spears, blue tattoos pulsing like veins beneath their
Dhoonehelms.

Angus said something, perhaps a warning to keep eyes down as the
Dhoonesmen approached, but Raif had no mind for it.

Clansmen, here in the Glaivehold.  Without thinking, Raif reached behind
his neck to the leather strip that held his hair.  The Blackhail silver
was long gone.  Even the black thread on his elks king coat now lay
concealed beneath a layer of muck.  All he had left to tell of his clan
was the silver cap that sealed his measure of guide stone in his tine,
and the bit of silver wire around the grip of Tern's sword.  Soon even
his hair would outgrow his clan. Bailsmen kept their hair shortest of
all clans, scorning the intricate plaitings, braidings, oilings, and
part shavings that were as much a part of the clan holds as the white
heather that bloomed on the fell fields each spring.

"Raif.  Ease to the side of the road and let them pass."

Out of the corner of his eye, Raif was aware of Angus pulling the

bay's reins and setting the Sull horse on a path to lead its riders from
the road.  So even Angus makes way for Dhoonesmen.  The thought made
somethingache in Raifs chest, The heavy-shod hooves of the shire horses
set the packed-earth road ringing.  The late afternoon sun shone
directly onto the Dhoonesmen's faces as they rode toward Raifat a trot.
Raifsaw their eyes flick to him, then just as quickly flick away.  Even
though Raif held the center of the road, they made no motion to alter
their path and continued to head straight for him as if he were nothing
more than a speck of dust.

Abruptly Raif kicked Moose into a turn and headed off the road.  Even
before horse and rider gained the ditch, the Dhoonesmen claimed the
space they'd left behind.  Heads held high, never once looking back, the
Dhoonesmen continued south.

Minutes passed.  Flecks of gray snow kicked up by the Dhoones- men
floated back down to earth.  Raif could feel Angus' gaze upon him, yet
he did not turn to look at him, even when his uncle spoke.  "Let's head
back onto the road.  I want to reach the Glaive before dark."

Raif breathed and breathed, and after a while he nodded.  After turning
Moose out of the ditch, he took the road ahead of Angus, deliberately
settinga pace that would keep him well ahead of the twice laden bay.

He had been less than nothing to the Dhoonesmen.

Raif bound Moose's reins around his fist as he rode the winding curves
and humpbacks of the Glaive Road.  The Spill lay below him, its oily
surface turned the color of bird blood by the first real sun to shine in
days. Farms, mills, smokehouses, stove houses broken watch towers and
fortifications, and crannogs extending out over the lake on stilts, all
lay within a short distance of the road.  Other people traveled the
road, mostly carters, drovers, and market traders, but occasionally a
fine lady dressed in scarlet velvet and sables, accompanied by her
men-at-arms, or a pair of Forsworn knights, wearing iron scale gleaming
with bone oil, cloth-of-skin cloaks, and the thorned collars known as
the Penance, would pass by or overtake them.

Raif paid them little heed.  Angus shouted ahead, informing him that the
city itself would likely come into view any moment, yet Raif made no
effort to search for it.  The blank, disinterested gazes of the
Dhoonesmen filled his sights.  He wasn't one of them now.  Somehow,
though his clothes hadn't changed and his hair had barely grown, the
weeks spent with Angus had changed him.  A month ago the Dhoonesmen
would have hailed him, asked what news he had of Dhoone year men
fostered at Blackhail, what lakes had frozen on the Hailhold, what he
was doing so far from home, did he need help or food or company.  They
would have seen him as one of their own.  Instead they had seen nothing
but a man on a horse who had no status or due respect in their world.

Raif breathed heavily.  With an effort he loosened his grip on Moose's
reins and set his mind elsewhere.  Lowering himself in the saddle, he
concentrated on guiding the gelding up the steep slope to the headlands
that lay high above the lake.

The surface of the road was especially bad on the incline, and mud broke
away in frozen clumps as Moose searched for hoof holds in the ice.  Five
hours' worth of sunlight had melted parts of the surface, and Raifs gaze
had settled upon a particularly treacherous- looking ditch filled with
loose stones and wet ice, when Angus whistled softly at his back.
Straightaway Raif looked up.

Ille Glaive rose before him like a cliff of golden light.  He saw stone
walls and slate rooftops and needle-thin towers, all transformed in me
sunset to gleaming metal things.  A thousand tear-shaped windows
collected shadows the color of dark amber, and a network of bridges,
ledges, and battlements glinted like human spines dipped into gold.

At the foot of the southern wall, the lake reflected a smaller, smoky
version of the city, a mirror image seen through old glass.

As Moose topped the slope, Raif studied the lakeshore, wondering how
many men it took to break and clear the ice.  Then he noticed the steam
and bubbling water forming a stewpot along the bank.

"Natural springs," Angus said, pullingalongside him.

"Ille Glaive was built on them.  They feed the lake year-round."

Raif nodded.  Following his trip to Spire Vanis he had no love of
cities, yet he couldn't help but admire Ille Glaive's golden sandstone
walls.  Savagely he scratched the scars on his chest.  The skin was
fully healed now, but the ghosts of the Bluddsmen's swords would not
leave him.  Two mornings ago he'd awoken to find dried blood driven deep
beneath his fingernails and the scars scratched raw and peeling.

"I think we'll take the beggar's entrance," Angus said, squinting ahead.

"We should be safe going through the market at this hour."

Making a small movement to indicate Ash, who was ridingat his back, he
added,

"The sooner we get our wee lassie here to Heritas Cant, the better."

Raif made no reply.  Cities were Angus' affair.  It was up to him to say
how they entered and where they stayed.  As long as Ash was seen to
quickly, little else mattered to him.

Glancing over, he saw she was still the same.  She sat, slumped against
Angus' back, her eyes closed, her eyelids pale and unmoving, her hair
pressed flat where it rested against Angus' shoulders, and her small
pink mouth open just enough to let in air.  She had not spoken since the
night by the white oaks.  Both Raif and Angus had tried to wake her many
times in the past four days, yet although her body seemed to respond,
sometimes cringing or pullingaway from a harsh or unpleasant touch, her
eyes seldom opened.  Angus had taken great pains to force her to drink,
holding her jaw apart and pouring clear broth or water down her throat.
Yet he could not make her eat.

Sometimes, as this morning before they'd broken camp, she became
agitated and her arms would slowly rise from her sides.  Whenever that
happened, Angus would force her wrists behind her back and bind them
together with sheepskin, hobbling her as if she were a dangerous horse.
Sometimes he wadded shammies in his fist and thrust them so deeply into
her mouth that they rested against the back of her throat.  Raif hated
to see it.  What within her was so terrible that she had to be bound and
gagged?

Runninga hand over his week-old beard, Raif frowned.  Even now, when he
wasn't looking at her and they were separated by twelve paces of air, he
was aware of her presence pushingagainst him.  Always he felt her in his
lore.  Somehow she pushed herself into his mind, claiming space that
belonged to Drey and Effie and Tern.

With a violent shake of his head, Raif stopped his thoughts from moving
farther past that point.  Last night, when he had taken a damp cloth
from the fire and cleaned the road grime from Ash's face, Angus had
said,

"You treat her as gently as if she were Effie."  Raif had had to stop
what he was doingand walk into the shadows beyond the fire.  Asarhia
March was no Effie, and he hated Angus for putting them in the same
sentence and linking them.  He looked after Ash because that was what he
and Angus had done since the moment they had saved her at Vaingate.  It
was a necessary thing, like brushing down the horses and lightinga
drying fire for their clothes each night.  Ash was not kin.  She would
never replace Effie or Drey in his heart.

Yet she had told him the truth.  While Angus had danced around the truth
like a clan guide around the Gods Night fires, she had told him who she
was.  That he valued.  That was an action worthy of a clanswoman.

"Hold the reins a nonce, Raif, while I see to our drunken lassie here."
Copper eyes twinkling, Angus handed the bay's reins to Raif and then
busied himself with other things.  Yesterday morning he had made Raif
wait with Ash in the cover of a grove of sister aspens while he'd
visited a farmhouse set a quarter league off the road.  An hour later he
had returned bearing fresh food, new waterskins, an-1 ancient and crusty
leather saddlebag, a pail of fresh milk, and a 3 newly fattened rabbit
flask, filled to the cork with the sort of stinging | birch alcohol that
Angus had a taste for.  He took the rabbit flask i from his buckskins
now, bit the cork free, and began anointing Ash's ^ head and shoulders
with droplets of clear alcohol.

^ "If anyone asks, she had a skinful at nooning."  I Raif nodded.  Ash's
breaths were very shallow now, and her lack| of response to the icy
drops of liquid worried him.  Glancingahead, ^ he judged the time it
would take them to reach the city.

"Will this man we're going to see be able to help her?"

Angus thumped the cork on the flask, then motioned for Raif to hand back
the reins.

"Heritas Cant knows many things: storm lore, the true names of all the
gods, how to read the secret language of prophecies and speak the Old
Tongue of the Trappers and the Sull.  He can bind hawks to fly on his
bidding, recite lists of battles from the Time of Shadows, heal
sicknesses of blood and mind, and find patterns in the stars.  If anyone
can help her, he can."

"Is he a magic user?"

Angus sucked in breath with a small hiss.

"He will do whatever he must."

Unable to decide what sort of answer that was and in no mood to dance
lies and truth with Angus, Raif let the matter drop.  Fixing his gaze
firmly ahead, he set his mind to contemplating Ille Glaive.  The city
was set at the head of a narrow plain.  Furrow lines in the snow,
tarred-log farmhouses, and trails of blue woodsmoke told that the
surrounding land was used mostly for crops.  A sparse forest, heavily
logged, reached westward around the farmland, and the low craggy peaks
of the Bitter Hills stretched northeast into the Bannen, Ganmiddich, and
Croser clan holds

Now that the brilliant light of sunset had faded, Ille Glaive looked
older, smaller, and less glorious than it had when Raif had first seen
it.  Where Spire Vanis had the hard lines, white mortar, and
precision-cut stones of a young city built by a single generation of
masons, Ille Glaive had the layered, worn, disorderly look of something
built over centuries by many different hands.  Unlike Spire Vanis, Ille
Glaive did not live solely within its walls, and pot houses stables,
barracks, covered markets, pieces of freestanding stonework, broken
arches, and lightning-cracked towers spilled from the split skin of its
east wall.

Angus guided the bay from the road and headed toward the clutter of
buildings and markets.  Raif smelled woodsmoke and scorched fat, and
then the faintly sulfurous odor of hot springs.  The wind earned broken
bits of sound: a baby crying, meat sizzling on a grill, a pair of dogs
scrapping, and the hiss and clang of water forced through pipes.  As
they approached the first line of buildings, Angus motioned for Raif to
dismount.  Angus had scraped the oil and wax from his face with the
blunt edge of his knife and now began to unravel the leather jesses
around his ears.

Snow was light on the ground, and Raif found walkinga relief.  He
understood why Angus wanted him on foot: Two armed men on horseback drew
looks. Discreetly he slid the scabbard containing Tern's sword along his
belt, tucking it into the shadows of his coat.  He didn't need Angus to
tell him to avoid everyone's eyes, and he saw little save the boot
leather of the first few people he passed.

Angus led them through the market, tracinga fox's path of quick turns
and sudden stops.  Timber stalls, roofed with hide or woven spruce
branches, reminded Raif of the clan markets held on the Dhoonehold each
spring.  Many of the same items were for sale: hand knives with carved
boxwood handles, dried fish skins for bow backing, grouse feathers
already bound and cut for fletchings, archers' thumb rings, horn
bracelets set with Blackhail silver, pots of beeswax, neat's-foot oil
and bright yellow tung oil imported in birds' craniums all the way from
the Far South, lynx pelts and sea otter pelts, brilliantly colored
leathers from a city called Leiss, amber beads threaded on caribou
sinew, shimmering purple silks from Hanatta, blue mussels, dried
mushrooms, green seal meat, pickled sweetbreads, whole eider ducks,
wheels of marbled yellow cheese, warm beer thickened with eggs, hot
sausages stuffed with unknowable meats, and fat white onions roasted
until they were black.

Raifs mouth watered.  Food had been sparse and cold for the last three
days. Angus showed only passing interest in the food and continued
weaving through the aisles in the manner of a man strolling idly through
a market.

"Here they come," Angus said under his breath.

"Don't look up.  I'll do the talking."

Raif, who had been looking longingly at a roasted leg of lamb crusted
with white pepper and thyme, had no idea who they were.  Slowing down to
match Angus' pace, he found something of interest to stare at on the toe
of his boot.

Footsteps, two pairs of them, pounded against the hard-froze mud.

Raif heard the dull ring of metal, thinly couched, then watched as the
tip of a knotted willow stick was jabbed at the bay's coffin bone.

"What 'ave we here, Fat Bollick?"  came a low, rasping voice.

"Newcomers, Nouse.  Poor if ye look to their clothes, rich if ye ken
their horses."

Raif glanced up.  Two men wearing the white ofllle Glaive with the
black, red, and steel tears at their breast stood at the bay's head.

Nouse, the man with the stick, had the small eyes and shiny black head
of a magpie.  Fat Bollick had the plumped-up wrinkly look of fingertips
soaked too long in water.

Angus addressed himself to Nouse.

"Good eve to you, gentlemen.  If the Master cares for tribute, then
he'll gladly let us pass."  Somehow, despite both his hands resting on
the reins in plain view, Angus managed to generate the sound of coins
clicking together as he spoke.

"The Master don't need no tribute," Fat Bollick said.

"He takes it simply because he can."

Inclining his head, Angus once again addressed his words to Nouse.

"Naturally I didn't mean to imply that the Master has need of funds.

I just want it to be known that my purse is over heavy and I would count
a favor in its lightening.  "

Nouse's eyes narrowed as he stroked the oily plumage of his beard.

"What d'you ken, Fat Bollick?"

Fat Bollick shrugged.

"The man speaks with respect, and I'd be inclined to lighten his purse
and let him pass.  Though I must say the girl at his back worries me. We
wouldn't want no foreign fevers brought into the Glaive."

Angus glanced over his shoulder at Ash.

"Her?  Fevered?  I wish it were so.  She's as soaked as a brewer's rag
...and Maker help my if me lady wife ever hears about it, for she's
handy with her skinning knife and well inclined to use it."

Nouse prodded Ash sharply with his stick.

"Ported, you say?"

"Aye."  Angus' voice was level, but Raif saw how his knuckles whitened
around the reins.

"She smells like it," Fat Bollick said.

"I say we take the Master's tribute and let 'em pass."

Nouse's sharp little eyes narrowed as he looked at Angus.

"I've seen you here afore."

"Aye, and you'll likely see me again.  And each time you do, you and the
Master will end up a wee bit richer for it."  Angus peeled his hand from
the reins and reached inside his coat for his purse.  It was the size of
a sheep's bladder and bunched full with coins.  He threw it, not gently,
at Nouse, who caught it like a punch to his chest.

"Now, if you gentlemen will excuse me, I have a daughter in need of
sobering, an apprentice in need of a wenching, and my own handsome face
in need of a good shave and some wifely fussing."  With that Angus
kicked the bay's flanks and started forward.  "Kindly give my regards to
the Master."

The willow stick twitched in Nouse's left hand as he weighed the purse
with his right.  Fat Bollick made eye signals to him.  Nouse's gaze
dropped to the purse.  Finally he cracked his stick on the bay's flank.

"Aye, go on then.  Pass.  Me and Fat Bollick will be watching ye.  Piss
too high against a wall and we'll know it."

Raif led Moose past the two men-at-arms, his gaze carefully avoiding
Nouse. He didn't know what to make of the exchange among the three men.
The Master of Ille Glaive ruled the city hold from the Lake Keep, and
Angus said he was more a king than the Surlord of Spire Vanis, as the
title of Master was passed from father to son.  Threavish Cutler likes
to call himself the King on the Lake, Angus had said just that morning
as the trail they traveled joined the Glaive Road.  And his sons and
sworn men call themselves thane lords Mark my words, one of these days
old Threavish is going to take all the gold he's collected in tributes,
melt it in a pot, and forge himself a crown. A big one, mind, one large
enough to cover his swollen head.

"That was easy enough," Angus said once they were out of earshot of
Nouse and Fat Bollick.

"Cost me my purse and saddle last time."

Annoyed at Angus' humor, Raif said,

"I wouldn't have given them anything."

Angus sighed, not heavily.

"Lad, you have a lot to learn.  Those two practitioners were playinga
well-turned tune.  They knew we wanted to slip into the city unnoticed;
we'd have gone the way of Shallow Gate otherwise. They simply made us
pay for the privilege."

Raif made no reply.  He was pretty sure the tune would have changed in
an instant if Nouse had prodded Ash a fraction harder with his stick.

"Let's get Ash somewhere safe."

Angus gave him a hard look.

"You're going to have to get used to the way things are done in cities,
Raif, like it or not.  Stove laws, rights of passage, due respect: They
all vanish quicker than snow on a grate the minute you leave the clan
holds Don't think those two Dhoonesmen who forced us from the road did
any different.  Their tribute alone will have been enough to keep Fat
Bollick in beer and sausage for a week."

Heat came to Raifs face.

"They would have taken the gate."

"Would they now?  Two clansmen armed to the jaws?"  Angus shook his head
for a long time.

"No gatekeeper worth his rations would let a pair of war-dressed
Dhoonesmen in the city, not the way the clan holds are at the moment.
Nay, laddie. Nouse and Fat Bollick would have taken them for a grand
sum."

Raif pulled far ahead of Angus, not wanting to hear any more.  All the
earlier shame he had felt from being overlooked by the Dhoonesmen came
back, causing hard knots in his chest.  He was so close to the clan
holds .  a day's hard ride would take him into Ganmiddich territory.  It
was said that Crab Ganmiddich, the Ganmiddich chief, could row out to
his island in the Wolf River that was known as the Inch, climb the watch
tower there, and see the lights of Ille Glaive at night.  Raif raised
his chin and looked north. The sky above the Bitter Hills was already
black and full of stars.

"Through the arch, Raif."

Acknowledging Angus' direction with a curt nod, Raif led Moose through a
timber-supported cleft in the wall and entered the city of Ille Glaive.
The light level dropped immediately, turning late sunset into darkest
night. Raif paid scant attention to his surroundings, heeding only the
directions Angus gave at irregular intervals regarding turns and
crossings and places to be avoided.  Ille Glaive was old, old.  It
smelled of passing centuries, mildew,

butchered carcasses, and slowly rotting things.  Roads were cobbled and
seldom straight.  Sandstone buildings were worn, crumbling, propped up
by massive blood wood stangs, and leaking smoke and lamplight from a
thousand cracks and chinks.  Mazes of hog-backed bridges connected
battlements to ring towers and stone barracks, and far to the west the
lead-capped domes of the Lake Keep caught the last of the sun's red
light.

Raifhad little mind for any of it.  The only thing that drew his
attention was the figure hunched at Angus' back.  Ash's breathing grew
heavier as they made their way along streets no wider than two pigs.

When Raif drew close he heard air scraping through her throat.  After a
time Angus halted and hobbled her arms with rope.  He said nothing to
Raif, but his face was grave and his movements were hard on himself and
the bay.  When they started up again, Ash's wrists strained against the
sheepskin tethers, sawing back and forth until the skin began to redden
and break.  Raif quickened his pace.

"Here.  Through the iron gate."

The sound of Angus' voice pulled Raifs mind only so far away from Ash.
He barely noticed the stone wall and the gated archway they had arrived
at, and he dealt clumsily with the heavy bolt and chain on the gate,
making much noise.  A dimly lit courtyard lay beyond.  A narrow
three-storied manse, its stonework hidden by the hard clay of five
hundred years of bird droppings and a rack of dead vines, commanded the
fourth wall.  The manse's windows were tightly shuttered, and its door
was banded with cords of iron that were, Raif noticed, the only thing in
sight that looked to be well tended.  Angus bade Raif go forward and
knock on the door while he dismounted and saw to Ash.

Raif held his raven lore in his fist as he thumped the wood.  He didn't
like the enclosed space of the courtyard.

The door opened silently, gliding on well-oiled hinges.  Momentarily
dazzled by the sour light of a goose-fat lantern, Raif took a step back,
his hand droppingautomatically to Tern's sword.  A moment later he made
out the slight, bow-shouldered form of a very old woman.

Robed in dark blue wool with a cap of coarse netting

pinned against her scalp, she reminded Raif of the clan dowagers who
always dressed plainly when washing the dead.  Her cataract- stained
gaze traveled from Raifs face to the hilt of his sword.  Immediately
feeling foolish, Raif snapped his hand away.

"Cloistress Gannet."  Angus pushed past Raif and nodded curtly to the
old woman.  Ash was pressed close against his chest.

"It's been forty years since I last rendered souls in a cloister, Angus
Lok. I have no claim to any title you give me."  The old woman's voice
was dry and hard.  The hand that held the lamp did not shake.

"Come, enter.  I see you have brought a sick birdie for the master."

The cloistress led them along a dark corridor toward the back of the
house, then showed them into a room where a fire burned with tired red
flames. Angus laid Ash on a rug near the fire.  Raif knelt by the hearth
and warmed his hands before he touched her.  He did not hear the
cloistress leave.

"What is this?  What is this?"  A twisted creature with misshapen legs
and too many bones in his chest walked into the room with the aid of two
sticks. Click, click, click.  Sharp green eyes assessed Raif in less
then an instant, then moved swiftly to Angus and Ash.  A bone grown high
in the man's shoulder twitched.

"I am not in the business of receiving visitors after dark.  Warm
yourselves, then begone.  You shall get no more fire out of me."

"Heritas, this is my nephew Raif Sevrance."  Angus spoke in a voice Raif
had never heard before, stilted and full of emphasis.

Levering his body around, Heritas Cant adjusted the curve of his neck
and fixed Raif with a hard stare.  Uncomfortable, Raif looked away.

His gaze rested on Heritas Cant's pale, bone-filled hand.  The knuckles
were out of alignment.  Two had twisted around completely and now faced
downward along with his palm.

As he straightened up, Raif caught the end of a look passed between
Angus and Heritas Cant, a message-filled look, where the crippled man
looked grim and Angus appealed to him like a puppy who had dug up some
piece of nastiness from the garden and brought it into the house.

"I suppose you'll be wanting supper?"  Cant said, each word a little
stab with a knife.

"And this late, too.  You won't get anything hot, mind.  I won't have
the oven fired for a ranger, a clansman, and a sick bit of a girl.
You'll have to make do with cold mutton, thinly sliced, and such crusts
as I could not eat myself.  Woman!"

The cloistress appeared in the doorway.

"Supper for these people.  Light no extra tallow and serve them only
with the third best bowls."

The cloistress said nothing, merely inclined her head.

"And watch your own trips as you go, woman.  Come here but once to bring
the food, then not again.  I will not have the carpet worn by undue stop
pings Heritas Cant turned to Raif.

"Nor will I have the heat from the fire hogged by just one man."

Raif pressed his lips to a line and moved a few paces from the fire.

He didn't like this petty little man.

Cant clicked his sticks on the plank floor as soon as the cloistress was
gone.

"So you've brought me something sick to look at, Angus Lok.

I trust she is not fevered, for I'll have no catching sickness in my
house. " As he spoke, he labored across the room, making his way toward
Ash.  His movements reminded Raif of an aging black bear that Drey had
shot at distance one summer in the Oldwood.  Drey's arrow had found the
bear's lower spine, and the creature had lurched into the undergrowth
before either he or Drey had chance to kill it.

To cover up the awkwardness of Heritas bending to tend to Ash, Angus
spoke.

"Heritas is treasurer of all monies levered from the Old Sull Gate."

Heritas blasted air through his nostrils.

"And they give me nothing but a copper on the crow-weight for my
troubles. More gold rubs off in the gatekeepers' pockets in a single
afternoon than I see in a whole month of counting coin."  Heritas Cant's
good hand traveled along Ash's body as he spoke, pressing the base of
her throat, the hollows beneath her eyes, her stomach, and the muscles
in her shoulders and sides.

Raif feigned interest in the topic of conversation, though in truth all
he was concerned with was watching Heritas Cant's hands on Ash.

"Why is it called the Old Sull Gate?"

"Because that's what it's always been known as." Heritas Cant slipped
something between Ash's lips, something dark and brittle like a dried
leaf.

"Master Threavish Cutler would have it otherwise; he's tried calling it
King's Gate, Lake Gate, and even Heron Gate, after his damn fool of a
brother who died in waist-deep snow battlinga dozen Crosermen on
disputed ground. Cutler's aim, besides appeasing his own undeniable
grief, was to make everyone forget that this city once belonged to the
Sull."

"But I thought-" "You thought what?"  Heritas Cant sent Raifa withering
look and then answered his own question.

"That Ille Glaive has always counted itself one of the Mountain Cities?
That the Sull have always lived in their forests in the east and never
built anything more ambitious than a stone redoubt and a ring of cairns?
No.  The Sull were the first to cross the Ranges and settle the Northern
Territories. Before the clans and the driven ranks marched north, the
Sull came here, to the shores of the Black Spill, and built a fine city
around the springs. That city still stands today if one cares to look.
It exists at the base of old buildings, beneath thickly worked plaster
and hastily laid tiles. Aboveground there is nothing--the towers,
statues, and earthwork have all gone, systematically wrecked by a long
line of Threavish Cutler's ilk--but below ground at the heart of Ille
Glaive, lie Sull foundations, Sull tunnels, and Sull stone."

Raif didn't care for Heritas Cant's tone of voice.  If the man hadn't
been a cripple, he would have dearly liked to hit him.  For Ash's sake,
he made an effort.

"So the lords of Ille Glaive forced the Sull from the city?"

Heritas Cant took his left hand from Ash's stomach and massaged the
misshapen hump of bones that was his right wrist.

"Yes and no.  A siege took place, many battles were fought, but in the
end the thane lords of Ille Glaive earned their tears' worth of Sull
blood cheaply.  The Sull have demons that are not of man's making.  They
fought for this city and would have held it if they hadn't had older,
more pressing battles to win.  They as good as gave this city to the
thane lords and their leader, Dunness Fey .  .  .  and it wasn't the
first time such a gain has been made at the Sull's expense.  Yet we
should all pray that it be the last."

Raiffelt his face burn as Heritas spoke.  He was angry, but there
something more here.  Almost against his will, Raifs hand moved to touch
his raven lore.  Heritas Cant's sharp green eyes caught the action even
as Raif stopped himself short.

"What is your lore?"

It was a rude question, and Heritas Cant knew it.  When a clansman met
someone from another clan, he would never ask him outright about his
lore. That sort of knowledge always came secondhand.  Raif considered
not answering.  Heritas Cant was something unknown; just because Angus
trusted him didn't mean that he should.  Yet something else struck him
about the small, broken man: He had known Raif was a clansman.  Angus
had not introduced him as such, and Raif knew his clothes and ornaments
no longer proclaimed him as clan--the Dhoonesmen's indifference on the
Glaive Road had told him that.  So, did Heritas Cant know him as clan
because he'd seized upon something subtle like his accent or his manner,
or had Angus discussed his sister's family in this house once before?
Either way Raif found little reassurance.

He glanced at Cant.  The man's shrewd, pain-sculpted face glowed like
polished wood in the firelight.

"I am raven born," Raif said.

"Watcher of the Dead."  Cant clicked his sticks.  "" Tis a hard lore.
It will drive you fierce and use your flesh and leave you little but
loss in payment.  "

Raif did not move; he neither blinked nor breathed nor trembled.  The
words felt like a sentence, and it seemed all he could do was stand and
accept them.  The same nameless fear he'd felt moments earlier when Cant
spoke about the Sull filled his chest.

Angus shifted his weight, causinga board to creak beneath him.  "Come
now, Heritas.  You need not be so bleak.  Ravens are clever beasties.

They're the only birds who can live out a full winter in the Want.

Strong, they are, with wings like knives and voices to match.  True,
they're not the prettiest creatures, but if the clan guide gave out
lores on looks alone, we'd all be kittens and doe-eyed .  .  .  does.  "

Heritas Cant had stretched his dead hand upon Ash's forehead as Angus
spoke.  Now he arranged the twisted ringers with his good hand,
spreading them wide, into her hair, over the bridge of her nose, and
across her eyebrows.

"True enough," he said as he worked.

"The raven is a clever bird.  It favors shadows and waits upon death."

With those words Cant changed, becoming for a moment something else, as
if a heavy substance, like molten rock, had been poured into his body
and then flash-hardened in an instant.  The dead hand that could only be
moved with another's help gripped Ash's flesh.  Cant's mouth opened, and
he uttered something that was not speech.

Ash's entire body moved toward him.  Her head rose from the floor.  Her
mouth gasped open, revealing the dead leaf on her tongue.  Raifsaw the
tendons on her neck and wrists working, straining.  The stench of
smelted metal was suddenly there in the room, so strong it could be
tasted as well as smelled. Pinpoints of spittle frothed from Heritas
Cant's lips.  His sticks clattered to the floor.  All was still for the
briefest moment, then Cant swayed and nearly fell and Ash slumped back
onto the rug.

Angus rushed to Cant's side, supporting him, helping him rise, leading
him to a chair.

Raifpaid them no heed.  He crossed to where Ash lay and knelt in the
warm space Cant had just vacated.  Even as he reached out to touch her,
her eyes opened.

Relief flooded over him, leaving him feeling drunk and breathless and so
stupidly pleased, he could have laid down Tern's sword and danced above
the blade.  All talk of ravens and death was forgotten.  Swiftly he gave
thanks to the Stone Gods; they were jealous and demandingand might take
something back if not appeased.  Ash was awake.  Her large gray eyes,
first shown to him weeks ago by the guide stone looked and saw and
recognized.

"You're safe," Raifsaid.

"We're in a friend's house."  He hesitated, knowing their peculiar
relationship demanded that he always tell her how long she had been
asleep. He didn't want to upset her with

the truth, yet he would not lie to her, either.

"You've been asleep for four days."

Ash's eyes looked into his.  Her lips trembled.  What had she been
through? He found he did not like the thought of her suffering.  Slowly,
deliberately, he bent down and gathered her up, pulling her fast against
his chest.  She was so cold it frightened him.

"Easy, Raif."  Angus put a hand on his shoulder.

"Let her be."  Raif shook his head.

"I will not let them take her again."  Crouching, Angus brought his face
close to Raifs.  He studied whatever was showing there for a long moment
and then said in a weary voice,

"And so it begins."

A quarter passed before Raif could finally be persuaded to let her go.

CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO.

Named Beasts have put what war dings I can between Ash and that which
calls her.

Later, I shall do more.  Yet know this: The Bound Men and Beasts of the
Blind will not be held off indefinitely.  They know what Ash is, and
they will not let her rest until she gives them what they crave.  "

Heritas Cant's wheel-broken body rested in a chair of hard black wood.
An hour had passed since Ash had awakened.  A light supper of watered
beer, bread, and roasted mutton had been eaten by all, during which Cant
had complained heatedly about the number of guests, the amount of food
eaten, the crumbs wasted, the gristle spat, the strain on the dying
fire, and the wear on his rugs, chairs, wooden bowls, and spoons.  After
supper he had called the cloistress to him and informed her that he was
taking his guests "to the warren" to show them his collection of foreign
coins.  The cloistress had bobbed her head sharply, like a sparrow
plucking insects from air, yet even as her face and chin pointed
downward her milky gaze had followed them from the room.

The warren was located at the far edge of the plot of land that lay at
the rear of Heritas Cant's house.  Constructed entirely underground, it
reminded Raifofthe rendering pits in the badlands, dug so that thirty
head of elk could be sweated at one time.  Its mud walls were braced
with crossing timbers as big as a full-grown man, and its ceiling was
formed from whole basswood logs mounted on brackets.

Things grew in the spaces between the logs: silvery weeds that moved
with every breath Raif took.  The floor was good firm stone, blue slate,
and much worn.  The air above it smelled of wet soil and old age.

Heritas said it had been built half a century earlier by the last owner
of the house, an eccentric man who had been convinced that one day
headless demons would walk the earth and only those living beneath it
would be saved. Raif had laughed.  Angus had suggested that the man's
real motive may well have been to get some peace from his wife.  Heritas
Cant had greeted both reactions with ill humor.

He was ill humored now, sittingawkwardly in his chair at the head of a
broad oak table laid with chained books, rolled hides, and copper
tablets as thin as blades.  Mud glistened on the walls behind his back,
oozing softly as the goose-fat lantern warmed the chamber.

"I don't understand," Ash said.

"What is the Blind?"

Heritas Cant and Angus exchanged a glance.  Raif watched his uncle's
face carefully, trying to see beyond Angus' guard of good humor.

Angus and Ash were sitting close, sharinga bench across the table from
Cant. Raif sat with his back against the far wall, glad of his place in
the background in the dim low-ceilinged space.

"The Blind is a place of darkness," Heritas said.

"Some would call it the underworld, others would say it is the boundary
where hell and earth meet.  More learned men will tell you that it is a
place of holding, a prison if you like, where beings that should never
have been brought into existence are walled in by the bricks and mortar
of ancient spells."  A pause followed, where Heritas settled his
crippled legs into a more comfortable position against the chair.  When
he resumed speaking his voice was sharp with pain, but as he continued,
everything--the chamber, the mud walls, the light from the lantern, and
even his own pain--fell away.

"The Blind is home to those who should be dead.  Things live there who
crave the light and the warmth of the world we inhabit.  Hunger is all
they know. Need is all they feel.  For a thousand years none amongst
them have reached the light, but still they do not forget or stop
craving.  Desire only deepens with time.  The Blind is as cold and empty
as eternity; it is fed by the dark rivers of hell, held in place by
spells so terrible and lasting that closeness to its boundaries can
kill.

"The creatures who wait there are chained in blood.  They hate living
men with all the substance of their souls.  Once they were human.  Once
they walked our world as men, yet dark times came and some would say the
world cracked open and through the breach rode the Endlords.  They have
many names, these lords: Lords of Shadow and Lords of Night, the
Unleashed, the Condemned, the Shadow Warriors, and the Takers of Men.
One touch is all it takes for an Endlord to claim a man's body and soul.
Their flesh bleeds darkness.  Cut them open and the black substance of
evil leaks out.  In the Time of Shadows they massed great war hosts that
stretched from sea to sea. They were terrible to behold, human yet not
human, wearing the faces of men and women they had claimed, stinking of
death, their eyes burning black and red, their bodies shifting shadows
beneath them.  The Endlords rode at the head of their armies, great
beast men on black horses, with weapons forged from voided steel that
reflected no light.

"It is said that they were birthed at the same time as the gods, and if
it is the gods' purpose to make life, then it is the Endlords' purpose
to destroy it.  Make no mistake, the world will end, perhaps not for a
thousand thousand years, but when it does it will be the End- lords who
will dance upon the wreckage.

"They ride the earth every thousand years to claim more men for their
armies. When a man or woman is touched by them, they become Unmade.

Not dead, never dead, but something different, cold and craving.  The
shadows enter them, snuffing the light from their eyes and the warmth
from their hearts.  Everything is lost.  Their memories leave them
first, seeping from them like blood from skinned flesh.  The ability to
think and understand comes next and with it all emotion except need.
Blood and skin and bone is lost, changed into something the Sull call
maerdan: shadow flesh

"These men and women are known as Shadow Wearers, the Bound Men, Wralls,
and the Taken.  The Endlords have taken others, too, beasts from
forgotten ages, things that are half man and half monster, giants, blood
wraiths .  things that no longer walk this earth.

"All have but one memory left: the knowledge they were once counted
amongst the living.  This is the core of their existence.  It is what
drives them to battle .  .  .  and to hate.

"There was a time when the Shadow Wearers and their masters rode
unchecked in our world.  Their numbers massed and their power cumulated
and the long night of darkness began.  Terrible wars were fought.  Wars
so ancient and devastating that only scraps of their history remain.
Wars of Blood and Shadow, the Ruinwars, Wars of the Blind.  Hundreds of
thousands of lives were lost.  Generations of sorcerer-warriors were
massacred.  Losses became so great that those fighting could see no end,
only the complete and utter silence of destruction.  That's when the
Hearth of Ten came together to bringan end to the wars and banish the
Shadow Wearers and the lords who had made them, exile them to a place
where their powers were rendered futile and they could no longer walk
the earth.

"I do not know if the Hearth of Ten created the Blind or found it.

Some say the Blind is where the Endlords first came from, that they
originated in a place beyond the boundaries of our world and that the
Hearth of Ten did nothing but drive them back.  Others will tell you
that the Blind is wholly the creation of man, that it is as artificial
as a glass eye and as monstrous as a cage riven with inward- pointing
spikes.

"One thing is certain, though: The Hearth of Ten sealed the Blind.

The ten greatest bloodlines of sorcerer-warriors came together and
worked upon the sealing for ten generations.  Spells and dark sorceries,
heavy with kin-blood, thick with time's passage, shared sacrifices and
loss, were woven over the course of three hundred years.  The Hearth of
Ten created new sorceries as they worked, inventing new methods of
seeing, new ways of combining their powers, and massing them over time.

"By such methods they built a wall around the Blind, such a wall as had
never been seen or imagined, one that could never again be duplicated,
whose secrets died with the generations of sorcererA CAVERN OF BLACK ICE
f 473 warriors who had created it, their blood, bones, ashes, and souls
ground into the substance of the wall, " And so the Blind was sealed and
remains sealed, and those beings that feed on men abide there,
remembering, waiting, living quarter-lives in an absence of light.  The
Blind is their prison and may one day be their tomb, and no man, woman,
or sorcerer may go there.  No one except a Reach.  "

At some point while he spoke, Heritas Cant had stopped beinga crippled
man with stunted, misshapen legs and a listing spine and become a
powerful sorcerer instead.  Now, finished, he set his green eyes upon
Ash and watched to see what she would do.  He shrank as he waited.  The
distance between his shoulder blades contracted, his chest sagged, and
the skin on his hands settled, revealing white ridges of bone.

He is two people, Raif thought, one broken and twisted like his body,
and one powerful and in pain and not often shown.

No one spoke.  Ash sat and suffered Heritas Cant's gaze as if it were a
necessary torture.  Since she had been wakened an hour earlier she had
said little and seemed glad to sit and listen.  Now all eyes were upon
her as she readied herself to speak.

Raif kept his face still, as he had done all through Cant's speech.

He would not show his fear to this man .  or Ash.  Especially not Ash.

Finally she moved, rocking forward on the bench so that her face caught
the light.  Angus' hand came up to touch her wrist, but she shook it
away as if it were a moth or a bit of dust.  Gray eyes met and held
Cant's gaze, and then she spoke a command.

"Tell me what I am."

Heritas' good hand came up to support his drooping jaw.  A thin line of
drool slid along his chin.

"To know what a Reach is you must understand where the Blind lies in
relation to our world.  The two exist alongside each other and within
each other, yet remain wholly separate places.  They are divided by a
gray plain, a no-man's-land known as the borderlands or the Gray
Marches."

"The Gray Marches," Ash repeated, showing her teeth.

"Yes.  March is an old word meaning the boundary between lands." Heritas
Cant's smile was knowing.  Angus had not told him who Ash was, yet it
was obvious he had already worked it out.  With a little click of his
sticks, he carried on.

"These borderlands hold the Blind apart from our world.  Powerful
sorcerers can enter them, some may even catch a glimpse of the
Blindwall, but no one but a Reach can know them truly.  And no one but a
Reach can lay her hands upon the wall and breach it."

Ash flinched at the word breach.  Angus muttered something to whatever
gods he believed in.  Raif concentrated on the mud walls behind Heritas
Cant's back, watching them ooze and drip and deteriorate as he imagined
putting his fist into Cant's face.  The cripple was taking pleasure in
this.  His green eyes glinted as he took another breath and spoke.

"A Reach is born every thousand years, a man or woman who can enter the
dead space of the borderlands, approach the Blind- wall, and free the
creatures who lie beyond it."

When he was sure the anger had left his eyes, Raif turned to look at
Ash. Almost she didn't shake.  Her hands were clenched on the table
before her, the tendons on her wrists pulsing.  Slowly her gaze rose to
meet his.  A question filled her large gray eyes, and even before he
fully understood what it was she asked, Raif answered with a swift jab
of his jaw.

Acknowledging his reply with a smile not quite cool enough to hide her
relief, she turned back to Heritas Cant and said,

"So you think me a Reach?"

"Yes."

"And you think I was born to free the creatures in the Blind?"

"Yes."

"And if I tell you that for the past six months I have dreamed of
creatures calling me, begging me to reach out and help them, then you
will tell me I have been listening to the creatures of the Blind?"

"Yes."

A muscle at the corner of Ash's lips began to quiver.  She worked
quickly to stop it, white teeth jabbingat lip flesh

"Answer me this, then, Heritas Cant.  If I am not the first Reach to be
born, why is the Blindwall still intact?"

Angus and Heritas Cant exchanged a glance.  Heritas shifted in his
chair, his good hand dealingawkwardly with his legs.  When he spoke his
voice was peevish.

"The wall is still in place for several reasons.  First of all, breaks
can be sealed if swift action is taken and certain conditions are met.
Second, not all Reaches have lived to an age where they could cause a
breach.  And third, a place exists where a Reach can discharge the power
that builds within her without threatening the integrity of the wall."

Raif frowned.  Compared with Cant's other answers, this one was short
and evasive.  Raif thought of asking why it was that some Reaches didn't
live long enough to cause a breach, then decided against it.

All possible answers worried him.

Ash did not reply straightaway.  Her fingers traced along the table's
edge, fingernails collecting wax.  Finally she said,

"Do I have no choice but to discharge this.  .  .  power that is
building inside of me?"

Heritas Cant nodded.

"You are the Reach and you have newly come into womanhood and by all
rights you should have caused the breach by now.

Great power masses within you; I felt it when I laid my hands upon your
skin. It pushes with cold force, displacing organs, feeding upon your
blood, forcing the air from your lungs.  It must be released or it will
destroy you. "

"But she has fought it so far," Angus cried.

"Yes, and look what it has done to her.  She is being eaten from inside.
Her body is skin and bone, her skin is yellowing with jaundice, her
breathing is shallow.  And you cannot see what I have felt: the
punctured kidney, the compressed chest organs, the poisons cumulating in
her liver, the rapid beat of her heart.  Soon her mouth will run dry,
her gums will turn gray and crack, her eyes will sink into their
sockets, her hair and fingernails will" -- "Enough!"  Raif stood.  In
his anger, he sent his chair crackingagainst the wall.  Angus and Ash
turned to look at him.  Heritas Cant regarded him with interest, as if
he were seeing some new species of insect for the very first time.  Raif
sent a look to wipe all fascination from his face.

"Tell us what we must do."

Again, a certain unspoken communication passed between Angus and Cant.
Raif hardly cared.  W;7/ you help me in this?  Ash had asked him across
the room moments earlier.  Yes, he had replied in an instant.

Crossing the room, Raif was aware of the size and health of his own body
compared with the wheel-broken shell that was Heritas Cant.  He saw envy
and even the cold sparkle of fear in the man's green eyes, and he could
not say he was sorry for it.  Drawing himself up to his full height, he
sent a hand down for his sword.

Heritas Cant shrank back.

"Raif," Angus warned.

"Stay out of this, Angus," Raif said without lookingaround.

"If I were to harm anyone over this matter, it would be you.  You knew
it all from the start, from that very first moment outside Vaingate.

That's why you saved her: to bring her here to Cant.  "

"No."  Angus rose.  Raif heard the soft scrape of chair legs, saw Angus'
growing shadow on the wall.

"I moved to save Ash for other reasons.  I" -- "I know what you mean to
say, Angus.  You have your reasons yet cannot speak them."  Raif turned
to face his uncle.

"Don't think that just because you switch a subject or avoid it
completely you can stop me from thinking on it.  You are my uncle and my
respect is your due, but I will not stand by and let you deliver Ash
into this man's hands."

Only as he spoke did he realize the truth of what he said: Heritas Cant
did want Ash.  With all his broken bones and mis- jointed limbs he
suddenly looked like a spider to Raif.

Angus shook his head softly, though his eyes were hard gold.  "No one
wants Ash harmed here.  No one.  Heritas has told us of the dangers, and
he does not lie.  Now we must find a way to save her.  You heard what he
said--she will die if we do not act."

Raif waved his uncle's words away.  He believed Heritas Cant had spoken
the truth--some of it--but he also believed that Cant was more concerned
about a possible breach to the Blindwall than he was about Ash.  Turning
to Cant, he said,

"What is the name of this place where she must go to release her power
safely?  I will take her there."

"There is not much time," Heritas Cant said, anger at being forced to
cower in his chair making his voice shrill.

"You have seen her blackouts for yourself.  These will only get worse.
Her health will only get worse.  As I said earlier, I can set war dings
to keep the voices at bay, give drugs to steel her mind, but these
measures will prove effective for only so long.  This place lies several
weeks to the north.  It is not an easy journey at any time of year, but
now, in winter . .  ."  Cant clicked his sticks.

"Gods spare us all."

"Just tell us where it is."  Ash sounded tired.  Raif saw where she had
scratched the varnish from the table with her nails.

"I'm not sure of the exact location of the Cavern of Black Ice .  .  ."

"Black ice?"  Ash said, paling visibly.

"Yes.  The cavern lies beyond the Storm Margin in the west.  I've heard
tell that it sits beneath Mount Flood, in the crease where the mountain
and the Hollow River meet, ten days south of Ice Trapper territory."

"What is it?"  Angus asked Ash, ignoring what Cant was saying
completely.

Ash lowered her head.

"I've had nightmares about a cavern for as long as I can remember.
Terrible dreams, where I'm trapped or crushed or lost."

"And were the walls of this cavern formed from black ice?"  Cant's green
eyes glowed with interest.  Ash nodded, and he made a little satisfied
sound.

"Then your dreams have been showing you how to survive.  This cavern is
as old as the Blind, and may indeed be made from the same substance.  I
cannot be sure.  What I do know is that it had been used by Reaches
before you.  It is said to absorb a Reach's power, hold it within its
walls, and stop it from causinga crack in the Blindwall."

Ash didn't look convinced.  She glanced at Raif, but he could offer her
no help.

"But the nightmares .  .  ."

Cant made a calming gesture with his hand.  When he spoke his voice was
surprisingly soft.

"The creatures in the Blind can infiltrate your dreams; that is how they
call to you.  Every time you fall asleep you are vulnerable to them. Now
that they sense you are close to releasing your power, they have grown
bolder and have laid siege to your waking mind as well.  Their weapon is
fear.  You have fought them so far, bravely, with such strength as I can
hardly imagine."  With a small shrug of his shoulders, Cant highlighted
his own physical weakness.

"Do not let them stop you from doing what you must."

Raif leaned against the table.  Suddenly he didn't know what to make of
Heritas Cant.  Nothing was straightforward here.  Secrets and traps lay
behind every word.  There was truth, but it was not the whole truth, and
he wondered how much Cant was keeping to himself.

Smoke from the lantern rose and shivered like a fifth presence in the
room. Raif watched as Ash breathed it in as she spoke.

"If I go to this cavern, will it be the end of this... this thing that
I'm part of?"

Cant sighed heavily, the nostrils on his still fine nose flaring to two
dark holes.

"Yes and no.  The power that is building inside you has only one
purpose, and once it is safely discharged you will never know its like
again.  Yet you will still be a Reach; that will not change.  You will
be able to walk the borderlands at will, hear and sense the creatures
that live there, and your flesh will become rahkardan.  Reach-flesh,
which is held sacred by the Sull. Why, I do not know.  Why Reaches
exist, I cannot tell you.  Perhaps the sorcery that originally sealed
the Blind was flawed.  Perhaps it is impossible to build a prison
without a key."  Cant smiled briefly.

"Perhaps one day when you ask me that same question I may have an answer
that suits us both.  One thing I am sure of, though, is that if the
Endlords and their Taken are freed from the Blind they will destroy us
all.

They walk in death, they are sustained by hate, and their memories last
as long as the sun.

"Yes, Asarhia March.  You do well to look afraid.  I, who have spent a
lifetime learningabout these matters, am more afraid than you can see.
I know the names of the beasts.  I know what is in there, some of it,
and even that small portion of knowledge burns like the fires of hell in
my mind.  So travel north along the Storm Margin with this young man who
has broken one of my chairs and does not trust me, go and wade through
waist-high snow, crawl over black ice, and release your power safely.
And when you've done, come back to me, and then perhaps I'll tell you
about the creatures of the Blind, recite a list of their names and their
deeds.  For if I told you now, I would only be unburdening myself at
your expense.  And although I am a sick man, with little but knowledge
and counting to live for, I seldom act out of spite.  "

Green eyes made brilliant by speech and strong emotions glanced briefly,
accusingly, at Raif.

"Tis better that J know much and you know little.  Let me worry and you
act."

Raif felt blood pumping up through his neck to his face.  He didn't know
if Cant's words were meant for him or Ash.  Either way he felt
frightened and stirred.  He wanted to be gone, now, away from Cant and
the spinning silk of his knowledge, away from Angus and his hidden
motives, back to the wide-open spaces of the clan holds He was boxed in
by secrets.  Gettingat the truth seemed an impossible task; Cant was too
clever, and Angus was too well practiced.  Together they were bent on
controlling Ash and probably him as well.

The door to the chamber looked inviting; one push and it would open, one
short walk through the adjoining tunnel and he would be outside in the
night. Punish Moose, and he'd be in the clan holds in less than a day.
Blackhail would never have him back, but Dhoone might take him, or one
of the lesser clans like Bannen or Orrl.  Outcasts could find homes in
other clans; Gat Murdock had been taken in by Ewan Blackhail after he'd
fought with Wort Croser over a woman and her dowry of two poorly drained
fields.  Raif tried to think of others but failed.  He looked from the
door to Ash, and as soon as their eyes met he knew he would go nowhere,
not tonight.  She had asked him to stand by her, and he had agreed.  And
as a clansman he was bound by his word.

A small sound, like half a breath, escaped his lips.  Who was he to take
refuge in a promise?  He, who had broken faith with his brother and his
clan? Raif closed his eyes for a moment, willed the pain not to come.

"I know the Storm Margin as well as any man," Angus said, breaking the
silence that had possessed the chamber since Cant had finished speaking.
Uncharacteristically, he seemed ill at ease and could find nothing to
occupy his large hands.

"Let me take you

and Raifas far as Mount Flood.  You'll need someone to show you the ways
of the ice.  The Margin is beset by white winds in winter.  It's easy to
become lost or fall victim to cold sickness or the 'bite.  I can teach
you how to wait out storms, show you how to find food beneath the rime,
and make shelter by burrowing into old snow.  Packs of ice wolves range
the Margin, and in dark seasons they become desperate enough to attack
men.  I know their signs and their trails and how best to avoid them.
I'll see that you get to Mount Flood alive and unharmed and in good
time.  "

Finished, Angus looked from Ash to Raif.  It was the closest thing to a
plea Raif had ever seen his uncle make.  Raif knew Angus possessed
skills that he did not, yet every clansman worth his lore learned early
about hard living in the white weather.  Wolves and ice storms were part
of clan life.  Raif sucked in breath.  Why, then, was it so important to
Angus to come with them?

Ash looked first to Raif, then to Angus.

"How soon do we leave?"

It was all planningafter that.

Heritas Cant left them as they spoke of supplies and routes and
clothingand horses.  Rising gracelessly from his black wood chair, he
muttered something about things that needed to be prepared.  Watching
him support his broken body with the aid of two sticks, Raif found
himself admiring the strength of will that lay like an iron plate
beneath Cant's skin.  He did not trust him, yet he respected him, and it
occurred to Raif that perhaps in the city holds that was the most he
could expect from another man.

With Cant gone, Angus took control of matters and began to plan a route
that would involve only minimal time spent in the clan holds

Raif recognized his uncle's consideration and was grateful for it, and
as the night wore on and he learned more about the Storm Margin and the
bleak wind-carved wastes that surrounded Mount Flood, he gave thanks to
the Stone Gods that Angus would be with them.

Later, much later, when the goose-fat lantern had all but dried and the
flames chewed away at the last bit of rope, Cant returned to the chamber
bearing two copper bowls and a knife of gray steel.  Angus, who had been
in the process of warning Ash about cold sickness, stopped speaking in
mid-sentence and rose to help Cant.

Angus' great red face was showing signs of strain, and his ready smile
was missingas he greeted the broken man.

It had been a long day for all of them.  Ash and Raif watched each other
across the table as Angus and Cant arranged things at the other end of
the room.  Raif suddenly wished they were alone.  There were things he
wanted to say to her, small things that no one else had asked or said.
He wanted to know if she felt strong enough for the journey north, if
she was afraid, how much she believed of what Heritas Cant had said.

Ash smiled gently, rubbing eyes that were nearly red.

"You wouldn't let anyone near me earlier."

Raif felt heat come to his cheeks.

"I didn't want you to fall asleep again," he said.  Even to his own
ears, his voice sounded gruff.

"I'm glad you're coming with me."

With those words the night changed one last time.  Cant came forward,
bearing the first of the copper bowls.  His eyes glittered like two
pieces ofseaglass as he said to Ash,

"Lie down on the bench.  I must place what war dings as I can upon you."

Ash's eyes flicked to Raif.  Her mouth made a small grimace of fear.

"I will not harm you," Cant said.

"The cost is only to myself."

"But.  .  ."

"But what?  Would you rather I did nothing and allow the creatures of
the Blind free rein to take you?  Your mind was last held by them for
four days; would you wish to let them seize it again?"

Ash shook her head.

"Lie down then, and let me do what I must."

After a moment's hesitation, Ash brought her feet off the floor and
lowered her back onto the bench.  She was shaking, Raif noticed.  So was
Cant.

"Angus.  If this young man is to stay and watch, you must take him in
hand. I will not have him throwing his fine clansman's body around,
ragingabout things he does not understand."

"Aye, Heritas."  Angus beckoned Raif to his side.

"The lad will stay by me, I'll see to that."

Raif did not like being spoken of as if he were a child, and he
suspected Heritas Cant had done so to punish him one last time for
breaking the chair.  Still, he crossed to where Angus stood at the head
of the table and settled himself in place against the edge.

Cant's spine had too many vertebrae.  As he bent to loosen the ties at
Ash's throat, they poked through the thin fabric of his robe like fish
bones Who broke him?  Raif wondered.  What crime bears the sentence of
the wheel?

"Place this upon your tongue."  Cant held out a dried leaf for Ash to
take.

"Bite through it when I say so."  Ash did as she was told.  Raif was
watching her so intently, he didn't see Cant draw the knife.

"Easy, lad," Angus said under his breath, reacting to the tension that
shot through Raifs body like lightning.

Easing back to reassure Angus, Raif watched as Cant drew the knife to
his wrist.  The blade rested there, above a vein as thin and
insubstantial as a curl of smoke, while Cant's lips spoke words that
Raif could not hear.

The room dimmed.  Air became thicker, colder, harder to expel from the
lungs. The stench of copper and blood rose in the room like mist rising
from a field at battle's end.  Raifs mouth watered.  Sickened, he
swallowed hard.

Asli's face shone with sweat.  Her eyes were closed and her mouth was
open, and the skin Cant had bared at her throat flushed pink.  Cant
stood above her, joined to her by the substance pouring from his mouth.
Raif saw it as thick shadow, a mixture of words and air and something
else he had no name for.  Light ran along the knife blade as Cant sliced
into his skin.

Blood welled in a perfectly straight line, so bright and hearty it was
shocking to see it pump from such pale, misshapen flesh.

Following the line of the blade, it dripped into the hammered copper
bowl, pattering like a child's footsteps on tile.

"Bite the leaf," Cant said.

Ash's mouth closed.  Her jaw worked once and then was still.  Cant
dropped the knife and placed his good hand on the tissue of Ash's
throat.  The air in the room shifted, as if moved by an opening door.

Raif felt the raven lore grow hot against his skin.  Cant's

presence became somehow less than it was, waveringas if seen through the
heat from a fire.  Pulse racing.  Rail became acutely aware of the
danger.  Ash was a Reach; it meant old skills and old knowledge and
power beyond anything he knew.  If she fought against Cant, she could
kill him.

Raif glanced at Angus and saw the same knowledge reflected in his
uncle's eyes.

Ash and Cant were as one now, joined as surely as two stags with antlers
racked.  Raif shivered as the image came to him.  Three summers ago he
and Drey had come across a pair of elk carcasses at the foot of the
balds: bodies head to head, torsos picked clean, antlers locked together
so surely that neither animal had been able to free itself from the
other's hold.  They had died that way, struggling to pull apart over
countless days and nights.  Rut deaths, Tern had called them.  He said
it only happened when two beasts of equal strength were matched.

Blood smoke rose between Ash and Cant as the contents of the copper bowl
began steaming.  Cant's face was gray with strain.  His mouth worked
furiously, speakinga clotted mix of words and sorcery.

Unable to watch any longer, Raif turned away.  His eyes settled on the
shadows cast on the wall, and after a while he couldn't even look at
them. Sorcery had never seemed so wrong and unnatural, and for the
second time that night he found himself staring longingly at the door.

The clan holds lay one day's ride to the north, yet they might as well
have stood in the frozen heart of the Want.  Raif had never felt farther
from all that he knew as he did waiting for Heritas Cant to be done.

CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE.

Shankshounds

E,

the's lore pushed her awake.  She'd been having such a strange dream
about Raif, about how he was trapped underground with no way out, when
her rock lore pressed so hard against her chest, it hurt.  Effie opened
her eyes immediately.  The quality of darkness in her cell told her it
was still properly and completely night.  Frowning, she reached beneath
the neckline of her wool nightdress and took her lore in hand.

Push.

Quick as if she'd picked up a hot coal from the fire, Effie let the
stone drop.

She had to go, leave her cell right now.

The idea didn't come to her in words; it wasn't really an idea at all.
It was just something she knew, like the time of day or whether the air
she breathed was cold or warm or damp.

Sitting up, she swung her feet onto the floor.  Boots or slippers?

Boots are warmer, said a little voice.  Slippers are quieter, said
another. Effie poked her feet into the darkness until her toes brushed
against the shaggy softness of her squirrel fur slippers.

That done, she pulled the rug from her bed and wrapped it around her
shoulders.  She didn't have time for a shawl.

Her legs didn't help much as she stood.  They felt like rain- soaked
twigs that had nothing to do with the rest other body and no" intention
of carrying her weight.  Effie felt her bottom lip start to tremble as
she shuffled to the nearest wall.

Push.

"Stop," she whispered, glad of the chance to give her treacherous bottom
lip something to do.

"I know."

Thinking about what Inigar Stoop would likely say to her if he knew that
she spoke to her lore made Effie feel better.  Rufus Pole had been the
laughingstock of the roundhouse last summer just for speaking to his
sheep. Effie had seen Rufus' sheep--they were clean and healthy and fat
as rain clouds--and she'd very nearly giggled out loud when he'd said
he'd rather speak to them than a good quarter of the people in the clan.

Sheep thoughts helped, and Effie felt her legs harden beneath her, ready
for flight.  Clutching the bed rug around her throat, she moved toward
the door.

It was closed, of course--open doors were the next worst thing to open
spaces--but both Raina and Drey had warned her about bolting herself in.
Fingers sliding over the bolt, Erne considered drawing it and simply
hiding from whatever danger was on its way.  She knew straightaway that
was foolish, though.  Doors could be easily broken.

Takinga shallow breath, she pushed against the wood and stepped into the
new darkness waiting on the other side.

The roundhouse at night was icy cold, peopled by strange drafts and
grinding noises.  Effie knew it well.  The noises came from stone blocks
in the walls movingagainst each other as the timbers separating them
cooled and the drafts blew from secret rotting holes in the
peat-and-gray stone roof.  Longhead said swallows nested there in
spring, and Effie thought about that for a bit as she walked along the
tunnel leading from her cell.  She was just wondering what swallows
found to eat up there when she heard footsteps pounding on the stone
steps directly ahead.  A halo of light descended from above.

Someone, a man, coughed with a hard hacking sound that produced
something worthy of spitting.  Effie, still standing in the darkness
close to the wall, felt for the nearest door.

Her hand found the splintery roughness of wood as the man's booted feet
came into view.  Thankingall the Stone Gods--even Behathmus, who always
gave her a chill and few except hammer- men ever named--she pushed open
the door and stepped into someone else's cell.  Doors were never locked
in the roundhouse, and Effie found herself glad of that fact for the
first time in her eight-year life.

More darkness occupied the cell--so much, in fact, that she couldn't
even see the hand she used to close the door.  A series of soft snoring
sounds rose from somewhere close by.  People sleeping.  At one time
Effie would have known the names and faces of everyone who occupied the
cells close to her own, but now she couldn't be sure who slept where.
The roundhouse was swollen with tied clansmen and their families, all
come to seek protection from the Dog Lord.  Most slept wherever they
could.  Some had caused fights. Just last week Anwyn Bird had beaten a
tied clan wife with a wooden spoon for daring to spend the night in her
kitchen.  By all accounts the woman had gotten off lightly, and the
bruises were said to be nothing that a few weeks of bed rest couldn't
cure.

Sniffing slightly, Effie peered through the shadows in the room.

After a few moments her eyes began to pick out shapes: a box pallet with
several hunched forms lying upon it, a blood wood stang propping up the
ceiling, and a line of fat grain sacks hanging from the rafters to keep
their contents dry.  Effie listened to the sound of breathingand snoring
rising from the pallet, assuring herself that those who lay there were
fast asleep. Then, just as she felt safe enough to think about what to
do next, a sliver of light shone under the door.  The man on the stairs
was walking this way!

Effie stilled herself.  Footsteps tapped close .  the light brightened .
and then receded as the man on the stairs walked past the door.

Suddenly realizing she had been holding her breath, Effie exhaled in a
great gasp of relief.  As she did so, she heard the familiar whine of
hinges so badly rusted by damp that no amount of calf oil could silence
them.  Her cell door.  Effie breathed in, snatching back her relief. Her
lore beat against her chest like a second, smaller, heart.

Pressing her forehead against the door, she listened for more sounds
from the man on the stairs.  Nothing.  What was he doing in there?

Effie imagined his boots; the leather was greenish, moldy, the toes
ringed with watermarks, and the soles caked with muddy

bits of hay.  Not a full clansman's boots.  Effie shook her head.  Not
even a year man

The whining noise came again, pushingall boot thoughts from her mind.
Effie tensed.  Suddenly she couldn't breathe.  Her throat felt as if
someone had their hands around it.

Footsteps again.  Slap, slap, slap.  They were so close, Effie could
feel their vibration on the part of her head that was touching the door.
They slowed.  Stopped.  Effie imagined monsters.  She knew what the
man's boots looked like, but what about his face, his teeth?  Tiny, hard
contractions punched at her belly.  Should she wake the other people in
the cell?  Might they be monsters, too?

Then, abruptly, the footsteps started up once more, receding with a
slowness that was another torture in itself.  Effie waited.  Even after
the footsteps had long faded and night sounds took over again, she
waited, forehead pushed against the blood wood door, body held so still
that dust settled upon her back.

The soft crunch of a body rolling over dried grass broke the waiting
spell. Effie lifted her head from the door and glanced over her
shoulder.  A tiny crack high in the rootlet in a trickle of dawn light.

The box pallet was clearly visible now.  Three bodies vied for space
upon its grass-filled mattress: a thin crofter with a silver}' beard, a
woman with dark hair and a pale back, and a young dark-haired child.  It
took Effie a moment to realize that the child was awake.

His eyes were wide open, and he was looking at her in the interested way
children looked at things that might, or might not, be dangerous.

Pressinga finger to her lips, Effie warned him not to cry out.  He was
small and skinny and a good deal younger than she, and even though Effie
wouldn't normally deign to notice such a boy, she knew they were made of
the same child substance.  The boy knew it, too, and acknowledged her
sign with a similar one of his own.  Effie was careful not to let her
relief show.  They might both be children, but she was the elder, and
even after favors were granted she had a certain superiority to
maintain.

They held their places for a good long time, watching each other in the
growing light, neither friendly nor unfriendly, waiting.  When the
child's mother stirred, sending out a hand to feel for her son, Effie
knew it was time to go.  Part of her didn't much like the idea of
venturing outside, but the sensible, thinking part knew that dawn was
properly here now and no one would dare harm her in the good light of
day.

Raising her hand, she thanked the boy with a seriousness befitting his
deed, then let herself out the door.

The corridor was no longer dark.  Sounds of clattering metal pots,
thudding footsteps, and sharply spoken orders filtered down from the
floors above. Anwyn was in her kitchen, stoking the fires and warming
last night's broth and bannock.  Effie glanced toward her cell.

Push.

No, better not go back there yet.

Massaging the part of her forehead that she had ground into the wood of
the cell door, Effie thought about what to do.  Drey would be in the
Great Hearth, sleeping close around the fire like all the other year men
He was becoming important these days.  Rory Cleet, the Shank brothers,
Bullhammer, Craw Bannering: All the year- men looked to him to lead
raids, settle disputes, and talk with Mace Blackhail on their behalf. He
was often away from the roundhouse: riding the borders, scoutingas far
as Gnash, carrying messages between Blackhail and exiled Dhoone.  Last
week he had ridden with Mace Blackhail and a host of two hundred full
clansmen to defend Bannen against the Dog Lord's forces.

Drey said the Dog Lord was working to take over all the Dhoone-sworn
clans and fortify his position in the Dhoonehold.  Already he'd taken
over Clan Withy, whose funny little roundhouse with its mine shafts and
mole holes lay two days south of Dhoone.  Even with the combined forces
of Dhoone, Blackhail, and Bannen working to defend the Banhold, the
battle had not gone easy.  Drey said the Bluddsmen had fought like men
possessed, and the Dog Lord himself had ridden at the head of their
line.

"You should have seen him, Effie," Drey had confided upon his return.

"He rode an ugly black horse and carried the plainest of weapons, yet no
clansman who matched hammers with him lived

to tell of it.  " After that Drey had shivered in a funny way, and Effie
had asked him what was wrong.

"He was screamingat us, Effie.

Screaming for Blackhail blood.  "

That had made Effie shiver, too.  According to Drey, the battle lasted
well into the night, and even though Bludd was out manned they managed
to break through the Dhoone lines and take more lives than they gave.

Drey had been injured in the Bludd retreat.  Mace Blackhail had sent him
and two dozen other ham mermen after the Dog Lord and his sons.

Ten of the ham mermen had died.  Drey had been unseated by a blow from a
spiked and lead-weighted Bluddhammer.  The spikes had pierced his plate
in two places, and he'd taken a bad landing upon stony ground.

Effie sucked in her cheeks.  Raina said that once the swellingand
bruising had gone down it wouldn't be that bad.  He'd only broken two
ribs.

With a small shake of her head, Effie made the decision not to go and
seek out Drey.  She knew he would see her no matter how busy he
was--hers was the first face he looked for whenever he returned home
from a raid and the last name he spoke in his words to the Stone Gods
each night--yet she didn't want to be a burden to him.  He had too many
worries already.

Raifs leaving still hurt him.  He never spoke of it, and Effie had seen
him stiffen in anger when anyone in his presence dared to mention Raifs
name. Yet these days it was hard not to hear talk of Raif Sevrance
around the Great Hearth at night.  All the clan holds were in uproar
about what happened at Duff's Stovehouse.  Three Bluddsmen had died by
Raifs hand.  Three.  Effie shivered.  It was unthinkable.  Watcher of
the Dead, they called him now.

Effie climbed the steps to the entrance chamber.  She wished Raif were
here now.  She couldn't tell Drey about the man on the stairs; he'd go
straight to Mace Blackhail, and this time they might actually fight.

Effie shook her head.  That couldn't happen.  Mace was a bad man.  Drey
was stronger and a better fighter, but somehow Effie knew that wasn't
enough. Mace hurt people in different ways.

He had hurt Raina, changed her.  He might send Drey from the clan, or
worse.

By the time she had walked through the entrance chamber and past the
kitchen, her mind was set.  She told herself that she didn't really know
whether or not Mace Blackhail had any connection with the man on the
stairs, couldn't even be sure if the man had meant her harm.

Fearinga push from her rock lore, Effie knocked it impatiently with her
fist. Suddenly she very much wanted to go to a place where she knew
she'd be safe.

Reaching up on her tiptoes, she worked the latch on the side door that
led out onto the court.  Cold air blasted her face as the door opened.
Snow was swirling in heavy gray flakes, and the wind was hard and from
the north. Another storm, Effie thought as she stepped outside.  The
third one in as many days.

The big stable door had been shut and barred against the wind, and she
concentrated on its shape and there ness as she made her way across the
court.  The open space of the graze, the distant rise of the Wedge, and
the far line of the horizon were blurred by the storm, yet Effie knew
better than to look at them even now.  Just the fact of their presence
made her heart race.  Not far to the little dog cote, she told herself.
Not far now.

Jebb Onnacre, one of the Shanks by marriage and caretaker of all their
horses and dogs, passed within a few paces of Effie on his way back from
the stables.  Seeing her, he smiled and raised his hand in greeting.
Effie liked Jebb; he was quiet and good with animals and never said
anything to anyone whenever he found her in the dog cote.

Normally she always waved back, yet today she put her head down and
ignored him.  His boots were caked in mud, she noticed.  He might have
sat and taken breakfast with the man on the stairs.

Disturbed by that thought, she broke into a run, heading north along the
stable wall and into roughs beyond.  By the time she arrived at the dog
cotes her squirrel slippers were stiff with ice.  Clutching the bed rug
close about her chest, she picked her way around the largest of the two
cotes and made for the small stone structure that lay behind them, its
round walls sunk deep into the

snow like a miniature version of the roundhouse.  The little dog cote.

Effie's chest tightened to see it.

Dog smells and dog noises defied the bluster of the storm.  Already one
of the shanks hounds had gotten wind of her scent and was howling like a
mad thing through the roof.  Effie grinned.  That was Darknose, by the
sound of it; he was always howlingabout something.  Crouching down by
the little dog-size door, she worked the latch and then jiggled the
hinges as necessary. By the time she had forced the door open, a wall of
dogs was waiting for her on the other side.

Effie's heart filled with joy.

"Stop that!  Easy now.  No chewing on my slippers.  Give me that rug
back! Bad dogs.  Bad dogs."  The dogs accompanied her into their warm,
dark lair, tails wagging, tongues licking, amber eyes bright with
interest and affection.

Most people in the clan held that the shanks hounds were the nastiest,
evil est most foul-tempered beasts that had ever fetched a stick on the
Hailhold. Hell-bred, Anwyn called them.  Bears with tails, said someone
else.  Of course, since one of them had found the crofter's baby buried
alive in the snow, a sort of legend had grown up around them.  Due
respect was given .  . .  but always from a safe distance.

Anwyn had taken to sending Mog Wiley out to the cotes with kitchen
scraps, and Jenna Walker, who now acted as foster mother to the rescued
child, would not hear a bad word said against them.  Orwin Shank, who
everyone held was the wealthiest man in the clan, had even sent one of
his best breeding ewes in payment to Faille Trotter for making up a song
about them.  Effie had heard the song.  It wasn't very good, containing
in her opinion far too many words that rhymed with dog, but even she had
to admit it was a jaunty tune.

With Effie the shanks hounds were as soft and playful as kittens.

Sometimes they didn't realize their own strength, and once or twice she
had returned to the roundhouse with nips and bruises from where they had
scrambled and jumped all over her in their eagerness to greet her.  That
never bothered Effie much.  The bruises hardly ever hurt at all.

Perhaps sensing some vestige of her earlier fear, the dogs were
especially gentle with her as she settled herself back against the
closed door.  Darknose probed her face with his handsome wet nose,
sniffingand concerned.  Lady Bee came and sat close, pushing her warm
body against Etfie's, giving her heat to the scrawny little thing that
had come in from the cold.  Effie stroked her fine black-and-orange
neck.  She had long ago worked out that Lady Bee thought she was one of
her pups.  Old Scratch simply laid his great old head on her lap and
promptly fell asleep.  Cally and Teeth worried at her slippers, making
small breathy noises as they nipped around her toes.  Cat came and sat
at a dignified distance from everyone, waiting for a sign from Effie
before she deigned to come close.

Sitting on the hard-packed earth of the cote with all the shanks hounds
around her, Effie finally felt safe.  Her lore was quiet now, sleeping.
The thought of the man on the stairs no longer frightened her, and she
began to wonder if she'd made too much of a fuss over nothing.  Already
she felt bad about ignoring Jebb Onnacre on the court.

Darknose watched her with his clever dog's eyes as the other shanks
hounds settled down in readiness to sleep, each one determined to use
some part of her body as a pillow.  Effie loved the feeling of their
heavy heads and paws on her skin.  Even aloof and dignified Cat came to
her in the end, tempted by a hand stretched her way and the soft click
ofEffie's tongue.

Effie loved the shanks hounds They were good dogs.  They smelled a bit,
but Jebb Onnacre had once told her that she probably smelled just as bad
to them as they did to her.

Snuggling down beneath her blanket of dogs, Effie began to drift off to
sleep.  She was ever so glad she hadn't gone running to Drey.  The
shanks hounds would protect her.

Dreams of dogs followed her to sleep.

Gmrrr.

Effie's sleeping brain first responded to the sound of a dog growling by
making it part of her dream.  Yet the growling went on and on, and soon
other dogs joined in and the noise became too loud to ignore.

Effie blinked awake.  Strips of light from the dirt hole at the back of
the cote took a moment to get used to.  Even before she could fully see,
she became aware of six dogs standing in a half-circle around her,
hackles raised, heads lowered, tails flat against their docks.

There was a moment where all she could really see was yellow fangs and
burning eyes, when she suddenly understood all the bad things people had
ever said about the shanks hounds They could kill a man and not regret
it.

Then, even as she raised a hand to calm them, she heard voices from
outside. Two of them.  A man and woman, shouting to be heard above the
storm.

"She's witched, that girl.  Witched.  Cutty swore she disappeared right
afore his eyes.  Reckons she knew he was after her the moment he
darkened the roundhouse door.  It's that lore of hers.  If you ask me .

.  "

Effie strained to hear more above the howling of the wind and the
snarling of the dogs.  Pushing her palms through the air, she worked to
silence the dogs without speaking.  She had recognized the speaker
instantly.  That deep mannish voice belonged to the luntwoman Nellie
Moss.  Cutty Moss was her son. He was about Drey's age yet had never
made year man Last summer he had been caught stealing chickens from
Merritt Ganlow's coop, and the winter before that there had been some
incident involving the Tanna girls that Effie had only vague ideas
about.  She hardly knew Cutty Moss at all and was quite sure he didn't
live in the roundhouse most of the year.  The only thing Effie could
remember vividly about him was that one of his eyes was hazel and the
other one was blue.

"Hush, woman}" cried a hard male voice, cutting the last of Nellie Moss'
words clean away.

"I'll listen to no more of your superstitious chaffing.  The Sevrance
girl is no more witched than you or I.  If she did slip away, then it
was likely because she heard that worthless son of yours coming."

All the dog-given heat left Effie s face.  The second speaker was Mace
Blackhail, she was sure of it.  His voice penetrated the stone walls of
the dog cote like icy drops of rain.

"Cutty's no fool," snapped Nellie Moss.

"He did as he was told."

"Then he'll have to do it again, for I won't have that little bitch
sneakingaround the roundhouse, telling tales and watching me with her
father's dead eyes."

Hounds from the larger cotes yipped and howled as Mace spoke, yet all he
had to do to silence them was whip a piece of leather through the air.
The soft jingle of metal followed, and Effie guessed that Mace had
brought leashes to the cotes meaning to save his best dogs from the
storm.

"Making ye feel guilty, is she?"  Nellie Moss sounded pleased.

"Just do as we arranged."

"" Twould be easier for everyone if she could be caught outside by a
cowl man arrow .  .  like Shor Gormalin.  "

A quick series of sounds followed.  Boots thudded snow, fabric rustled,
and then Nellie Moss issued a low throaty wail.

"You'll not speak of Shor Gormalin again, woman.  Is that clear?"  A
moment passed where all Effie could hear was the wind and the soft
persistent growling ofDarknose, then,

"I said, is that clear?"

A breath was taken sharply.

"Aye.

"Tis clear.  No one will hear the truth of it from me."

"Good."  A sound, like many knuckles snapping, accompanied the word.

Effie sank back amid the shanks hounds deeply shaken.  Lady Bee began
licking Effie's ears as she would with a sick pup.  Old Scratch, Cally,
and Teeth were still intent upon the people outside, spines lowered,
snouts bunched and quivering.  Darknose and Cat, whom Effie always
thought of as the leaders of the pack, were alert, trotting to and fro
in front of the door, listening, ready.  All of the dogs except Lady Bee
continued to growl.

Shankshounds.  That had been Shor Gormalin's name for them.  Effie
remembered smiling when he'd first called them by it.  Now she knew it
was their real name.  The only one that suited.

A space opened in Effie's chest.  Shor Gormalin had known about dogs.

He had known about her, too.  He was the only person who understood why
she had to run and hide sometimes.  He'd even said he did it himself.
That meant something to Effie.  It helped cancel out some of the bad
things Letty Shank and the others always said.  She couldn't be that
different.  Not when the best swordsman in the clan told her she
reminded him of himself when he was growing up.

Now something terrible had happened.  Nellie Moss had spoken as if Shor
Gormalin wasn't really killed by a cowl man at all, that somehow Mace
Blackhail had arranged it.

Effie began to rock back and forth on her haunches.  She felt violently
sick, as if she'd eaten a meal of dirt and grease.  When Lady Bee licked
her ear again, she pushed the dog away.  Shor Gormalin.  Mace Blackball
had killed Shor Gormalin.  He had hurt Raina and .  .  .  Effie stopped
rockingas a thought smashed through the others like a rock breaking ice.

Mace had killed Shor because of Raina.  Shor loved Raina.  He would have
protected her, stopped her from marrying Mace.  Effie had seen how Shor
was around Raina, how gently he'd tended her when she'd first heard
about Dagro's death.  Anything he could do for her he had.

He'd taken over her duties with the tied clansmen, seen to the stores of
grain and oil.  he'd even ridden out to the Oldwood to check on Raina's
traps.

Effie's stomach turned to liquid.  Shor had been working on Raina's
behalf the day he had found her here, in the little dog cote.

Sickness flooded Effie's head and chest, and she turned away from the
dogs to vomit.  Even as she ran her fist over her mouth to clean it.

Lady Bee began lappingaway at what had been produced.

"What was that?"  Mace Blackhail's voice suddenly sounded close.

"Shanks dogs.  With any luck a fever'll take 'em."

Mace Blackhail grunted.

"Be off with you, woman.  And don't follow me here again.  People will
mark our meeting."  The leashes he held jingled.

"Do your business."

"Cutty'11 bide his time.  He'll wait till things settle and the girl has
long forgotten him, and then he'll take her in such a place as she canna
get away."

A disgusted breath was almost lost to the wind.

"I want her gone, and quickly."

"My Cutty won't be rushed.  Not now he knows she's witched."

Mace Blackhail said something, but the wind drove the words away.

"Me and Cutty need no lessons in trespass from you."

"And I need no lessons in man-craft from a woman who lights torches for
her supper.  Go."  The word was spoken in a whisper, but it carried
better than anything else Mace Blackhail had said.  So strong was its
compulsion that Effie found herself obeying it, edging farther away from
the door.  Even the shanks hounds quieted.

Footsteps receded toward the roundhouse.  All was silent for a long
moment, then Mace called to his dogs.  A door creaked open, dogs
shrieked and howled and dashed through the snow.  A wet nose probed the
door to the little dog cote.  And then a command was spoken and Mace
Blackhail led his killers away.

Deep inside the cote, Effie hugged her knees.  The shanks- hounds formed
a barrier of dogs around her, yet for the first time in all the months
she had been coming here she no longer felt safe.

CHAPTER THIRTY-FOUR.

Men Buying Clothes for a Girl How do you feel?  " Raifs face was grave
as he asked the question.  A scarred hand smoothed the edge of the
blanket that covered her.

"Well... I think."  Ash rubbed her eyes.

"I feel a bit knotted inside, as if Heritas Cant had bound all my organs
with string."  Raif didn't like Heritas Cant; Ash could tell that from
the brief twitch of muscles around his mouth as she mentioned his name.

"Are you well enough to ride?"

"Do I have a choice?"

Raif made no answer.  He looked at her with dark eyes then turned away.

They were sitting in the room Heritas Cant had first greeted them in
last night.  Judging from the bands of gray light that shone beneath the
shutters, it was sometime after midday.  Ash had slept on a padded bench
close to the fire.  She had no memory of being brought here, didn't even
know if she had walked on her own two feet or been carried inside.  The
last thing she remembered before wakingand finding herself snug and well
wrapped by the fire was the sound of Heritas Cant's blood dripping into
a bowl.  Ash shivered. She could still taste the fear in her mouth.

"I'll leave you for now," Raif said.

"Eat your breakfast."  He frowned.

"Angus and I went to the market this morning.  We bought you some new
clot lies They're in the basket by the table."  He opened the door.

"And there's a pony outside, too."

Ash raised herself up from the bench.

"A pony?"

"Yes.  She's mountain bred.  Gray as a storm cloud."

"You picked her?"

Raif nodded.  Their eyes met.

A moment passed.  Then Ash said,

"I won't hold you to any promise you made last night.  It was all so .
.." She shook her head.  "I had no right to ask for your help."

An expression that Ash didn't understand glowed with cold light in Raifs
eyes.  For a moment he looked older, harder, like someone she might
cross the street to avoid.

"I'll take back no promise, spoken or unspoken.  I owe loyalty to my
uncle and will say no word against him that is not to his face.  Nor
will I speak ill of Heritas Cant, for I respect his strength of mind and
am grateful for all he has done.  Yet know this.  My reasons for helping
you are not the same as theirs.  I have no interest in the Reach."

"I know.  That's why I turned to you last night.  That's why I told you
the truth by the Spill."

Raif looked at her and did not speak.  After a moment he turned to
leave.

"I'm sorry," she said, halting him.

"For what?"

Ash found herself struggling for words.  He was giving her so much .  .

quietly and with no fuss.

"For letting you touch me that day by Vaingate."

Raifs hand rose to his throat, where it probed until it found the black
bit of horn he called his lore.  Surprisingly he smiled, and it was such
a beautiful thing to see that Ash caught her breath.

"You are worthy of respect, Asarhia March."

Before Ash could decide what sort of answer he had given her, the door
clicked closed and he was gone.  Stupidly she stared at die space he had
left behind.

She took her time getting ready after that, pausing to eat slices of
cold fried bread and sour winter apples.  Someone, probably Cloistress
Gannet, had seen to it that she had everything she

needed to take a bath.  It seemed a long time since she'd last had the
luxury of soap and water, and she stripped off her clothes and stood
naked in the copper tub and let the hot steam soak her skin.  After a
time she scrubbed the grime from her body and worked her hair into a
frothy lather that smelled of oats and winter mint.  The water beneath
her soon turned gray, and for the briefest moment she considered calling
to Katia to bring more.

Ash stepped out of the tub.  The water seemed suddenly cold, and she
could not dry herself quickly enough.  Katia was dead.  Gone.  Hung on
the gallows for crows to pick at and all the world to see.

And Penthero Iss had put her there.  Ash dropped the wool towel into the
tub and watched as it soaked up the dirty water.  She understood more
about her foster father now.  Last night while Heritas Cant spoke of
Reaches and the Blind and the creatures who lived there.  Ash had
thought of Iss.  Everything he had ever done and said to her--every
kindness he had shown, every kiss he had given, every little attention
he had paid her--was a lie.  She was a Reach, and he had known it.  It
was why he had come to her late at night, asking slyly worded questions
about her dreams.  It was why he had set Katia to watch her chamber, the
Knife to guard her door, and Caydis Zerbina to steal away her things.

Penthero Iss had wanted his own Reach.

Ash stood in the center of the room and let that fact sink in.

Gooseflesh pricked along her arms and chest, and after a while she began
to shake uncontrollably.  Her foster father had planned to lock her away
in the Splinter and keep her for himself.  Already he had something,
someone, imprisoned there, and she was the next piece he meant to add to
his collection.

How long had he known what she was?  Always?  Had it been the only
reason he had saved her?

Ash didn't know how long she stood there, shaking, didn't even know if
she shook from anger, shock, or cold.  Heritas Cant's words had remade
her life. Her memories were now as dirty as the water in the tub.

The hard clack of wood hitting wood jolted her from her thoughts.

"Yes?"  she called, falling back into her old ways of command as easily
as if she had never left Mask Fortress.

"It is Heritas Cant.  I must speak with you before you leave."

"Wait a moment while I dress."  Ash's voice was as cold as her body.

She crossed to the table where the basket of new clothes lay and began
sorting through them.  Two men buying clothes for a girl!  Ash smiled a
crazy tear-filled smile as she looked on what they had bought.  They
meant to spoil her.  They had thought of everythingand nothing, buying
red silk skirts and pretty embroidered blouses and the finest, softest
woolen cloak she had ever felt or seen.  Everything was dyed in bright
and lovely colors: a waistcoat of peacock blue, ribbons as green as
emeralds, and suede boots the color of rust.

Ash found herself laughingand cryingas she held up a needlepoint bodice
as fine as anything she had ever seen on a grange lord wife in Mask
Fortress. There were slippers and wraps and fine woolly mittens, lace
collars, bone buttons, and shoes: everything two men thought a girl
needed.  Everything they thought she'd love.

She did love them.  She loved them so fiercely, she hugged them to her
chest like living things.  The thought of Angus and Raif walkingaround a
market, choosing colors, feeling textures, guessing sizes, and talking
trim made her giggle like a child.  On the other side of the door, she
heard Heritas Cant wheezing.  One of his sticks tapped impatiently
against the floor.

Time she was dressed.  Only she could find neither wool stockings nor
small linens in the basket.  Ash shrugged.  Men couldn't be relied on to
think of those.  She'd have to make do with the ones she had.

Having picked out the plainest wool skirt, a white blouse embroidered
with tiny forget-me-nots, and the peacock blue waistcoat, Ash began
folding the other clothes away.  As she picked up the red silk skirt, a
small muslin bag fell from its folds.  She scooped it up and untied the
string.  Underthings. The bag contained pretty ladies' underthings, all
scented and fastened with bows.  Angus, she thought immediately.  Angus
remembered to buy these.

Five minutes later, dressed and ready, she opened the door to Heritas
Cant.

He did not look well.  The twin sticks he used to walk with shook with
the force of his weight.  Immediately feeling guilty about making him
wait, Ash came forward to help him.  He shook her away, and they both
spent an awkward few minutes as he made his way toward the fire and then
settled himself on a high-seated, high-backed chair that Ash guessed had
been specially built for his use.

His first words to her were,

"Money wasted."  And it took her a moment to realize he was talking
about her new clothes.

She said nothing.

"Are you well?"  Cant's green eyes seemed to extract the answer from her
before she spoke, and the nod she gave had the quality of an
afterthought.

"Good.  Good.  The blood wards I have set are in place, then.  Can you
feel them?"

"I think so.  My insides feel tight, almost as if they've been battened
down."

"In some ways they are."  Cant struggled to adjust his right leg, which
rested in an odd way beneath him.

"Wardings do two things.

First, they conceal you, making it difficult for magic users and the
creatures of the Blind to track you down.  Now this doesn't mean they
won't or can't find you, for if you draw upon your Reach power, you
might as well light a beacon on the highest hill, put a horn to your
lips, and blow.  No. The war dings are just a trick to fool those who
don't look too close.  "

Ash made herself nod.

"Second, war dings protect you.  The restraint you feel is part of the
barrier I have erected.  Your body is bound by cords of sorcery.  They
wrap around your heart, your liver, your brain, and your womb, shielding
them from harm or interference.  They are strong now, yet time will wear
them.  I pray they will last until you make it to the Cavern of Black
Ice, but in truth I cannot be certain.  You can help by making yourself
strong.  Eat well and often, sleep for as long as you can, do not drive
yourself hard, and never put yourself in a position where fear might
lead you to draw sorcery."

"I'm not sure I understand."

"As a Reach you were born for one thing: to make a rift in the
Blindwall.  The power is here" --he poked a finger at his chest"--inside
you.  And nothing of flesh and blood can stand against it when you draw
it forth and reach."  Cant's eyes were suddenly hard, green jewels in a
face so pale it could have belonged to a corpse.

"You think I mean to scare you, Asarhia March.  Well, perhaps I do.
Perhaps I myself am scared.  This is an old land we live in, and old
myths and old powers sustain it.  Before the clans and the city men came
here, before even the Sull settled in their cities of ice wood and
stone, there were others, not men, not as we would name them, yet they
had eyes and mouths like men, and built great halls of earth and timber
in the heart of the Want.  I cannot tell you how many centuries they
lived for, but I do know they died out within a hundred years,
slaughtered or taken by the creatures in the Blind. The Sull call it Ben
Horo, the Time Before.  They hold the knowledge of these others close,
pass it down from generation to generation, even though they share
neither blood nor kinship with them.  This they do to honor the memories
of the Old Ones as they named them, and to keep fear of the Endlords
alive."

"Why tell me this now?"

"Because you must know what is at stake.  Any magic user who is
untrained is dangerous.  Anger, terror, fear: Any strong emotion can
concentrate power. You must guard yourself against such things.  Lash
out in anger, and sorcery may be released with the blow.  You cannot
afford to lose control of your emotions.  More than your own life
depends on it."

Ash decided she would say nothing .  .  and not be afraid.

"If there were more time, I could show you what the Sull call Saer Rahl,
the Way of the Flame, which teaches men and women how to master their
emotions and never act out of anger or fear."  Cant smiled thinly.

"I never took to it myself, but then I was born on the slopes of the
Shattered Mountains, and no flames I knew burned cold."

Cant clicked his sticks against the floor.

"So I must send you north with nothing but blood wards to protect you.
And perhaps we should both pray that next time we meet your Reach power
will be gone and you'll have no need of lessons in self-control from an
old man such as me.  Just know this: Any kind of sorcery you draw before
you reach the cavern will blast through my constraints."  Spittle shot
from Cant's lips.

"Is that clear?"

"Yes."

"The war dings will not withstand Reach power."  A pause followed, and
then he murmured,

"Little can."

Ash held herself tall.  She would show no reaction to this man.

Cant watched her for a moment, then shrugged.

"Well, that's all I mean to say."  He began the long process of rising
to his feet, and Ash turned away to give him privacy to position his
legs and sticks.

His breaths sounded like discharged arrows at her back.

When finally he had moved himself close to the door, she turned and
said,

"How did my foster father know I was a Reach?"

"Do you really mean how or when?"

Surprised by his cleverness, Ash confessed the truth.

"Yes, when?"

An expression looking much like sympathy charged the slack muscles of
Cant's face.

"Prophecies that foretell the coming of the next Reach have been passed
from mouth to mouth ever since the last Reach died ten centuries ago.  I
have read or heard many of them myself.  Some are obvious fakes, written
by the sort of men and women who take pleasure in hoaxes and tricks.
Others are food for scholars, filled with so many archaic references and
metaphors that no two people can agree on their meaning.  Others still
are written in dead languages that once translated lose their subtlety
and sense.  A few, just a few, have the ring of truth about them.  One
such prophecy is a child's verse.  It has been known and spoken in the
North for many years."  Cant hesitated.

"Say it."

Cant nodded.  He adjusted his sticks to better bear his weight and then
spoke in the soft voice of secrets and confessions.

First to breathe upon a mountain First to gaze upon a barren gate First
to Reach in the hands of her captors Last to learn her fate.

Silence filled the room like cold water.  Ash breathed and thought and
did not move.  Cant waited.  The air surrounding them was thick and
dark, filled with the scent of old things.  Ash met Cant's gaze and held
it until he looked away.  She had no desire to discuss the verse with
him.  Its meaning was clear.  She had been left on the north face of
Mount Slain, five paces away from Vaingate, the barren gate, and
Penthero Iss, Angus Lok, and this man standing before her had all known
who she was before she had known herself.

Yes, Cant had answered her question, the real one she had not asked.

Her foster father had known all along.  Scores of children were
abandoned each year in Spire Vanis, left in doorways of grand manses, on
the steps of the Bone Temple, or at the foot of Theron Pengaron's statue
in the Square of Four Prayers.  Hundreds of children must have passed
through Iss' hands, yet he'd chosen to keep just one.  A baby girl left
outside Vaingate to die.

Ash closed her eyes, told herself she must be strong.

"Go now," she said to Cant.

"Tell Angus I am ready."

Cant's mouth worked upon a word but did not speak it.  Like a servant
obeying orders, he bowed his head and left.

Only when the door had closed behind him and she heard the click of the
latch did she reach over and grab the table for support.  She had
thought her father loved her.

Minutes later when Angus entered the room, she was composed, her face
cleared of all emotion.  She was surprised at the wave of relief she
felt upon seeing his big red face.  He looked well and had taken the
trouble to shave his beard and trim his hair.

"You look beautiful," he said, his gaze missing no detail of her hair,
clothes, or feet.

"Blue suits you.  I thought it might."

She had forgotten about her new clothes, forgotten even that she was
wearing them.  She went to reply, but for some reason it was hard to
speak.  Smiling instead, she made a little twirl to show off her dress.
As the wool skirt whipped against her ankles, it occurred to her that
she had performed this little ceremony countless times for Penthero Iss.

Angus looked at her without smiling.  Suddenly he didn't seem much in
the mood for talking, either.

"I want to thank you," Ash began, "for all the lovely things" -- "Hush,"
Angus said, not gently.

"It was nothing.  Nothing."  His voice had a roughness to it that she
didn't understand.

"Well, we'd better be on our way.  Raifs waiting outside with the
horses." With that he scooped up the basket containing the remainder of
her clothes and made his way from the room.

Ash put on her new cloak and gloves, then followed him.  In the darkness
of the hall she met gazes with Cloistress Gannet.  The tiny black-clad
woman gave no greeting, save to pinch her dry little mouth into an even
drier line.

Angus held open the door against the wind.  A storm was picking up, and
snowflakes sailed through the doorway, coming to land on the
red-and-cream rug that covered the floor.  Cant won't like that one bit,
Ash thought, fastening her cloak ties in haste.

Her new boots sank deep into the snow as she walked across the courtyard
toward Raif.  He was standing by a black iron gate, holding Moose, the
bay, and a full-grown pony with thick legs and a strong neck.  The
creature was gray, like Moose, but darker and more blotchy, not so
elegantly turned, as Master Haysticks would say.  She had a large head
and three white socks and wasn't a bit like a grand horse at all.

Raif grinned as she approached.  The storm suited him.  He didn't shiver
or stamp his feet as most people did in foul weather.  Tilting his head
toward the pony, he said,

"She's a beauty, isn't she?"

"Yes."  Ash stopped short of the creature so as not to alarm her on
their first meeting.

"What's her name?"

"Snowshoe."  Raif continued to grin.

Ash grinned madly back.

"It's a perfect name.  Perfect."  Stripping off her new gloves, she
moved wide of the pony so she could approach her from the side.

"Snowshoe," she said softly, to get her attention.

Arms down at her side, Ash stepped closer, presenting herself for
sniffing.  Master Haysticks had always been particular about that.  Let
a new horse sniff you before you touch it, he'd said.

Else it's like a total stranger coming up to you and poking you in the
neck. Ash very much wanted Snowshoe to like her.  It was suddenly the
most important thing.

Snowshoe sniffed and looked, then made a rolling motion with her head.
Ash glanced at Raif, who nodded.  Leaning in toward the pony, Ash raised
her hand and stroked the bottom of the creature's neck.

Snowshoe's huge brown eye watched her closely.  By the time Ash had
worked her hand down to the withers, Snowshoe was moving her chest
forward to meet each stroke.  Ash's heart tightened with joy.  When Raif
held out his hand, presenting her with a small green apple to give to
the pony, she thought she might cry.

"Take it," he said.

"The last owner said they were her favorites."

The apple was offered and taken.  Snowshoe allowed her mane and back to
be stroked while she crunched it.

"Aye, you've made a friend there," Angus said, approaching with the last
of the packs.  Ash smiled at him as he loaded the horses.  The hound
bites on the bay's flanks were no longer bandaged, and she was relieved
to see they were closed and dry.  When she raised her gaze from the
gelding's flank, she noticed Heritas Cant standing in the doorway,
watching her.

"Here, give me your wee footie."  Angus bent at the waist, ready to help
her mount.

A little unnerved by Cant's presence, Ash placed her left foot in Angus'
cupped hands and levered herself onto Snowshoe's back.  The saddle fit
perfectly, and Raif moved quickly to adjust the stirrups to her leg.
Snowshoe held herself steady all the while, as calm as if she met new
riders every day in a storm.

When everyone was mounted and ready.  Cant called out from the doorway.

"The north road should be clear.  Follow it until dark and then turn
west when you pass the twin storm barns of Clan's Reach."

Angus nodded.

"Aye, Heritas.  We'll do just that.  I thank you for the warmth of your
hearth and the knowledge you have given.  Gods willing, we'll meet again
afore winter's end."

Cant made no reply, save to click his sticks against the stone step.

"I owe you a debt, Heritas Cant," Raif said, his voice rising to compete
with the storm.

"When we meet again I'll repay it."

Cant shook his head.

"I will not add to your burdens, Clansman, by claiminga debt against
you."

Ash watched Pair's face as he listened to the reply.  A muscle high on
his cheek pulsed, and then he bowed his head and looked away.  Ash
stroked Snowshoe's neck, searching for warmth.  Turning the pony into
the street, she nodded her farewell to Heritas Cant.

Ille Glaive was differently made from Spire Vanis.  As Ash trotted the
pony down the street, past crumbling stonework, slate-roofed mansions,
sealed-up sewers, and lead pipes venting steam, she began to see layers
in the stone. The lower cellar levels that were only partially visible
from the street were built from finely hewn stone that was black with
soot and age.  Ash saw moons and stars carved into the risers of cellar
steps and the undersides of arches.  Aboveground the stone was newer,
lighter, the walls constructed from softer, more workable sandstone.
Everything seemed to be heaped upon everything else, and buildings
creaked and listed under the weight of added stories, ring towers, and
timber bridges.  In the distance the five lead-capped domes of the Lake
Keep could clearly be seen rising high above the great curtain wall of
ironstone that surrounded them.  The Three Tears of Ille Glaive--the
Black Tear of the Spill, the Red Tear of Sull blood, and the Steel Tear
of Dunness Fey's sword--flew on stiff white banners from their
hoardings.  Ash remembered her foster father telling her that the Lake
Keep was built around a pool of black water known as the Eye of the
Spill.  The pool was said to be deeper than the lake itself, and strange
blind fishes were said to swim there.

The nearer they drew to Ille Glaive's north wall, the more squalid the
city became.  Many buildings were little more than occupied ruins.

Ash studied the caved roofs, boarded windows, and iced-up drains with
eyes that had seen such things before.  She knew what it felt like to be
out on the streets, cold and hungry and alone.  A journey north along
the Storm Margin was nothing compared with that.

Quickly, before her mind turned to the subject of Heritas Cant and all
that he had said.  Ash began patting Snowshoe's neck and saying horsey
things out loud.  She couldn't think about being a Reach.  Not now.  Not
yet.

The storm darkened as they approached the Old Sull Gate.  Mounds of
brown snow had been piled to either side of the gate posts, and rows of
icicles hung from the gate and its rigging, wet and dripping like
monster's teeth. Angus dismounted but indicated that Ash should keep her
seat.  He appeared calm, yet Ash saw the way his gaze flickered from the
gate tower to the guards in white mail shirts to the bowmen walking the
wall.

The north gate of Ille Glaive was old and beautifully carved from
honey-colored stone.  It matched neither the color nor the style of the
wall in which it was set.  Unlike the gates in Spire Vanis, it had not
been designed to impress anyone with its size and grandeur and existed
simply as a thing of a beauty, like an entrance to a holy place.  A
landscape of gently sloping hills, valleys, thick forests, and gorges
alive with crashing water was carved across its posts and arch.

"The clan holds murmured Raif.

Ash turned to look at him.  Snow swirled around his face, switching this
way and that with every change of the wind.  He held Moose's reins at
tension, and Ash was reminded of what he looked like when he was drawing
a bow.

"Aye," Angus said.

"There's parts of Dhoone and Blackhail and Bludd up there.  The stone
was cut and carved by Sull masons.  All their gates tell stories of the
lands that lie beyond."

Raif did not acknowledge what he said.  Ash watched him as they joined
the thin line of people waiting to take leave of the city.  His gaze
never returned to the gate.

A woman farmer with a dog and cart and an old trapper dressed in rabbit
furs that stank like all the hells stood ahead of them in line.

Two guards wearing the Three Tears at their breasts gave them little
trouble as they passed.  Ash expected Angus to be relieved when they
took the gate unchallenged, yet no part of his body relaxed.

What is he afraid of?  she wondered as she caught him looking over his
shoulder one last time.

Beyond the city walls the storm raged.  Ash's eyes and mouth filled with
snow the moment the pony cleared the gate, and she was forced to pull
her fox hood so close that she looked at the world through a filter of
gray fur.  The north road stretched out ahead of her, straight as an
arrow and wide as four carts.  The city hold ofllle Glaive, with its
sprawling farms, stout out walls and tight little villages where every
building shared walls with another, spread across the horizon like a
land made of snow.  Everything was white, even the sky.  The only dark
patches were chimney stacks and smoke holes on the roofs of a thousand
farms.

Angus mounted and set a brisk pace north.

Snow drove into the horses' faces all the way.  Darkness came early,
moving south through the city hold like a second storm.  The wind died
along with the light, and the sudden drop in temperature bred frost.

Ash huddled in her oilskins, aware of every gape hole eyelet, and poorly
stitched seam.  Cold settled in her chest like a disease.  Every breath
she exhaled caught in her hood and turned to blue ice.  Lights from
roadside taverns began to look tempting, yet Angus showed little
interest in stopping. Smoke smelling of roast meat and onions burned
black blew across the road, making Ash's mouth fill with saliva and her
stomach growl.  Hours passed, yet Angus still refused to call a halt.

Ash sank into the misery of aching thighs, numb fingers, cracked lips,
and a full bladder.  She took to looking at the starless sky and
wondering how long it would be before dawn.  She had already decided
that Angus meant to ride through the night.

Finally Raif spoke up, saying something to Angus that Ash couldn't hear.
Whispers passed between the two.  Angus shook his head.  Raifs voice
dropped dangerously low.  Ash heard him speak her name.  Angus'
shoulders stiffened for an instant, yet on his very next breath he
relented.  Glancing over at Ash, he said,

"Aye.  A short stop will do no harm."

Ash tried not to let the relief show on her face.

They rode a while longer, until they were free from the light of nearby
villages and Angus was satisfied with the density of trees along the
road.  Ash smelled the sharp vinegary scent of resin as they headed for
a stand of blackstone pines.  Snowshoe was delighted to be off the road
and found much to sniff at beneath the snow.  Ash looked over the tops
of the pines as she waited for the pony to raise her head.  The northern
horizon was dominated by a row of jagged peaks, dark shadows against a
nearly black sky.

"The Bitter Hills," Angus said as his boots thudded into the snow.

"The clan holds stand beyond them.  Ganmiddich, Bannen, and Croser lie
that way."

Hearing Angus speak, Ash knew she had been watched.  Did he always mind
her so closely that he could tell where her eyes focused?  She
dismounted Snowshoe in silence, unwilling to draw Angus out on the
subject of clans. Something inside her knew that Raif would not welcome
it.

"On certain days if you look northeast, you can see a light above the
hills. Ganmiddich has a tower, though I can't say as they built it, and
they light fires in the topmost chamber so the blaze can be seen
throughout the North."

Ash glanced at Raif.  He was down from Moose, busy tending to the
gelding's nose and mouth.  He gave no indication of having heard what
Angus said, yet sound traveled well in the makeshift hall of pines.

Angus began filling snumebags with oats.

"Last time I saw the tower lit was when the old chief Ork Ganmiddich
died. They doused the timbers with milk of magna to make the flames burn
white."

Out of the corner other eye, Ash saw Raifs hand come down to touch the
silver-capped horn he wore at his belt.  He's showing his respect, she
thought.

Perhaps Angus noticed the gesture too, for he didn't speak anymore about
the tower or the clans, simply walked among the horses, bringing snow
melt and grain.

Ash worked the cramps from her legs by stamping her feet in the snow.

After a while Raif came over bearing food.  There was square- cut oat
bread that Raif called bannock, crumbly white cheese, cold black bacon,
hard apples, and flat beer.  They ate it sitting on a storm-felled pine,
and it tasted like a feast.  Angus joined them halfway, consuming
everything with gusto except the beer.

"I canna do it," he cried, slappinga hand upon his heart.

"I'll drink warm beer, cold beer, beer thickened with oats, iron
filings, and eggs, but I canna drink a flat brew.  A man must draw the
line somewhere."

It was good to laugh.  Angus passed around his rabbit flask, insisting
that both Ash and Raif take a mouthful of some "real warmth" instead.

Ash drank, though the contents tasted like lamp fuel and smelled of dead
trees.

"That's the birch," Angus explained as Ash's eyes watered.

"There's a curl of bark in the bottom of the flask.  It'll make you grow
as tall as a tree ... or is it as thick as one?  I canna remember
which."

Ash grinned.  It was impossible not to like Angus Lok.  Handing back the
flask, she stood and brushed the snow from her skirt.

"Just going to stretch my legs a bit."

"I'll come with you," Raif said, making to stand.

Angus put a hand on his arm.

"I think our wee lassie of the ice needs a spot of privacy."

Raif look puzzled for a moment, then understanding dawned on his face.
Quickly he settled himself back on the log.

Angus' copper eyes twinkled as he turned to Ash and said,

"Go ahead.

We'll be here if you need us.  "

Unable to decide if she was embarrassed or amused, Ash walked away.

Angus Lok knew a lot about girls.

Finding a sprawling tangle of dogwoods, she relieved herself in the
cover they created.  The fastenings on her new clothes caused her much
irritation, and her fingers were half-frozen and nearly useless.  By the
time she arrived back in the clearing, both Raif and Angus were mounted
and ready to move on. Snufflebags and pigskin water buckets had been
packed away, and all that was left of the meal they had eaten was a
handful of brown apple cores in the snow.

Snowshoe showed no signs of weariness and held herself still while Ash
mounted.  Determined not to let her own exhaustion show, Ash made a
point of sitting high in the saddle as Angus took them north through the
pines.  Eventually they came upon a game trail that led west, and Angus
seemed content to follow where it led.  They rode for some time through
the dark hours of night, passingabandoned farm buildings, frozen
streams, and forests steaming with mist, then Angus surprised everyone
by signalinga halt.

Turning due east, he stood high in his stirrups and looked back along
the path they'd just traveled.  Shaking his head, he said,

"It's not the finest ghost trail I've ever set, but it'll just have to
do." He kicked the bay forward.

"As it's high time we turned for home."

CHAPTER THIRTY-FIVE.

Findinp Lost Thinps Meeda Longwalker's dogs found the raven's frozen
corpse beneath two foot of glaciated snow.  She was minking in the
new-fallen snow nineteen leagues east of the Heart, when her team of
terriers began excavation on a new set.  Meeda had been minking on the
high plateau known as Old Man's Rib for fifty years, and she knew the
moment her dogs started digging that there was nothing but hard rock
beneath the snow.

She nearly called them off.  Across the empty streambed, on the thickly
wooded bank where ten thousand years of willow and spruce growth had
broken down the bedrock into fine powdery soil, had been her intended
destination: soft land where she knew a mother and her three cubs lived.
Yet the dogs were excited about something, and there was always a chance
of a carcass. Meeda had known mink bitches to tear limbs and genitals
from male mink babies in a frenzy of protective mothering, then leave
them for dead.  A frozen and bloody mink pelt was no good for a cloak or
a coat, but it could be washed and used as lining for gloves, game bags,
and hoods.  It was worth the time and effort of pursuit.  Barely.

Slippinga strip of inner birch bark between loose lips long drained of
pigment by age, Meeda stood back and waited for her dogs to finish
digging. Her terriers, much maligned by male hunters for their small
size, small brains, and small muzzles, shredded the snow with claws so
sharp and strong that even now after fifty years of living with their
breed, Meeda feared to let them close to her face.

The male hunters were right: They did have small brains.  But Meeda
Longwalker had long realized that a small brain acutely focused was
often more effective than a large one split by many thoughts.

When she caught her first glimpse of the dark form beneath the snow,
Meeda spat out the birch bark and issued a few choice curses to the Lord
of Creatures Hunted.  Dark was not what she wanted.  Dark was not what
Slygo Toothripper had promised to trade her for a pair of good new boots
and a metal spearhead.  Slygo wanted white.  Dark mink pelts were worth
double their weight in arrowheads.  White pelts were worth ten times
that and more.

"Mashi!"  Meeda cried to the terriers, halting them instantly.  She
would waste no more time digginga dark and bloody carcass from the snow.

The terriers feared Meeda even more than they loved to dig flesh, and to
a dog all stepped aside from the excavation, allowing their mistress
space to inspect their work.  Meeda prided herself on being the greatest
living minker in the Racklands.  Fifty years of experience, eleven
generations of dogs, five thousand leagues walked and another ten
thousand ridden, and only twenty-eight days lost to childbirth, grief,
and sickness.  What man could boast such a record?

As always before she had bagged her first catch of the day, Meeda was
impatient with herself and her dogs, but she knew that certain rituals
had to be maintained.

Terriers were like children: When they went to the trouble of
excavatinga den, a freshly killed carcass, or even a set of old bones,
they needed to be praised for their efforts.  Meeda looked down at four
sets of dark eager eyes, and although she didn't much feel like it she
drew her ice wood stick from her belt.

"What have we here?"  she said, proddingat the top snow covering the
dark, mink-size carcass.  Two sons she had birthed, yet their names had
been spoken less than those four words.

Muscles in the terriers' necks strained.  One, a young pup barely eight
months old, sprayed the snow with urine in his excitement.

Meeda frowned.  She would have to beat that out of him: What if a
perfect white mink had lain dead instead of-- A raven.

Meeda Longwalker's face cooled beneath her lynx hood as she upturned a
clod of snow to reveal the blue gleam of a raven's bill.  Ill tidings.
The thought came so swiftly, it was as if a stranger had leaned over her
bent back and whispered the words in her ear.  Meeda had half a mind to
walk away, call her dogs to heel, and walk as fast as her knee joints
would permit toward the empty streambed and the wooded bank.  She was a
minker, nothing more.  It was not her place to deal in messages and
omens.  Yet even as she puffed herself up with excuses, she knew that it
was her fate to find the raven and her duty to bring it home.

There would be no mink trapped today.

Speaking more harshly than was her wont to the terriers, she kept them
at a distance while she finished the excavation with her own gloved
hands.  The raven had been killed by a pair of hawks.  Its eyes had been
plucked out, and the soft black down on its throat was stiff with the
shiny substance of dried blood.  The hawks had attacked it in midnight,
and the impact of the fall had severed its left wingand sent its rib
cage smashing into its heart.  Meeda clucked softly as she scraped away
the snow.  Hawks had little love for any predatory birds entering their
territory, but seldom had she witnessed the result of such a violent
attack.  Never had she known them to take down a raven.

As she freed its lower body from the snow, Meeda noticed something
silver and scaled, like fishskin, flash as it caught the winter light.
Meeda Longwalker knew then that an ill omen was not the only thing the
raven had brought to the Racklands.  It had brought a message as well.

Stripping off her thick horses king work gloves to reveal hands crossed
with the scars of dozens of sharp mink teeth, Meeda dropped to her knees
in the snow.  Her knife was in her hand before she knew it.  A package
the size of a child's little finger was bound to the raven's left leg.
The silver material was pikes king--her hunter's eyes could not help but
pick out that one detail even as her mind was intent on something else.
Should she open the package, read it?

The raven had come from a long way away, Meeda knew that.  No one in the
Racklands used pikes king to bind messages to birds, and only two men in
the Northern Territories used ravens to send them.  The first man she
knew little about; he was one of the Far Family and lived upon a distant
western shore, where he feasted on the fat of the great whales in summer
and sat deep within the ground, chewing sealskin, through the long
winter nights.  The second man was her son.

This message was for him, could only be for him.  And judging from the
desiccation of the raven's corpse, it was already eleven days late.

Meeda Longwalker cut the message free.  The dry, freezing winds had long
robbed the bird of all its fluids, yet even now she did not forsake her
minker's caution: Never break the skin.  It was foolishness, she knew,
but there it was.  She was too old to change her ways now.

Too old also to wait upon her son's hands and eyes to open and read the
message.  It was for him--she could not and would not pretend
otherwise--but her dogs had dug it from the snow.  The find was hers.

And in Meeda Longwalker's adopted world of hunters, coursers, minkers,
ferreters, badgerers, and trappers, that meant she could do with it what
she wished.

With hands that were deceptively agile despite their age and scarring,
Meeda slit the pikes king package down the center where it had been
fixed with fish glue.  A piece of white bark, not dissimilar to the
strip she had spat into the snow earlier, fell into her palm.

It was soft, excellently worked with both saliva and some kind of animal
fat she did not recognize.  The message was burned into the wood.

Meeda read it slowly over minutes, though in truth it was barely two
sentences long.  Her father had been a learned man who believed in
tutoring both his sons and his daughters in letters, lore, and history,
but for as long as she could remember Meeda had valued freedom other
body more highly than freedom other mind.  As

a child she had run from her lessons, even in full winter when her
father and his High Speaker swore that the temperature outside was cold
enough to kill a soft-skinned girl within minutes.  Meeda had proven
them all wrong, though now, in her old age, she felt a portion of shame
for having mocked and disobeyed her father so completely and with such
terrible joy.  The High Speaker, unlike her father, still lived.  He was
the oldest man in the Racklands, second in power only to her son.  He
had no eyes, yet that did not stop Meeda from avoiding his blind gaze
even now.

Shivering, she folded the message and slipped it into her game belt.

The terriers, thinking she was reaching for her treat bag, began to snap
and jostle for position.  Meeda shook her head.  No treats.  Not today.

"Mis!"  she told them.  Home.

It was nineteen leagues back to the Heart of the Sull.  Meeda Longwalker
walked them no more quickly or slowly than normal, yet they cost her
more and wore her more than any other leagues in her life.  As the path
rose from the valley floor and the white chalk cliffs of High Ground
became visible above the Heart Fires, she spotted two mounted figures in
the distance.

Ark Veinsplitter and Mal Naysayer.

Far Riders, returning from whatever journey her son had sent them on at
Spring's End.  Meeda dropped her hand to the belt, felt the message
carried there.  The two men did not know it, but they would barely have
time to bleed their horses and blacken their hands in the ashes of the
Heart Fires.  They would need to travel north now.  Meeda Longwalker,
Daughter of the Sull, had listened to her father's teaching long enough
to know that Far Riders responded to the silent summons of the gods.

They rode east through the night and much of the next day.  A new dawn
brought more snow and the kind of low, gusting winds that came from all
directions and were impossible to guard against.  The farther they
traveled from Ille Glaive, the emptier the landscape became. Villages
were rare occurrences, and the land became peopled with backbreaking
rocks, frozen mud holes and forests of tall, silent trees.  Raif called
it taiga.  He said that much of the clan holds was like this.

They rested during the evening of the second day, making a cold camp
some distance from a tiny village that boasted an alehouse, a dry forge,
and an ancient retaining wall built to prevent snow and mud from sliding
down the Bitter Hills and overrunning livestock and farms.  A pair of
ewes and their yearlings penned on a nearby slope were their only
company as they slept through the night.

Ash was woken by Angus.  It was still dark, but a blush of light on the
southeast horizon told of imminent dawn.  Ash had slept on a mattress of
piled snow, wrapped in two layers of oilskins and wearing a mask of
greased linen over her face.  Frostbite was a real and constant danger,
and at various points in the night she had been aware of hands touching
her nose and cheeks through the cloth.  Angus insisted on checking her
now, his rough fingers feeling for any stiff or frozen skin.  Raif saw
to the horses, then laid out a breakfast of cold store.  The bannock,
which one night earlier had been soft and toasty, now had ice crystals
at its heart.

While Ash and Raif filled the waterskins with snow, Angus hiked onto
high ground and surveyed the surrounding land.  Now, finally, Ash knew
the reason behind his constant watchfulness: He didn't want any
uninvited guests following him home.

He hadn't trusted Heritas Cant, not fully.  Ash clearly remembered him
telling Cant that they would travel north and then west.  Only he'd
never had any intention of doing such a thing.  As soon as he'd judged
it safe he had turned east instead.  "]just a wee visit," he had said
last night.

"It'll only slow us down by three days--a day there, a day back, and one
in the middle for some decent rest under a safe roof and a spot of
scolding from my wife."

Ash had accepted his decision without question.  She could not stop
Angus and Raif from visiting their family.  How could she argue against
the wish of two men to see their kin--she, who knew nothing of fathers
and daughters and cousins and aunts?  Cant's war dings would stretch the
extra days.  They had to.

The tail end of the storm had passed in the night, and the snow
underfoot was still finding its level.  The going was hard, but sunlight
broke through the clouds at midmorning, creatinga world of sparkling
blue frost.  Everyone's spirits lifted.  Angus hummed a selection of
tunes as he rode; Ash recognized one of them as

"Badger in the Hole."  Raif remained silent, but his hands were lighter
on the reins and he often leaned forward to scratch Moose's neck and say
some bit of nonsense to the horse.  Watching the men's obvious
excitement about the homecoming, Ash felt herself growing nervous.

The thought of Angus' daughters knotted her stomach.

"Raif," Angus said as the snowbound roofs of a small village appeared on
the horizon, "what say you take out that borrowed bow of yours and bring
down something fitting for Darra's pot.  She'd have my hamstrings for
slingshots if I brought her two extra guests and no extra food."

Cords rose in Raifs neck as his uncle spoke, and Ash thought he might
refuse. Yet after a moment he reached back over Moose's quarters and
unfastened the bow from its case.  The bow was one of the few things
that had not been lost by the lake.  It was a thing of beauty, horn and
wood fitted together and then worked to a high sheen.  Raif stripped
down to bare hands to brace it. He worked quickly, tying knots, warming
the wax-coated string, kneading the belly of the bow as he curved it.
The bow case now boasted a dozen straight, well-tilled arrows, and Raif
drew one at random and put its head to the bow.

Something in his face changed as he scanned the surrounding territory
for game.  Ash saw nothing, only blackstone pines, hemlocks, bladder
grass and snow, yet Raifs gaze focused on the spaces between things, and
his eyes flickered as if they were tracking invisible beasts.  Minutes
passed.  Angus busied himself by scraping the dirt from his fingernails
with the tip of his belt knife.  Ash could not take her eyes from Raif.
He became something else when he had a bow in his hands, something she
tried but could find no name for.

Thud The bow thwacked back, rattlingas Raif's hand absorbed the recoil.
Ash followed Raif's gaze but could see nothing.  No creature cried out
in pain or shock.  A smell, like sulfur or copper, filled her nose and
mouth.  By the time she swallowed it was gone.

Angus, who Ash guessed hadn't really been interested in cleaning his
nails at all, turned the bay toward the shot.  Even as the bay's hooves
sent snow flying, Raif released a second arrow.

"A pair of ptarmigan should be enough," he said softly, after a moment.

Ash did not know how to reply.  She nodded quickly.

He turned to look at her.  His draw hand was free of the bow, and she
could see the pink, herringbone flesh of a recently healed injury on his
palm.

"You look frightened."

She tried a smile but failed.

"I've seen you shoot things before."

"That's no answer."

It wasn't, and she knew it.  Looking into his eyes, she saw how dark
they were, even with the sun full upon them.  She tried a second smile
and said,

"Are you afraid of me?"

Raifs own smile was slow in coming, but when it did it warmed her heart.

"Not yet."

The moment between them lasted only as long as it took Angus to return
with the ptarmigan, yet it was enough.  They pulled their horses apart
as Angus held the two fat white birds above his head and cried,

"I'll be sleeping in the big bed tonight!"

Both Ash and Raif laughed.

The journey went quickly after that.  They talked and rode and swapped
stories.  Ash was surprised to learn that Raif had never visited Angus'
farm before or met any of Angus' daughters.  She thought it strange that
Angus had never brought his daughters north to Blackhail to meet their
cousins, but Angus made a joke of it, saying he'd already lost one
sister to a clansman and had no intention of losing his three girls as
well.  Ash laughed along with Raif, yet she was beginning to wonder what
Angus feared.  Why was it so important to hide his family from the rest
of the world?

As midday approached they neared the village that had first appeared on
the horizon.  The ground was hard here, good for nothing save stone
walls and sheep.  The Bitter Hills rose to the north, sending winds
whistling through tough gray grasses that somehow kept their heads above
the snow.  Sheep farms dotted the slopes.  The air smelled of woodsmoke
and manure and damp wool.  A necklace of frozen ponds strung across the
hills told of glaciers long gone.

The village itself consisted of two streets of stone-built houses sealed
with tar.  Ash saw signs of pride in ownership in the cleared ground
surrounding each buildingand the well-maintained shutters and doors.
Like the bay, the village had a name, yet Angus preferred not to give
it.

Angus also preferred not to approach the village too closely, and he
took them along a series of low roads, sheep runs, and dry creek beds
changing course at least three times.  By the time they arrived at the
bank of a green-water river Ash had lost all sense of direction and
couldn't have pointed the way back to the village if her entire life had
depended on it. They followed the river downstream for an hour or so
until it ran through a forest of ancient hardwoods.  Towering elms,
basswoods, and black oaks rose like an army around them.  The wind was
quiet here, and the only sound came from the horses' hooves snapping
forest litter with every step.

Ash was the last to see the farmhouse.  The forest did not thin; It
stopped. One moment they were walking through deep green shade cast by
hundred-year oaks, then suddenly there were no more trees.

Sunlight dazzled Ash's eyes.  Raif took a hard breath.  Angus said a
single word: "Mi's."

The rear of the Lok farm lay a quarter league ahead, set into a stretch
of softly worked farmland and framed by a white elm as tall and stately
as a tower.  The roof of the house was blue gray slate, and the walls
were pale yellow stone.  A low door, carved from honey colored oak and
gleaming with newly applied resin, formed the center of the main
building, and all paths, partition walls, lean-to's, and outbuildings
were built in an arc around it.

As Ash looked on the door opened.  A woman .  .  no, a girl.  stepped
onto the path.  She was wearing a blue wool dress with a white collar
and sturdy work boots.  Her auburn hair reached past her waist.

"Mother!  Beth!"  she called, her voice high and excited.

Angus made a sound deep in his throat and jumped down from his horse.

Ash glanced at Raif, thinking that he would do likewise, but something
must have been showing in her face, for he sent her a look that said,
I'll stay here with you.  Ash was surprised by her own relief.

Two other figures appeared in the doorway, a woman with dark gold hair
and a girl of six or seven, dressed in the same plain wool as her older
sister. The woman held something in her arms, and it took Ash a moment
to realize it was a young child.  The two girls raced down the path,
shouting,

"Father!  Father!"  The woman waited in the doorway, watching.  Ash
noticed her eyes flick to Raif and then to her.  A small chill took Ash
as she sat upon her pony and received the woman's attention.

Angus ran onto the path to meet his daughters.  Catching them in a bear
hug, he lifted them clean off the ground and swung them in a great
circle, all the while calling them "his best girls."

Ash had to look away.

Raif, who had taken control of the bay's reins, clicked his tongue,
encouragingall three horses to step forward.  Snowshoe moved without
Ash's consent.  Ash wanted to stop her, considered stopping her, yet in
the end she didn't.  It's just Angus' family, she told herself.  I'm
making a fuss over nothing.

She just wished he had sons.  Not daughters.

Angus put his daughters down, and both girls stepped away from him,
allowing him a clear view of their mother at the door.  Angus stripped
off his gloves, pulled down his hood, and stood and looked at his wife.
His eyes were dark as he waited for her to beckon him.  With half a
smile she called him forward, and the space separating them contracted
to nothing at all as Angus moved toward the door.

Ash knew then that Angus had lied about his wife.  All the threats she
supposedly issued, all the rules she supposedly made, were nothing more
than thin air.

Turning away from them, Ash met eyes with the eldest of the two girls.
She was beautiful.  Ash realized that straightaway, with hazel eyes and
skin that glowed with good health.  As the girl looked at Ash, her hand
moved up from her side and was taken immediately by her younger sister.
Such a little thing, yet neither girl even glanced at the other as they
touched.

"Darra, I have brought visitors."  Angus' voice broke the moment.

Holding his wife's hand, he pulled her down from the step and onto the
path.

"Raifs come all this way to see you.  He's brought a fine pair of
ptarmigan."

Hearing Raif dismount at her side, Ash did likewise.  Her eyes never
left Angus' wife.

Darra Lok was dressed in a plain wool dress- without jewelry or trim of
any sort.  Her fair hair was piled on her head in a style that Ash knew
took only minutes each morning to fix.  As her dark blue eyes met Raifs,
she let the child she had been carryingat her hip slide to the ground.
The little blond-haired girl headed straight for Angus, crawling
fiercely through the snow and calling,

"Papa!"  loudly.  Angus snatched her up and threw her into the air like
a sack of grain.  The child loved it.  Giggling madly, she demanded,

"More!  More!"

With both arms empty, Darra looked to Raif.

"Da's gone," he said quietly.

"I know," she murmured.

"I know."  Ash could see that she wanted to take hold of Raif and hug
him, yet he stood apart from her and all she could do was touch his
sleeve.

"Tern was a good, good man.  I never met anyone more honest and more
fair."

Raifnodded.

Darra smiled.

"And he could dance .  .  .  my, how he could dance..."

No longer nodding, Raif turned away.

Darra's hand moved in the air after him.

"Cassy, Beth!"  Angus said.

"Run and open the barn."  He held out his youngest daughter.

"And take Little Moo with you.  Hurry now."

The middle daughter pouted.

"But Father, we want to meet the lady with silver hair "

"Later."

The girls heard something in their father's voice that made their backs
straighten.  The eldest came and took Little Moo from her father's arms,
and the three sisters headed for the side of the house.

Ash watched them disappear, envy stabbing softly at her chest.  When she
glanced up, she saw Darra Lok watching her.

Angus gripped his wife by the wrist as he led her toward Ash.  "Darra,
this is Ash.  She's from Spire Vanis.  We're taking her north with us."

Darra's face was as pale and smooth as wax.  She was shaking in a
strange way, as if she were either very cold or very afraid.

Ash didn't understand what was happening.  Darra's large eyes were
filled with so much emotion, they frightened her.  Glancing over her
shoulder, she looked for Raif, but he was some distance behind her now,
tending to the horses.

"Ash."  Darra seemed to test the word as she spoke it.

"Welcome to our house."

Ash didn't know what to do.  This was no time for smiles.  Darra Lok
looked distraught.  Her welcome seemed almost to hurt her as she spoke
it.

"Thank you," Ash said.

"I'm glad to be here."

Darra Lok made a nervous gesture with her hands, brushing imaginary dirt
from her apron.

Angus moved himself into a position between his wife and Ash, touching
both of them on the shoulder.

"Well, ladies," he said.

"I

think we should all go inside and have a little brose by the fire.  "

Ash didn't know what brose was.  Suddenly nothing made any sense.  Did
Darra Lok know she was the Reach?  Was it fear she saw in the older
woman's eyes or something else?

Angus held on to both of them as they walked toward the house.  Raif
followed after, leading the horses.  When the eldest daughter returned
from the barn, carrying horse blankets and feedbags, he called her by
name: Cassy.  What the two said to each other, whether they touched, or
hugged, or kissed, was something Ash never knew, as she stepped into the
warm, fire lit interior of the house, leaving Raif and Cassy to the
snow.

In the short time it took to walk to the door, Darra Lok had composed
herself, and when she turned to Ash and bade her strip off her cloak and
take the seat closest to the fire, she looked and acted like a different
woman. Smiling gently, she helped Ash with cloak ties, her fingers
making quick work of the hooks and laces.  Angus stood in the doorway,
watching them, an unreadable look on his snow- burned face.

"Well, don't just stand there, Angus Lok," said his wife.

"Stoke the fire and fetch me the heavy iron pot--the one for heating
bathwater.

Oh, and you might as well fill it while you're on your way.  "

Angus smiled at Ash.

"I told you what she was like."  With that he went about his appointed
task with the all the grumblingand puffing of a man perfectly happy yet
pretending not to be.

Ash looked around the large farmhouse kitchen.  Undressed stone walls
glowed like old parchment in the firelight.  The blue slate floor was
covered in worn rugs of all shapes and sizes and thicknesses; the oldest
one looked to be a balding fox pelt that lay like a faithful dog beside
the hearth.  The fireplace was as big as a shed, and cast-iron shelves,
roasting racks, and gridirons were suspended at various heights above
the flames.  An armory of knives, graters, skewers, roasting forks, and
nut-and-bone crackers hung above the hearth on meat hooks, and a great
black warming stone sat in the middle of the flames.

It was a hard-used, well-cared-for place.  The large birch table that
sat in the center of the room had been scrubbed down to the raw wood,
and every chair in sight boasted a slat, spindle, or leg that had been
repaired with newer stock.

"Sit," Darra said, hanging Ash's cloak over the back of a chair to dry.

"I'll warm us some brose."

Ash did as she was told, finding a stout little stool to her liking.

She watched as Darra poured frothy amber beer into a pot, then thickened
it with a hand of oatmeal.

"I'm sorry if my coming here has upset you."

Darra did not stop what she was doingas she replied,

"No, Ash.  It's me who should apologize to you.  I offered a poor
welcome. I... you .

" She struggled for words.

"It's not often Angus brings visitors to the house."

She had meant to say something else, Ash was sure of it, but before she
had chance to question Darra further the door opened and Raifand all
three of Angus' daughters burst into the room.

"Look, Mother!"  cried the middle daughter.

"Raif brought down two ptarmigan on the dog flats.  He said they were
flyingas fast as eagles when he took them.  And he's promised to teach
me how to shoot."

Raifs smile was tactful.  He had probably said no such thing.

"Hush, child," said Darra.

"Raif, come and warm yourself by the hearth.  We haven't got any black
beer, I'm afraid, only brose."

"Brose will be good."

"I don't doubt it," Angus said, emerging from another door with a huge
iron pot filled to the rim with water.

"Tern's black beer has doubtless ruined your palate for life."

"It was useful for keeping flies away in summer," Raif said.

"Aye, and women and maidens, too!"

Everyone laughed.  Ash guessed that Tern's beer was famous for being
bad. She smiled, then joined in the laughter.  It was good to learn
something small and homely about Raifs life back in the clan.

"Father."  The middle daughter turned the word into a reprimand.  Her
large gray blue eyes rolled in the direction of Ash.

"We haven't met the lady yet."

Ash felt her cheeks color.  Cassy sent her a sympathetic Sorry my
sister's acting like a fool look.

Angus frowned.  He fitted the iron pot onto the warming stone, where its
height and breadth halved the light in the room.  That done, he turned
and surveyed his three girls, who were lined up from smallest to tallest
by the door.  After a moment he growled at them, sounding just like an
agingand much-put-upon wolf.  Little Moo growled right back, mimicking
him perfectly. The two elder girls tried but did not succeed in keeping
straight faces.

"Daughters!"  Angus complained to no one in particular.

"Who would have them?"

theatrically at his middle daughter"--the talker of the family.  And
Maribelthe" -- "Growler," said Beth, quick as only a child could.

Angus very nearly gave himself away by laughing.

"The baby."

"Moo!  Moo!"  said Little Moo.

"Aye," Angus said.

"My youngest child, for reasons known only to herself, refuses to answer
to any name other than Little Moo."

"Moo!  Moo!"  repeated Little Moo, eminently satisfied that her name
situation had been explained.

Ash smiled shyly at the three girls.  Cassy smiled back; Beth curtsied
in an elaborate manner, losing her footing on the knee bend and knocking
into the door; and Little Moo giggled, growled, and said, "Moo!  Moo!" a
few more times for good measure.

"Girls," Angus said, "this is Ash.  She's traveling with me and Raif for
a while.  And tonight she's our special guest and must be treated so by
all of you.  Understand?"  All three girls nodded.

"Good."

"Father, can Ash sleep with me and Beth tonight?"  Gassy raised her
bright hazel eyes to meet Ash's.

"If you'd like to?"

Ash nodded.  Gassy was almost as tall as she, but better filled out,
with proper breasts and hips.  Her hair was glorious, sometimes red,
sometimes golden, thick and wavy and full of light.  Ash thought for a
brief moment of Katia, of her dark beautiful hair that no amount of pins
could tame, then shut the memory away.

"Gassy, why don't you take Ash to your room?"  Darra poured hot cloudy
liquid into a set of wooden cups as she spoke.

"Help her bathe and change if she'd like to.  She's had a hard journey
and may want to rest before supper."

Ash sent a look of thanks to Darra.  Meeting Angus' family had left her
shaken and exhausted.

"Can I come, too?"  Eagerness lit up Beth's small pink face.

"I'll help with her clothes and hair."

"No," Darra said.

"Just Gassy."

ur) , rv But-- "I said no.  You can go up later, once she's rested."
Beth closed her mouth.  Her bottom lip trembled.

A moment passed.  The kitchen was so quiet Ash could hear the impurities
in the firewood sizzle as they burned.

Then Raif stood and extended his arm toward Beth.

"What say you and I go outside and shred some wood7 I'll have you
hitting bull's-eyes by sundown."

Ash loved him for that.  It was the act of someone who knew what it was
to have sisters and brothers of his own.

Issuinga high, excited scream, Beth ran to Raifs side and hugged him
fiercely.  Together they left the house, Beth hitting Raif with a
barrage of questions about bows, arrows, ptarmigan, the lady with the
silvery hair.

Angus and Darra exchanged a glance, then Angus slipped on two thick
sheepskin mitts and picked the now hot iron basin from the hearth.

"Follow me," he said to Gassy and Ash.

He led them up a flight of stairs and into a tiny, odd-shaped room.

Once he'd placed the iron tub on the floor, he lit an oil lamp and left.
Ash noticed how his hand came up to touch his daughter's cheek as he
crossed toward the door.

"Would you like to wash now, or rest?"  Cassy gestured toward one of the
two boxed pallets that lay against opposing walls.  The room was
sparsely furnished, with plain walls and a rug of woven rushes.  The
only item of furniture beside the pallets was a small table that had
originally been built for carpentry work, as the many hammered nail
heads saw marks, and chisel gouges attested to.

"I'm sorry the room's a bit bare.  Beth and I hardly spend any time
here."

Ash shook her head, thinking of her own silk-lined, thick- rugged,
amber-warmed chamber in Mask Fortress.

"No.  I like it very much.  The bathwater looks tempting.  I think I
might wash first."

Cassy came forward to help her with the hooks and eyes of her skirt.

Her hands were rough and callused, split in part by old scars, and Ash
reminded herself that Cassy lived on a working farm.

"Father's away a lot some years," Cassy said, obviously noticing
wherever Ash's gaze rested.

"Last spring Mother and I had to shear the lambs ourselves.  They kicked
a lot."

Ash made no effort to hide her own street-worn hands.

"Usually Father tries to go away in the winter, when there isn't much to
do except feed the chickens and milk the ewes.  But sometimes the birds
come in summer and springand there's nothing he can do about it."

"Birds?"

"Messages.  .  .  from people."

"Oh."  Ash waited, but Cassy said no more.

"Can no one in the village help with the sheep?"

Cassy shook her head, sending her auburn hair dancing.

"No.  We never talk to anyone in the Three Villages.  We keep to
ourselves."

Ash thought that strange yet didn't say so.  Stepping out of her skirt
and underskirt, she watched as Cassy tested the bath.  What was Angus
afraid of? What made him hide his family away?

"The water's not very hot, I'm afraid.  Father still imagines that girls
are like men: One quick dunk and we're done."

Ash grinned.  She liked Cassy very much.

"Your father's a kind man."

"Tell him that and he'd spend more time denying it than he would if you
swore he was a rogue."

Bracing herself against the coolness of the water, Ash stepped into the
iron basin.  Cassy began making lather with a hard wedge of charcoal
soap and a linen cloth.  Ash guessed the cloth was Cassy's best, as it
had little birds embroidered around the border.

Cassy began washing Ash's hair with the firm, capable movements of a
girl who probably performed the same duty each week on her sisters.

"How long will you be gone?"  she asked as she poured rinse water over
Ash's scalp.

"If it's all right to say."

"I don't know.  Not long, I hope.  A month, perhaps."  As she spoke, Ash
imagined a map of the Northern Territories in her head.  The Storm
Margin lay far to the west, caught between the Coastal Ranges and the
Wrecking Sea.  She knew only bits of things about the Margin; about the
chain of Floating Isles just off its coast that were surrounded by mist
year-round and where the Sull King Lyan Summerled was said to have died;
and about the Ice Trappers in the Far North, who camped upon the sea ice
in midwinter and chewed upon squares of frozen seal blood like clansmen
chewed upon curd.  Far to the south lay the Seahold, where the Trader
Kings lived.

"I envy you."

Ash looked up to see Cassy Lok watching her closely.  It was in her mind
to say something lighthearted and dismissive, something about
trekkingacross thick snow in winter not being the sort of thingany sane
person would envy, yet when she saw the expression on Cassy's face.  Ash
knew instantly that Angus' daughter meant what she said.

Cassy Lok wasn't the sort of person to say anything lightly.

"I envy you," Ash replied, and meant it.

CHAPTER THIRTY-SIX.

A Moon Made of Blood Breakfast was eaten in silence.  Crusty bread,
smoked bacon, and mushrooms drenched in butter were washed down with
ewe's milk flavored with pine nuts.  All the plates and cups were made
of white oak, so even the business of cuttingand spearing did little to
break the hush.

Angus ate as slowly as a condemned man, cutting his bacon into ever
smaller bits until a substance resembling sawdust filled his plate.

Raifsat by the kitchen's only window, a tub of wax floating in a bath of
hot water by his side.  Every now and then he'd scoop some of the wax
with a cloth and work it into his bow.  "Weatherproofing," he had said
earlier to Beth, who never stopped asking him questions.  More often
than not his gaze was on the dark gray sky outside the window.

Cassy sat beside Ash on the bench by the fire.  They did not speak, but
the silence between them was comfortable.  Cassy had Little Moo on her
lap, and the little blond-haired child was sucking on a rasher of bacon
as stiff as a twig.  Darra Lok sat at the table with her husband and her
middle child. Every now and then Ash was aware of Darra's gaze upon her.
She pretended not to notice, but it worried her.  What had Angus said to
his wife?

Angus chose that moment to push his plate into the center of the table
and stand.

"We'd best be on our way."

Everyone, including Raif, stood up on hearing his words, and within
seconds the Lok farmhouse became alive with activity.

Cassy ran upstairs to fetch Ash's things, Beth ran to the stables to
saddle the horses with Raif, Angus topped his rabbit flask from a keg by
the door, and Darra began winding the remains of last night's ptarmigan
in strips of waxed linen.

Ash started the long process of wrapping, buckling, and caulking herself
against the cold.  She didn't know if she was sorry to leave or not.
Angus' family were close to what she had always imagined a family should
be, yet she had no place in it, and that knowledge left her strangely
cold.

She was Ash March, Foundling, left outside Vaingate to die.

The words--her words--made her stronger, and she said her good-byes to
Angus' family and went to join Raif outside.

Saddlebags and bedrolls were buckled onto the horses, last words were
spoken, and then the three travelers mounted and rode south through the
forest of old trees.

Angus did not look back.  Ash did, and she saw Cassy Lok's hazel eyes
filled with longingand Darra Lok's blue ones filled with fear.

They followed the green river west for many leagues, shoulders hunched
against the wind, heads down, silent.  Storm clouds formed troughs and
swells in the sky, and it wasn't long before Ash felt rain spit against
her face. Warm air driven south before the storm had caused a minor
thaw, and the snow underfoot was wet, and not all pond ice could be
trusted.  Snowshoe was no dancer like the bay, but she was a wily pony
and soon learned to follow Angus' gelding step for step.  Gradually the
old hardwoods gave way to open fells and stunted pines.

After a noonday meal of cold salted ptarmigan, Angus turned northwest
toward the Bitter Hills.  Ash sat and suffered the wind and rain.  She
would have been grateful for any sort of conversation, but neither Angus
nor Raif had a mind to do anything but ride.

The Bitter Hills changed color the nearer you drew to them.  Ash had
first thought they were gray, then blue.  Now, as she and her two
companions headed straight for the walls and cirques of the hills'
southern approach, she saw veins of green copper, white shale, and black
iron threaded through the rock. Ash remembered her foster father telling
her that the Bitter Hills had once been named mountains by the people of
Ille Glaive, but visiting clansmen had laughed at them, saying,

"These wee things?  Why, they're naught but hills."  With storm clouds
massed at their throats like furs around a king, the Bitter Hills looked
like mountains to Ash.

As darkness came and the rain cooled to sleet, Angus turned his party
once more.  Locatinga path at the base of the hills that ran above an
ice-sealed stream, he led them west along the border between Ille Glaive
and the clan holds

They traveled through much of the night.  The hills acted as a barrier
between the horses and the worst of the storm.  As the hours wore on,
Ash became increasingly aware of Cant's war dings They dug into her
chest like wire, painful sometimes when she moved too quickly or
breathed too hard.  She still didn't know what to make of Cant's claim
that she was a Reach.  Before Cant had spoken she had never heard that
such a thing existed.  And if a Reach had been born a thousand years
ago, why did no one in Spire Vanis know it?  Ash knew her history.

Haldor Hews was the surlord then, and he had reigned for sixty years.

During that time he had extended the reach of the city hold to the
southern tip of the Black Spill and brought so much wealth into the city
that he became known as Haldor the Provider.  Ash frowned.  Yet a Reach
had been born then; Cant had said so.  And a thousand years earlier .  .
.  Ash thought a moment as she checked her dates, .  .

Theron and Rangor Pengaron had ridden their war host north and founded
the city itself.

Puzzled, Ash shook her head.  It really didn't seem as if a Reach could
bringall the horrors that Cant said.

Not quite feeling relieved.  Ash kicked her heels into pony flesh and
turned her mind to other things.

Not much later Angus called a halt, and camp was made hard against the
stream.  Raiflit a fire, but no one had the inclination or energy for
choppingand stripping wood, and it fizzled quickly after the ptarmigan
fat had been rendered to make stock.  Ash fell asleep with grease on her
lips, bundled deep within a goose down quilt that had been a gift from
Darra Lok.

A second, greater storm front moved south across the hills overnight,
and Ash was woken by a pebble spray of hailstones on her back.  Locks of
her hair that had escaped her fox hood were stuck to the ground with
frost.  The temperature had dropped again, and when she crouched in the
bushes to make water, she half expected her urine to freeze.

It didn't.  At least not in the time it took to straighten her stockings
and skirt.

No one spoke as they broke camp.  The wind howled through ridges and
canyons, shifting pitch like a human voice.  Raif and Angus rode to
either side of Ash, buffering her against the storm.  There was no true
daylight to mark the day's passage.  The farther west they traveled, the
flatter and more rounded the hills became.  Clouds boiled above them,
sending sprays of ice and snow to sand already smooth slopes.

"Ganmiddich Tower should be in that bank ahead," Angus shouted as the
storm light began to fail, flinging his arm toward the clouds.

"If we turned north here, we'd be at the pass within an hour."

Ash looked but could see nothing except hailstones and clouds.

Darkness descended even as Angus returned his hand to the reins.  Ash
kept glancing north, hoping for a glimpse of the tower.

After a while she became aware of a pale glow above the hilltops.

Thick curtains of cloud hid its color and center, and at first she
thought it was the rising moon or the north star.  Then the wind gusted
west, clearinga small portion of sky, and a ball of red fire was
revealed.

Ash felt something drop in her stomach.  Reaching over, she touched
Raifs arm.  His gaze followed hers, and she watched as his eyes and face
turned red with reflected light.

"Light in the tower," he said quietly.

"The red fire of Clan Bludd."

Those were the last words she heard him speak that night.

A flight of arrows skimmed the air, whirringas softly as a fisherman
droppinga line.  Something thwacked against Snowshoe's rump, making the
pony rear and break with the other horses.  Ash sawed at Snowshoe's
mouth, but the pony was scared and determined to flee.

Similar impacts hit Moose and the bay.  Raif fought his horse, pulling
hard on the reins and wheeling the gelding through a half turn.  As Ash
looked on, he bit off one of his gloves and spat it into the snow.  The
bay stood his ground.  Sull trained, Ash remembered, glimpsing twin
flashes of steel as Angus drew both knife and sword.

A second arrow hit the pony in the chest.  This time Ash got a quick
look at the head before it fell: a thumb of rounded wood capped with
lead.  A blunt. As she tried to make sense of what that meant, a troop
of mounted clansmen descended the southern slope.  Ash saw long oiled
braids, sable cloaks, dull plate, and boiled leather dyed the color of
blood.

Crack!  Ash's world flashed red and white as a blunt clipped her chin.

Her teeth roots rang with pain.  Working to steady herself in the seat,
she pulled so hard on the reins that Snowshoe reared and screamed.  Cool
air whiffled past Ash's cheek as another blunt sailed wide.  The arrows
were coming from the east.  To the north, the mounted clansmen spread
wide as they reached level ground.

Out of the corner other eye, she saw the risingarc of Raif s bow.  It
was Raifs bow now; it had been Angus' once, but seeing it bend like a
dancer's spine in Raifs hand, she knew Angus could never ask for it
back.

Fear filled Ash's mouth the instant he released the string.  She didn't
need to look over her shoulder to know that the point would find a
clansman's heart.

Coldness took her.  It's so easy for him, she thought.  If he had enough
arrows, he could kill them all.

Suddenly Angus was beside her, wheeling the bay so tightly that clods of
snow and frozen dirt spattered against her leg.

"Behind me," he said.

The bay's steady presence calmed Snowshoe, and she stopped fighting
against the bit and allowed Ash to maneuver her against Angus' flank.

A blunt skipped off the bay's neck, yet the great Sull horse held his
ground.  Ash looked into the gelding's brown liquid eye and felt a
moment of pure reverence.  We've danced together, you and

I.

A dozen clansmen bore down on them across the runoff plain at the base
of the hill.  There were more somewhere, hidden in the darkness to the
east, shooting blunts.  Ash watched as the warriors un couched their
steel points and lowered them as they rode.  Spearheads set with back
hooks to snag flesh reached ten paces beyond the horses' heads.

Raiftook one down, then another.

"Who are they?"  screamed Ash.

Angus' weapons wept oil as he raised them.

"Bluddsmen.  They've taken Ganmiddich and want the world to know it...
that's why they lit a fire in the tower."

"Why bother with us?"  Ash was close to hysterical.  The sight of Raif
drawing his bow was terrible to her.  She wanted Angus to stop him.

Pointing his knife at Raif, Ash, and then himself, Angus said, "Take
your pick.  All three of us are prizes worth taking."

Ash didn't know what he meant.  What would clansmen want with her?  And
then: What had Raif done to warrant taking?  Even as that thought
burrowed deep in her thoughts, a storm of blunts hit Raif and his horse.
Moose kicked and howled as his forelegs, ears, and snout were smacked.
Raif was struck in the throat and the bow hand causing him to lose his
grip on the bow.  Hands scrambling for the reins, he worked to control
the thrashing horse.

Ash let out a small cry.  Raifs skin was gray, and something close to
madness shone from behind his eyes.  Without a thought, she kicked
Snowshoe's flanks. She had to go to him.

Angus' hand shot out, gripping her wrist so tightly that knuckles
cracked.

"No!"

Furious, Ash fought him, lashing out with her free hand and driving
Snowshoe into the bay.  Her fingernails hooked Angus' cheek, and she
scraped four strips of skin from his face.  Still he would not release
her.

The line of clansmen were closing on Raif.  Their steel points

shone as red as Rive Watch blades where they caught the tower's light.
Calls passed between the clansmen, terse words roughly spoken.

Their black armor had been tarnished so that it reflected no light, and
their cloaks-of-fur rippled like living shadows at their backs.

To the east, the company of bowmen finally showed themselves, trotting
wide on horses bred for the darkness of their coats.

"Calm yourself," Angus said, twisting Ash's arm to stop her fighting.

"They will not harm him."

It was then Ash realized they were going to be taken.  She shot Angus an
accusation of a glance.

"I will not endanger you by fighting against such odds."  Blood rolled
down Angus' cheek where she had scratched him, yet he heeded it not.

His eyes were on Raif.  Sobered, Ash let her arm go limp in Angus' grip.

Raif now had Moose under control, and his half sword was drawn and
ready.  He was facing the line of Bluddsmen, yet he glanced over his
shoulder and met eyes with his uncle.  An unspoken communication passed
between the two, and Raif nodded imperceptibly.  Turning to meet the
Bluddsmen, he raised his sword over his head, skimming the cutting edge
against his free hand to draw the blood that was needed as a sign of
submission.

For her.  Ash knew that in every cell other being.  If she had not been
here, riding with these two men, the fight would still be waging.

Perhaps Angus would have come up with some clever way to retreat,
perhaps not.  But Raif would have fought to the end.  Ash had seen that
madness in him .  he was never far from death.

The Bluddsmen slowed but held their points.  A leader emerged from the
line, indistinguishable in every way from his companions except for the
fact he pulled ahead.  He wore no helm, and the shaved portions of his
head had been painted with red clay.  When he judged the distance
sufficient, he raised a fist and stopped both warriors and bowmen dead.

Ash had never seen a Bluddsman before, but like everyone else in the
North, she believed them to be the most savage of the clans.

It took all her will not to call to Raif, to have him turn and look at
her one last time before he was taken.

"Do not speak his name," Angus warned, renewing his grip on her wrist.

All was quiet except for the wind.  The red fire in the uppermost
chamber of the Ganmiddich Tower shone like a moon made of blood.  Two
men stood twelve paces apart: one with his sword lifted high above his
head and a line of dark blood snaking down his wrist, the other with his
spear pointed straight at the first man's heart.

With his free hand, the Bluddsman lifted his lore from his chest and
weighed it.  Just like Raif, Ash thought, hairs on her arms rising.

After a time the Bluddsman let the small token drop to his chest.

Taking his spear in both hands, he broke the shaft in two.  The crack
sounded like nothing else Ash had ever heard, like a great stone split
open or a tree falling to the earth.  Bluddsmen signed to their gods.
Some touched the hide pouches and horn vials that hung from their
equipment belts along with blade grease, sheath knives, and dog hooks. A
night heron took to the air, its wings curling upward as it crossed the
light of the red moon.  Somewhere far to the north a wolf howled to its
pack members, telling of carrion found and waiting.

Angus whispered two words under his breath.

"They know."

Hearing them.  Ash was filled with dread.  She wanted to ask what it was
they knew, yet her throat had lost its power to form words.

Raifs shoulders held firm.  He had neither wavered nor flinched at the
spear breaking, and Ash was filled with the certainty that he had been
expecting such an action from the moment he had raised his sword.

"I am Cluff Drybannock of Clan Bludd," the leader said, speaking in a
low voice, "and I claim your heart for the Dog Lord, Raif Sevrance of
Clan Blackhail, for wrongs done to our clan."

A cold light shone in the Bluddsman's eyes for one long moment, then
Cluff Drybannock turned his back on Raif.  Addressing himself to no one
particular in the line, he said,

"Strip him of his euidestone.  One such as he deserves no protection
from our gods."  Ash glanced at Angus.  For the first time since she had
met him, Angus Lok looked afraid.

Maiafice Eye's foot stank.  Blisters the size of eyeballs wept fluid
onto the inn floor.  Black and purple skin floated over a mass of
swollen tissue. Beneath the shell of dead and shedding skin, the plump
pinkness of proud flesh could just be seen.  The proud flesh was a good
sign: It meant the foot would survive intact.

Well, nearly.  The tip of the Knife's big toe had already come away,
cast off in a jelly of red translucent flesh like something birthed in
the deepest troughs of the sea.  Sarga Veys shuddered at the memory.  He
hated sickness in any form.

"How much longer before I can put this damned foot in a stirrup,
Halfman?" Marafice Eye spoke from the largest chair, set closest to the
fire, in the third finest inn in Ille Glaive.

Hood, sworn brother-in-the-watch and distant kinsman to the Lord of the
Straw Granges, sat across from his general on a birch wood bench,
working his way through a keg of black beer thickened with egg and a
haunch of roasted elk as big as a child.  Hood and Sarga Veys had ridden
to the city while the Knife was carted in a one-horse wagon like a bale
of hay.  Hood's excellent horsemanship had not been affected in the
slightest by the loss of two fingers on his right hand.  Indeed, the man
seemed determined to make the best of it.  Veys thought him mad.  Just
last night Hood had stopped him in the corridor and waggled the stumps
in his face.  Make you sick, do they?  he had said, his wet lips coming
close to Veys' ear.  You should see how they pleasure the wenches.

Veys' face darkened at the memory.  He hated being holed up with
Marafice Eye and his thick-necked crony.  Where was the sept Penthero
Iss had promised? Veys wouldn't have put it past the Sur- lord to slow
their sending just to torture him further.  Everyone was intent on
causing him harm.  Letting his anger seep into his voice, Veys said to
the Knife,

"The top layer of skin must shed before you can strap on a boot."

"And how long might that be?"

"A week," Veys replied, deliberately addinga few extra days to the
tally.

The Knife cursed.  Swipinga hand across the table, he sent dishes and
flagons crashing to the floor.  Beer hissed where it landed on the
hearthstone.

"A week!  A week!  You said it was cured.  Now look at it."

He thrust the blistered and weeping foot toward Veys.

"Your foul magics have made a leper of me."

"I said that I had warmed the flesh as best I could.  You will not lose
your foot.  You will be able to walk and ride as normal.  What is
happening now is just the natural course of events.  I cannot make your
skin heal any faster."

"Aye, but you'd make it heal slower if you could."  Hood turned over a
cracked dish with the toe of his boot.

"If the limb festers, you die, Halfman.  My own eight fingers will see
to that."

Veys pinched his lips tight.  He didn't understand Hood's loyalty to the
Knife, yet he knew it was something real.  Hood would kill him, and it
would be out of some strange and twisted brother love for Marafice Eye.

Pale eyes glinting in anger, Veys watched as the innkeeper a fat man
with womanish breasts shoved one of his girls toward their table to
clear up the mess.  The girl was blond, fleshy, and brazen, exactly the
kind of woman Veys despised and Hood and the Knife well liked.

Deciding it was time to leave, Veys stood.  He had no wish to witness
Hood and the Knife exchanging the kinds of obscenities they took for
flirting with some cheap, overfed whore.

Looking to the Knife's foot, he said,

"As long as it's cleaned and packed with dog mercury each night, the
skin will not fester."

Marafice Eye grunted.

Hood smiled slowly, revealinga good portion of unswallowed elk between
his teeth.  Grabbing the blond girl by the waist, he forced her into his
lap.

"Running off to your bed, Halfman?  The thought of our little Moll here
scares you that much!"

The sound of Hood's laughter accompanied Veys from the taproom.

Holding his white robe above the stair level so it didn't catch dust
from the floor, Veys mounted the inn's main staircase and headed for his
private chamber.  The third best inn in llle Glaive was named the
Dropped Calf, and calf hides, calf pelt rugs, and paintings of calves
formed the main decorations.  Even the wax candles that lit the
stairwell shone from scrubbed calf craniums, giving Sarga Veys the
feeling he was being watched by the spirits of long-dead gras seaters as
he made his escape.

The quiet grandeur of his room soothed him.  No dirty rushes, no cheap
boxed pallet, no tallow, unwashed linen, or pests.  Instead there was a
proper pitch pine floor, a bed carved from fruit wood a dozen beeswax
candles whiter than his own teeth, bed linens as crisp as autumn leaves,
and nothing but stray filaments of dust buzzingaround the light.
Gratifyingly enough, upon their arrival at the Dropped Calf the
innkeeper had mistaken him for the head of the party and had housed
Marafice Eye and Hood on the far side of the inn, in a chamber that
looked out across the vinegar brewery next door.  Veys had at first been
surprised when Marafice Eye discovered the error and chose to do nothing
about it, then contemptuous.  The Knife could think no further than the
Rive Watch and his men.

Of course, the passing days had shown the innkeeper who the real leader
was, yet it pleased Sarga Veys' vanity to remind himself that on first
look he had seemed the superior man.

The greasy smoke in the taproom had agitated Veys' eyes, and he crossed
to the nearest of the two north-facing windows and flung back the
shutters to let in the night.  Icy darkness soothed him like a dip into
a still pool.

The Dropped Calf was situated close to the north wall of the city, and
its height and elevation allowed Veys a view across the battlements to
the city hold beyond.

The glacier-ground peaks of the Bitter Hills were a distant break on the
horizon, topped by a crown of silver storm clouds.  Each winter a
hundred storms traveled south from the clan holds and the Want, some so
close behind each other that three had been known to hit in the course
of a single day.  The Bitter Hills took punishment from them all.
Perhaps once they had been mountains, yet between the grinding of
ancient glaciers and the lashing of a million storms, they had been
reduced to that awkward height that man had no right name for.  Clansmen
called them hills, yet that was just clannish bravado.

And Veys knew all about that.

Making a small grimace of distaste that exposed his fine, inward
slanting teeth to the light, Veys sat at the oak desk that was
positioned in front of the window.  An excellent, large-scale map of the
Ille Glaive city hold lay unraveled and pinned to the wood.  The map had
cost Veys a small fortune, purchased earlier that day from a young
ambitious chart maker named Siddius Horn, and it merited every coin paid
and more.

"All villages within thirty leagues of the city are marked and plotted,"
boasted Siddius Horn from behind the shabby, acid- burned counter of his
shop.

"All hamlets, all proper farms, all roads, shared cattle trails, and
elevations."

It was a very good map.

Veys trailed a finger over the bleached silk-rag paper, tracing the
course of Ille Glaive's northern road.  The road, painstakingly traced
in iron ink with a hair-fine sable brush, led directly from the Old Sull
Gate to the Ganmiddich Pass.  Angus Lok and his two companions had taken
that road from the city.  Veys knew that.  He also knew that instead of
continuing north to the pass or turning west toward Clan Blackball, they
had turned east instead.

The first piece of information had come cheaply enough.  Gatekeepers
were as willingly bribed as small children.  It had taken Hood but
quarter of a day to find the right gate and the right gatekeeper and
purchase what intelligence was needed.  The second piece of information
was all Veys.

Yesterday morning, after Hood had returned to the Dropped Calf, Veys had
paid a visit to the Old Sull Gate himself.  More coins had changed
hands.  All bore the fine undetectable film of grease that formed on
objects much handled and much used, yet one bore a little something
extra as well: a compulsion. Compulsions were

high sorcery, and Veys was good at them.  More often than not a
compulsion was spoken, not passed from hand to hand, but Veys didn't
have the voice for it.  A warm, rich, compelling voice was best.  The
sort of voice that encouraged a man to take part in one's schemes, that
flattered his ego, and played tricks with his reason, and made the most
irregular requests sound sane.  A good voice and a commanding presence
were half the work of a compulsion.  Without them, such sorcery was hard
work.

It had taken Veys most of the night to fix the compulsion on the coin.
It was a simple one, of course.  Compulsions only worked when the
request was modest and of a nature that did not antagonize the victim in
any way.  Mostly they were good for information.  With a compulsion upon
him, a jailer might let slip the time of day when his prisoner was fed
and the cell door was open, a pretty chambermaid might disclose her
mistress's bedtime indiscretions, and a respectable innkeeper might
point the way to the room of a guest who had just paid him good money
for silence.  The trick was in making the person want to fulfill one's
request.

With the five silver coins that Veys had passed to the lean- bodied,
smoke-eyed guardsman, he had also passed along the suggestion that the
man ask all who passed into the city that morninga simple question.  Had
they seen two men and a woman riding together, the men mounted on good
horses and the woman atop a gray hill-bred pony?

The guardsman's eyes had turned from smoky to blank as Veys spoke his
request.  No power was present in Veys' voice, yet the coin pressing
against the red flesh of the guard's palm had burned cold with sorcery.
The guard had nodded his assent even before Veys had reached the words
gray hill-bred pony.

Haifa day had been enough.  After a small but excellent noonday meal of
pheasant prepared in a crust of its own blood, Veys had returned to the
guard and the gate.  The guard related his intelligence in a voice that
was fast and furtive--somewhere deep inside he knew that what he did was
wrong. Several people had sighted the three companions heading north
toward the pass, and Veys was about to conclude that Angus Lok and his
party had indeed crossed into the clan holds when the guard offered his
last piece of information.

"A drover and his son said they saw such a party heading east three
nights back.  Said they were about ten leagues off the north road,
travelingalong a cattle path known only to locals and drovers."

Veys made no reply--one did not thank an ensorcelled man-- simply turned
his back and walked away.  A few discreet inquiries produced the name of
the best chart maker in the city, and not many hours later Veys was back
in the comfort of his well- appointed chamber, plotting Angus Lok's
journey with a pot of lampblack ink and a twig.

The guard's information was sound.  It was just like Angus Lok to know
the back ways: the low roads, cattle paths, game tracks, and dogtrots.
If a drover had claimed to see him in such a place, then the drover was
likely right.

Satisfied in that regard, at least, Veys sat back and contemplated
Siddius Horn's map.  Until an hour ago he had assumed that Lok's final
destination lay east.  Now he wasn't so sure.

Asarhia March's trail was dead.  Either the sorcery that had clung to
her had worn offer she had been warded by someone very clever indeed.

Warding was a difficult business.  One could not set war dings in place
without giving something of oneself to the person who was being
protected. Only few magic users could manage them, and almost all were
likely members of the Phage.

Veys' lip twisted with the force of unwanted memories.  Yes, there were
one or two people in this city capable of warding ; Asarhia March .  . .
but that was not what concerned him now.  t Other sorceries did.  I An
hour earlier, while he had sat with Marafice Eye and Hood J h in the
taproom, wetting his lips with beer he found too coarse to ;| swallow
and cutting slivers of meat from the inner loin of elk, he '-j had felt
a different source of power in the North.  Three fast jabs, | one after
another.  Barely sorcery at all, so instinctively was it used I by he
who drew it.  i The Clansman.  ;

Veys had perceived him twice before.  Once, in Spire Vanis as he
heart-killed four sworn brothers in the shadow ofVaingate, and aeain on
the shore of the Black Spill when he took down a pair of hounds.

His aftermath reeked of Old Blood.  It made Veys' skin crawl.  As soon
as he perceived it, it was gone.

North was all Veys knew.  North, not east.  North.

A clean and perfectly filed fingernail scratched a furrow in Sid- dius
Horn's map.  After a three-day detour east, Angus Lok and his party were
back at the Ganmiddich Pass.

To Sarga Veys that meant only one thing: Angus Lok had taken his new
friends home.  Smiling softly to himself as he worked, Veys began to
work out how far three people mounted on good horses could travel east
in a day in thick snow.

CHAPTER THIRTY-SEVEN.

In the Tower hey separated him from Angus and Ash--that he was grateful
for. That was one thing to hold on to in the darkness that was to come:
Ash would not see or know.

The skiff traveled smoothly over water as slick and black as volcanic
glass. The storm had long passed, and the Wolf River was sleeping after
a night spent howlingat the moon.  Raif could smell the thick animal
odor of the water, water that in spring moved so swiftly and with such
force that it killed more elk, horned sheep, snag cats bear cubs, and
small game than the largest pack of wolves in the North.  It smelled of
those kills now, of carrion suspended, half- frozen, in water so thick
and cold that nothing would rot until spring.

The Ganmiddich Inch lay ahead.  The Inch was a shoulder of granite that
broke water in the river's middle, risingabove the surface like the dome
of an ancient temple, long sunk.  The Ganmiddich Tower was built upon
its bedrock. The red fire burning in the tower's uppermost chamber
provided the only light for the skiffs skipper to steer by.

It was close to dawn.  Raif could tell that much from the lay of the
stars and the restless switching of air currents as night made way for
day.  He lay bound in the belly of the skiff, the booted feet of six
Bludd oarsmen keeping him in place.  A rope lashed across the bridge of
his nose made it difficult to breathe, and another binding the soft
tissue of his throat made any but the slightest movements impossible. He
had not been beaten, but rough handling had broken open the hard,
inflexible scar tissue on his chest.  Bluddsmen's spit was still wet on
his face and neck, and scratches on his temples and forehead leaked
blood into the hull of the boat.

Cluff Drybannock stood at the prow, one foot up upon gunwales, his
entire body leaning forward toward the Inch.  Earlier, as they'd ridden
north toward Ganmiddich, he had let down his braids, and now his
waist-long black hair streamed behind him in the predawn chill.

Raif knew Cluff Drybannock by reputation--all clans folk did.  He was
the Dog Lord's right hand, his fostered son, a fatherless Trenchland
bastard who was named after the first meal he had eaten at Clan Bludd:
dry bread.  Now he was known to all as Dry- bone.  He was the only mart
the Dog Lord trusted, people said, the only one who could speak and
fight in his likeness.  And he was the best long swordsman in the North.

A rasping noise broke the quiet of slow-moving water as the boat's keel
scraped against granite pebbles on the Inch's shore.  The oarsmen raised
their oars and waded into the river to haul the body of the skiff
ashore. Cluff Drybannock worked with the men as one of the team, the
tail ends of his hair floating in the animal-scented water as he
shouldered his portion of the weight.

Raif looked up at the vast five-sided tower that had been standing since
before the clan holds were settled.  Algae, mud, and mineral stains
ringed the tower's lower chambers, each ring marking high water levels
of ancient floods.  The stench of the river clung to the stone, hiding
in pockmarks and clefts in the granite.  Ice, colored green and orange
by rust, hung in storm-broken fingers from the tower's ledges,
overhangs, and mooring rings.

The skipper tied the skiff to the nearest ringand then fell in line with
the oarsmen, awaiting Cluff Drybannock's word.

Time passed.  Cluff Drybannock stood, half-in, half-out the water,
watching the red fire burn thirty stories above him.  Weariness was a
hard presence on his face, and Raif wondered what it had taken for him
and his men to capture Ganmiddich's roundhouse and hold.

Finally the Bluddsman spoke, his vivid blue eyes not once leaving the
light of the fire.

"Take him inside and beat him."

The words were heavily said, and the six oarsmen and the skipper reacted
to the tone of their leader s voice by moving slowly and silently about
their task.

Raiffelt large cool hands grasp his shoulders, ankles, and wrists.

Somewhere ahead, an iron door creaked open, and for the first time that
night Raif felt his stomach betray him by clenching in fear.

Chains rattled as he was lifted from the stench and dampness of the
skiff. Fresh air skimmed across his face, but the ropes at his nose and
throat stopped him from inhaling deeply.  The Bluddsmen's breaths came
short and ragged as they hauled him inside the tower.

Inside all was as still and dark as a mine shaft Wet mud sucked at the
Bluddsmen's boots.  Leaking moisture dropped like slow rain on their
backs. The smell of the river was concentrated to a thick stock of meat,
minerals, and mud.  Smoke filtering down from the Bludd Fire provided
the only relief from the stench.  Raif watched stone ceilings pass above
him as he was carried into the tower's heart.  He thought perhaps they
would take him upward, but they bore him down instead.

Mud turned to wet slime and then thick, blood-colored water as they
descended.  No one spoke.  No tallow was lit to guide the way.  Thin
shavings of dawn light came from sources Raif could neither identify nor
see.  River sounds filled his senses.  Even in winter, when the water
was thick with suspended ice and sluggish with cold undertows, its
current throbbed against the watch tower like a stallion's heart.

All around water trickled and dripped, poured and rushed, making the
tower echo like a sea cave.

A second door opened.  Water sloshed around the Bluddsmen's ankles, then
Raif was thrown to the ground.  His shoulder and temple struck hard
stone.  Water filled his mouth and nose.  The rope at his throat was
suddenly tight enough to choke him.  Someone said, "Cut him free,"

and cool blades licked his skin.

Raif saw pale edges: a curved end wall the lip of a stone bench, a
square grille overhead that let in a keyhole's worth of light.  River
water, foul smellingand turgid with algae and gelatinous strings of
animal matter, formed a shin-high pool above the floor.  Raif had no
time to take in more details before the first blow was struck.

Pain exploded in his head, streaking the world white and gray and
filling his mouth with hot blood.  Other blows followed, swift, well
placed, each one a hard wedge in the soft belly of his flesh.  Bluddsmen
grunted.  Water rode high against the walls, spraying the cell like a
ship's prow in a storm.  Raif rose and fell with the waves, grasping
water, then air, fingers scrambling for handholds in the stone.

His jaws clenched and unclenched as he accepted the Bludds- men's blows.
Boot tips hammered at his spine.  Knuckles found the same places in his
ribs. .  .  again and again, like a machine.  Boot heels were thrust
below the water level, seeking out the hidden tissue of thighs and
groin.  Raif thrashed like a hooked fish, knowing the same terror and
confusion.  Pain tore at his senses, causing him to breathe water and
swallow air.  Still the blows came, so many kicks and punches that soon
they could not be separated or counted.  Hard dots of white light burned
in place of his vision.  Vomit blocked his nasal cavity and flooded in
and out of his mouth like driftwood carried on the tide.

Soon he lost all sense of where he was and what was happening.  Blows
and dealing with the pain of them were all he knew.  Water buoyed but
did not cool him.  His back was afire, stripped of skin and bleeding
acid in place of blood.  His stomach contracted in hard waves, yet each
time he tried to raise his knees to his chest to soothe the cramping, he
was beaten below the water. .  .  held under by booted feet.

He lost time.  Slaps revived him.  A half-closed fist thudded against
his chest, forcing water from his lungs.  Fingers found his raven lore,
twisted it round and round until the twine that held it was like a
garrote against his throat.  Breathing was impossible .  .  .

More time lost.  Through closed eyes he judged an increase in light.

His eyelids were gummed together--whether by blood, mucus, or swollen
tissue, he did not know.  His throat burned.  Breathing caused
excruciating pain.  A voice grunted words he could no longer understand,
then something that could only have been a human hand pressed against
his skull, forcing his head under the water once more.

When he came to again he was no longer in the water.  Hard stone dug
into his spine and ribs.  His clothes were sodden. Daylight was gone.
People were gone.  He was alone in the darkness with his pain.

Hours passed before he could work up the strength to move his right
hand.  He wasted nothing of himself by trying to open the bruised flaps
of flesh that were eyelids or lick lips that were so dry that a single
breath exhaled through the mouth could cause them to crack and bleed.
Everything within him he put toward raising his hand to his throat.

Pain made him pass out more than once.  Sour matter in his mouth stung
his gums.  The desire for water, just a few clear drops, was strong.

But the desire to reach his raven lore was stronger.

Fingers swollen with bruises grasped at the horn that had been embedded
in his throat.  Blood made the ivory slippery.  Gobs of flesh came away
as he pulled on the twine and closed his fist around the lore.

Ash.  He felt her presence immediately, like a warm breeze or a sliver
of sunlight shining upon his back.  She was close and unharmed.

Cfose and unharmed.

Those words made the next beating bearable.

They came for him at some unknowable point in the night, or perhaps it
was the next night and he had slept or been unconscious through a full
day.  This time they brought a hood for his head.  He wanted to tell
them not to bother, as he could not open his eyes, but instinctively he
knew that any words spoken would condemn him to torture of a worse kind.
They beat him in silence, always silence, grunting softly when strikinga
blow, breathing hard when tired by their exertions.  Someone brought a
knife and slit open skin on his thighs and buttocks.  Someone else
urinated on the wounds.

Days passed.  For hours at a time he was strung up on dog hooks hammered
into the cell wall.  His arms were dead.  The hood over his face made
every breath taste of his own trapped sweat.  He was not fed, and what
water he drank came from the cell floor.  Sometimes the river rose then
fell, washing his own filth away.

Close and unharmed.

Whenever he woke, he spoke those words to himself.  Time came when he no
longer knew their meaning, yet even then they calmed him, like a prayer
spoken in a foreign tongue.

Often he dreamed of Drey: Drey racing through the long summer grass in
the graze; Drey teaching him how to tie and trim trout lures in the dead
of winter when all the trout lakes were frozen; Drey waiting for him on
the camp boundary the day they set Tern's corpse ablaze.  The ambush on
the Bluddroad always played itself out one beat slower than real time.
Time and time again Raif saw the two hard points of his brother's eyes
as he swung his war- scratched hammer into the Bluddswoman's face.

No.  Raifs dream-self fought the memory.  That was not his brother
swinging the hammer that day on the Bluddroad.  That was not the Drey he
knew.

Hunger gnawed at Raifs body, then his mind, robbing flesh and sanity and
the simple ability to rest in peace.  Waiting became worse than the
heatings. Waiting, he was alone, utterly alone.  Thoughts and dreams
tormented him. Inigar Stoop pointed a finger, calling him Watcher of the
Dead.  Tern walked from the badlands fire, his body alive with flames,
his mouth openingand closingas he spoke the names of the men who had
killed him.  Raif strained and strained but could not hear them.  Later
Effie was there in the cell with him, standing knee deep in water,
calmly recitinga list of the lives he had taken .  .  and somehow Shor
Gormalin and Banron Lye were on the list, and he wanted to tell her that
she was wrong, that he had killed no Bailsmen, but she disappeared
before he could form the words.  Later still Mace Blackhail was there,
beneath the water, his wolf teeth flashing yellow as he laughed and
said, I knew you'd push me too far, Sevrance.

Pain was something Raif passed out from and woke to every day.

Bruises blackened his body, yet he could not see them.  Split skin
knitted and festered, healed and reopened, raising scars and welts that
only his fingers knew.  Unseen Bluddsmen choked and suffocated him into
submission every night, his head held underwater until his lungs burned
like furnaces, the cord that held his lore twisted until it robbed his
breath.  Soon the sickening blackness of unconsciousness was all he knew
of sleep.

Then one day the heatings stopped.  The high whine of the cell door woke
him from unknowable hours of senselessness.  Through the fog of wakening
senses, Raif waited for the first blow to land.  His body was stiff with
pain, his stomach sick with it.  Above his head his arms ached with the
strain of bearing his weight.  Every breath cost him.  A muscle spasm in
his knee made his entire body jerk.

Close and unharmed.  Who?  Effie?  Was she here?

All thoughts left him as air switched against his throat.  He hated his
body for flinching, hated the fear that came to him as instantly as if
he were a child listening for monsters in the dark.

The expected blow did not come.  Instead hands worked on the rope that
bound his wrists to the dog hook.  The sour taste of helplessness stung
his mouth. The routine was to beat him while he was strung, then later,
when he was incapable of taking action to protect himself from a fall,
let him drop to the stone bench or the floor.  The change in tactics
made him nervous.  When firm hands took him by the shoulders, he heard
himself make an animal sound, like a hiss.

Fingers grabbed the base of his hood, snapping his head back.  "Now is
no time to fight, Hailsman."  The voice was rough, heavily accented.

Its owner took Raifs weight when the last of the ropes was cut and then
laid him down upon the bench.

Relief soaked through Raif like water through a rag, leaving his body
cold and limp.  Another pair of hands clutched his throat, but he hardly
cared. At least he would be beaten lying down.

A knife point pricked his jaw as the rope that held the burlap hood in
place was sawed.  Blood rolled into the crease between Raifs lips.

The Bluddsman working the knife smelled of the last meal he had eaten.
The stench of scorched animal fat and roasted leeks drove Raif to open
his mouth and make a blood meal of the fluids accumulated there.  When
the rope was severed, the Bludds- man's fingers hooked the hem of the
hood and pulled it free.

Raif squeezed his eyes more tightly closed.  It had been days since he
had last seen the faces of those who beat him, and he had no wish to see
them now.  Fresh air buffeted his face--also unwelcome.  Suddenly he
wished very much the beating would begin.

Water sloshed as the man who had handled him left the cell.

Raif heard the door close, yet he did not trust his senses and kept
himself still.  They had never left him awake before.  Minutes passed.

The Wolf River rolled like liquid thunder against the tower's exterior
wall. Somewhere high above him, water dripped in perfect time like a
pulse. Nothing moved in the cell.  Raif concentrated on breathing .  .
that, at least, was something he could do.

"Open your eyes and look at me."

The voice came from close to the door.  It was not the same man who had
spoken earlier, though both shared the Bluddsman's accent.  This voice
was harder, older, wearier.

Water lashed against the cell's walls.

"I said LOOK AT ME."

" Raif obeyed.   Skin on his eyelids tore and bled as he forced the
gummed tissue apart.   Through a film of blood he saw a man of medium
height, heavily built and turning to stoutness, with hair of such
brilliant grayness that the braids that hung down his back seemed like
something woven from silver, not human hair.

The Dog Lord.

Raif knew it instantly.  The man's presence filled the cell like a guide
stone It was impossible not to look at his deep blue eyes, impossible
not to edge back in his presence.  How had he stood there for so long,
watching in utter silence, without making himself known?

The Dog Lord said nothing.  He looked at Raif and through him, his eyes
pullinganswers, his entire being pressingagainst Raif with a force so
great it made breathing impossible.

Raif held his gaze steady.  He thought of the four Bluddsmen at Duffs
Stovehouse, the Bludd women and children running through the snow the
day of the ambush.  Shame burned him.

The Dog Lord continued looking, seeing, knowing.  His heavy breaths made
the shin-deep water ripple as if with dropped stones.  Suddenly he
moved.  Raif braced himself for a blow, but instead the Dog Lord turned
his back.

A cold dagger entered Raifs heart.  The contempt of the gesture cut him
to the core.  You are not worthy of my fist, it said.  You are not
worthy of my breath.

As the Dog Lord opened the cell door and entered the world waiting on
the other side, Raif felt himself shrink and wither like a dead leaf
cast from a tree.  He was nothing.  The Bludd chief's scorn had stripped
away what the heatings could not.  He was an oath breaker, an outcast, a
killer of men.  As Angus had promised, the story of the killings at
Duff's Stovehouse had spread.  Raif Sevrance's name and his deeds were
known to all. His presence at the Bluddroad ambush was known, and the
betrayal of his clan.

Raif brought his knees to his chest and prayed for the senselessness of
sleep.  He did not want to feel or think.  The pain was not enough,
though. The leaking eye, the cracked ribs, the slit ear and lip, and the
torn muscles in his arms and thighs were suddenly hurts that could be
borne.  He lay there in the quarter light and suffered the voices from
his past.

You are no good for this clan, Raif Sevrance, murmured Inigar Stoop.

You are chosen to watch the dead.

You knew I would leave!  Raif fired back at him.  So why did you not
stop me from taking First Oath?

Inigar Stoop shook his head from his place behind the shadows, the
silver medallions sewn to his pig coat making a sound like breaking
glass.  Ask that of the Stone Gods, Raif Sevrance.  It is they who form
your fate, not I. Raif turned away, shifting limbs that felt hot to the
touch.  Still the voices hounded him.  Raina warned him about Erne: Just
you be careful with her, Raif Sevrance.  You and Drey are all she has.

And Drey spoke up for him that day on the court: J will stand second to
his oath.

Raif howled into the darkness.

Hours later, fever finally took him to sleep.

When next he woke the world was soft around the edges.  Someone, a
Bluddsman, placed a bowl containing thick gray liquid beside him on the
bench.  Raif watched the bowl intently.  He did not move.  Fever lines
spreadingalong in his chest made his body tremble.  Thirst tore at his
throat, yet he could take no action to relieve it.  Watching the bowl
was all he could manage, and he did it diligently until he knew no more.

CHAPTER THIRTY-EIGHT.

Lords and Maidens Vaylo Bludd slipped a square of black curd into his
mouth and chewed on it.  The wolf dog and the other dogs sat in a circle
around their master, their great jaws firmly closed, their ears pinned
close to their heads in sign of submission.  Occasionally one would moan
softly, making a sound as if in physical pain.

Vaylo sat in silence, chewing.  Ahead in the distance lay the shimmering
black line of the Wolf River and the dark hump in its center that formed
the Ganmiddich Inch.  It was bitterly cold, yet the Dog Lord felt little
of it. The night air was still, and the sky above the clan hold was
cloudless, revealinga clawed moon and a thousand ice blue stars. Sitting
where he was, on a block of trap rock used for blunting hammer edges and
filleting trout pulled from the river, Vaylo could see both the
Ganmiddich Tower and the roundhouse.  All his now.  All the land south
to the Bitter Hills was his.

Footsteps crunched in the snow behind his back.  The Dog Lord did not
need to look around to know the identity of the one who approached.

The reaction of his dogs told him all he needed to know.

"Does he still live?"

Cluff Drybannock made no answer, yet Vaylo knew well enough the question
had been heard and understood.  Coming to crouch by the dogs, Drybone
gazed out across the river as he warmed his hands against the wolf dog's
throat.  After a while he said,

"He's still fevered.  Cawdo doesn't know how he's made it through the
past five days.  Says any other Hailsman would be dead by now."

Vaylo spat the curd into his glove.  Suddenly he didn't want to be out
in the cold any longer.  He wanted to be close to the hearth, his arms
full of the two grandchildren he had left.  Without a word, he stood.

The dogs were as much a part of him as the gray braids that fell down
his back, and they rose as a single body the moment they heard their
master's boot leather creak.  Drybone also rose.  He need not have
done--Cluff Drybannock had led the raiding party that took the
Ganmiddich clan hold and his due respect was now great enough that he
need stand for no man, even his chief--yet he did so as quickly as
always.  Others might have dismissed the gesture as mere force of habit,
but Vaylo knew better than that.  Cluff Drybannock stood because he was
a bastard and that's what bastards did.

Vaylo placed his hand on Drybone's shoulder, and together man and chief
took the short walk back to the roundhouse.

The Ganmiddich roundhouse was small compared with those of Dhoone and
Bludd. Built of trap rock and green river stone it commanded a high bank
above the river and the forest of old growth oaks known as the Nest. The
main structure rose a full six stories aboveground, in fitting with the
Ganmiddich boast: Over mountains and our enemies we tower alike.  Like
most northern clansmen, Vaylo felt nothing but distrust for a roundhouse
that rose to meet the clouds.  A roundhouse's strength should come from
the earth and the Stone Gods that lived there.  Yet many of the southern
clans built high roundhouses, betraying the influence of the Mountain
Cities and the god of sky, air, and nothingness that the city men prayed
to.

The Dog Lord shook his head as he and Drybone entered the storm-smoothed
edifice of the roundhouse's southern wall.  He found little joy in
possession.  Crab Ganmiddich, the Ganmiddich chief, was a man who had
come to power only five years after he had.  Crab swore like a trapper,
would start a fight with any man who looked at him the wrong way, and
had fathered as many bastards as most men had eaten meals, yet Vaylo had
liked him well enough.  He never lied, never failed to acknowledge his
bastards, and once ten years ago when wet pox killed off all of
neighboring Clan Withy's spring lambs, he had sent sixty head
ofblacknecks as a gift.

Vaylo sucked on his aching teeth.  He had no grievances with Crab
Ganmiddich, none save the man's newly struck friendship with the Hail
Wolf.  The attack on Bannen had made the Crab chief nervous, and rather
than rely solely upon Dhoone for protection, he had been making
overtures to Blackhail.  Dhoone was weak, broken, and dispossessed.

Blackhail was strong and getting stronger.  Who could blame the Crab
chief for dancing to two fiddles?  As for Mace Blackhail.  .  well, he
had fought beside Dhoonesmen to save Bannen, and once the battle was
done and he had returned home to that dark stinking Hailhold of his, he
must have turned his gaze south and asked himself,

"What did I get for my trouble?"

The Dog Lord shook out his braids.  Next time Clan Blackball came to the
defense of a Dhoone-sworn clan, he doubted very much that the Hail Wolf
would return home empty-handed.  He had ambitions, that one.

Vaylo recognized the taint.

"The Crab's fled east to Croser," Drybone said, as always his thoughts
closely following his chiefs.

"He's gathered forty score men about him and taken possession of the old
fortalice."

Vaylo grunted.  Slowly his enemies were mounting on his borders.

Dhoone was split among Gnash, Bannen, and Casuemilk, and now Ganmiddich
was housed at Croser.  Any other time these facts would have consumed
him, yet here and now his mind would not settle.  The Hailsman was too
close.  Half the rooms in the Ganmiddich roundhouse looked out upon the
tower and the Inch.  All Vaylo had to do was raise his head and look.

He looked now, one last time before Drybone drew the great clan door
closed, shutting out the frost and the night.  Thirty stories of green
granite rose above the river's surface like a Stone God's finger
pointingat the sky: Ganmiddich Tower.  Raif Sevrance was held there at
water level.  Watcher of the Dead.

A shiver passed along the Dog Lord's body, making his seventeen teeth
rattle in their casings of bone.

"Nan.  Bring the bairns to me.  I'll be in the chiefs chamber."  He
spoke to a middle-aged, Bluddswoman with braids the color and texture of
sea rope, who approached with beer and sot ted oats as he and Drybone
crossed the vaulted expanse of the great hall.  The woman met eyes with
Vaylo for half an instant, nodded, then withdrew.

Nan Culldayis had traveled down from Dhoone with him.  She looked after
his grandchildren now their mother and elder sister were gone.

Vaylo trusted Nan with his life.  She had nursed his wife through the
last year of her illness and cared for his grandchildren and sons' wives
since. For many years now she had provided him with what private
comforts he needed. She was of an age where conception and childbirth
were well behind her, and that suited Vaylo well enough.

Thirty-five years ago on his wedding day he had sworn to himself he
would father no bastards.

Vaylo's thoughts were broken by the soft burr of Cluff Dry- bannock's
voice.

"Say the word and I will assemble a troop of ham mermen and escort the
bairns back to Dhoone."

Halting by the chiefs door, the Dog Lord turned and looked into the
man's Sull-blue eyes.

"You don't think I should have brought them here."

It was not a question, yet Drybone answered it anyway.

"No.  This roundhouse is no place for them.  It's only a matter of time
before the Crab tries to reclaim it."

"And what if I had left them at Dhoone, with their father?  How safe
would they be there?"

"Safer than here, on the city hold border, in a roundhouse only a day's
ride from Bannen and Croser, and not much farther from Gnash."

Vaylo slammed a fist against the door.  The dogs at his heels skittered
and shrank to their haunches.

"Don't you think I know the dangers?

Don't you think I lie awake each night, thinkingand rethinking them?  "

Drybone did not respond in any way to his chiefs anger.  Instead

he held his fine head level and spoke in a quiet voice.

"Every journey you take them on is a danger.  They are best kept at the
Heart of Clan, at Dhoone."

He was right, and Vaylo knew it.  Entering the green-walled interior of
the chiefs chamber, he turned to Drybone and said,

"I fear to let them out of my sight.  Dry.  Two now, only two."

Cluff Drybannock nodded, once.  He offered no comfort, made no attempt
to remind him that his sons were still young and would father dozens
more, and Vaylo was grateful for that.  For the second time that night
he touched Drybone on the shoulder.

"I'll let you take them in a few days."

As Drybone assented with the briefest of his always brief smiles, the
two children in question came bounding through the door.  Ignoring their
grandfather completely, they made straight for the dogs.

After watching them wrestle, tumble, and shriek in delight at the
black-and-orange beasts known throughout the North as the Dog Lord's
knuckles, Vaylo turned to Drybone and grinned.

"I can't say they'll miss me much."

Cluff Drybannock turned to go.

Halting him with a small turn of the wrist, Vaylo said,

"How is the girl?"

"Well.  Nan visited her room today.  Says she's not the sort to starve
herself or throw tantrums.  I think she's quite taken with her myself."

Vaylo rubbed his jaw, soothing his aching teeth as he thought.  "How old
is she?"

Drybone shrugged.

"Just a girl.  Tall, thin."

"Have her brought to me, Dry.  I would look upon the Surlord's daughter
myself."

"Here?"  Drybone's gaze flicked to the children, who were giggling
wildly as they groomed the wolf dog's belly with their feet.

"Aye.  If Nan thinks well enough of her, then I'll trust her at my
hearth."

Drybone left, closing the door behind him as quietly as if he were a
servant, not the man who only seven days ago had claimed

Ganmiddich for Bludd.  Give me two hundred swordsmen.  Dry had said the
day before he'd left, and your silence until the deed is done.  Even now
Vaylo did not know how he'd managed it.  Two hundred men to take a
roundhouse the size of Ganmiddich?  And it hadn't been a blood bath,
either .  .  .  not like Withy.

Easing himself onto the maid's stool close to the fire, Vaylo slapped
his thighs for dogs and children alike.  Many feet, both hairy and
hairless, scampered over the stone to reach him by the shortest,
quickest route.  The two children came and sat at his feet while he
unhooked the leather cinches from his belt and began lashing the dogs
into a team.  The dogs hated being bound, but the children's presence
tempered their normal reaction, and Vaylo managed to collar them with
only a minor loss of skin and blood.  When he was done, he looped the
main lead over a spit hook in the hearth wall

"Granda, why do they have to be tied?"  Casha, now his eldest
grandchild, sent a long, sympathetic look the wolf dog's way.

Vaylo brushed the girl's jet black hair.  Her mother had Far South blood
in her, and the child was dark skinned and dark eyed and beautiful to
behold.

"Because I'm expectinga visitor, and the dogs seldom take kindly to
those."

One of the dogs, a lean bitch who was all teeth and snout, growled.

Vaylo hissed at her, though in truth he was not displeased.  As he
returned his gaze to his granddaughter, a red light shining through the
slitted window in the opposite wall caught his eye: the Bludd Fire
burning in the upper chamber of the tower.  Seven days and nights it had
blazed, long enough for all in the city holds to know that the Dog Lord
now stood at their door.

Vaylo tried to tear his eyes away but couldn't.  There had been a time
when taking Ganmiddich would have meant something, when the thought of
war and raids was what roused him from his bed every morning and kept
him awake past midnight with his warlords every night.  He fought
because he had the jaw for it, because he loved to win more than he
loved life itself.  Now, though, he fought from hate.

And fear.

Vaylo rose and closed the iron shutters, engaging each of the seven
clasps and drawing the bar.

Blackhail was the reason Cluff Drybannock had moved against Ganmiddich.
He had been there the night the women and children were found off the
Bluddroad. He had helped excavate the bodies.  Any clan who might form
an alliance with the Hail Wolf and his clansmen had to be sent a message
of death.  Drybone knew it.  The Dog Lord knew it.

And although no word had passed between them, they both knew the war
would not end until Blackhail had been destroyed.

Vaylo put a hand on the iron shutters, resting the heavy bulk of his
standing weight.  The Ganmiddich Tower and its red fire still burned
upon his irises. The Hailsman who lay imprisoned within it still burned
upon his soul.

He was just a lad.  When Vaylo had entered the tower yesterday at noon
he had not known what to expect.  Watcher of the Dead, people had
started calling him after the night he'd slain three Bluddsmen at DufPs.
He'd fought like a Stone God, they said, and freely admitted to being
present at the Bluddroad ambush before he'd forced his way through the
door.

Vaylo's hand cooled to the temperature of iron.  Now he had this
Hailsman here, imprisoned upon the Inch.  He had seen him with his own
two eyes, minded his wounds, and sniffed his stench.  Cluff Drybannock
and the others had expected him to finish the Hails- man off.  He saw
that on their faces, later, when he had emerged from the tower and they
stood waiting in a half circle about the skiff.  Drybone had even given
orders that no beating was to be so great as to threaten the Hailsman's
life or limb: that privilege belonged to the Dog Lord.

Yet Vaylo had not used it.  He hardly knew why himself.  Seeing the
Hailsman lying there on the bench, beaten, his clothes dark with blood
and river grime, Vaylo had tortured himself: How had it happened, that
massacre on the Bluddroad?  Did the Hailsmen go in expecting to kill
women and children?  Did one man panic and kill one child out of anger
or surprise and the others followed suit?

Had any of the women fought back?  How long had it taken for his
grandchildren to die?

Vaylo closed his eyes, let the iron shutter take more of his weight.

No.  He had not killed the Hailsman.  He would, because he was the Dog
Lord and no one could slay his kin and survive, yet there were things he
needed to know.  Things only someone present that day could tell him.

The dogs stood and growled.  Immediately Vaylo looked to the door.  A
few seconds passed, and then knuckles rapped against the wood.  A moment
later Drybone entered the room, leadinga girl before him.

Depositing her in the center of the room, he turned to leave without a
moment's hesitation.  Vaylo knew he would wait outside, at a distance
where he could be sure not to overhear a word.

Penthero Iss' foster daughter matched gazes with the Dog Lord.  As
Drybone had promised, she was tall and thin, yet Vaylo knew enough about
young women to realize that the thinness would leave her soon enough.  A
few weeks of lard and oats would see to that.

"What have you done to Raif Sevrance and Angus Lok?"  The girl's voice
was cold, and for the briefest moment Vaylo was reminded of her foster
father, Penthero Iss.  He had reared this child from birth.

Vaylo gave no answer.  Instead he walked from the window to the hearth
and came to sit in the company of his dogs.  His two grandchildren
scrambled quickly to his feet, the youngest tuggingat his dogs king
pants, demanding to be picked up and held in his granda's lap.  Vaylo
was aware of his grandchildren's unease: They had sensed the fear of the
dogs.

Normally when a stranger entered their master's territory, the dogs were
quick to show their teeth.  Growling, they would test their leashes,
lower their tails, and watch the intruder with eyes that held memories
of pack kills on the frozen tundra of the Want.  Yet from the moment
Iss' foster daughter had entered the room all the dogs had been silent.
Not one of them growled, not even the wolf dog.

They lay on their bellies, rumps pushed up against the hearth wall ears
flat against their skulls.  As Vaylo picked up his grandson, one of the
bitches whined softly and withdrew farther into the pack.

Vaylo watched the girl as she waited for his reply.  Her silver gold
hair brushed against her shoulders, fallingas straight as if each
individual strand had been weighted with lead beads.  Her eyes were the
same gray as the sky before a storm, large and clear, with silver
filaments in the irises that reflected light.  Everythingabout her
looked conjured up from silver, water, and hard stone.  Yet she was
little more than a child, and she was afraid; Vaylo wasn't fooled about
that for an instant.  He saw how she clutched at the fabric other skirt
to prevent her hands from trembling, how a muscle in her throat bobbed
when she swallowed .  .  .  and she swallowed a lot.

It was interesting that the first question she had asked had concerned
her companions, not herself.

Vaylo said,

"You have been well treated by my clan?"

"Answer my question."

"Answer mine."

The girl flinched at the hardness of his voice.

Vaylo pressed his hands against each of his grandchildren's shoulders in
turn, calming.  Their granda's anger frightened them.

"I have been treated well enough.  Fed.  Clothed.  Confined."  The
silver in the girl's eyes turned to something darker, like steel.  "Now
tell me what has become of my friends."

Vaylo made her wait upon an answer.  He was impressed by her courage--he
couldn't recall the last time anyone had demanded anything from him--yet
he had been the Dog Lord for too long now to let a surlord's daughter
force him into speaking before his time.

When he was good and ready he said,

"Angus Lok is being held in the pit cell directly below my feet.  His
only harms have been the dampness of the four walls that surround him
and the poor ness of his diet.  By all accounts he has little taste for
raw leeks and sot ted oats."

"And what will you do with him?"

It was on Vaylo's mind to reply,

"Whatever I wish," yet the girl chose that moment to push back her hair.
The curt, guileless flick of her wrist was the action of a child, not a
woman.  To Asarhia March her hair was still a hindrance, something to be
flicked away like a mosquito or a bit of dust, not a veil to be toyed
with for the benefit of men.  Vaylo almost smiled but didn't.  The
ghosts of granddaughters lost began to gather in the room.

"I shall hold Lok here in Ganmiddich until such a time as I see fit to
move him.  When I am ready I will either ransom or exchange him.

There are some in the North who would pay good money for his head.  "

If this was news to the girl, she didn't show it.  She merely blinked
and said,

"And Raif?"

"He will die by my hand."

The girl took a breath.  The light in her eyes dimmed, actually dimmed,
as if something within her had blocked the fuel they needed to burn.  A
noise such as Vaylo had never heard before sounded deep in the throats
of his dogs.  The skin along his arms puckered with gooseflesh as he
listened to the fearful keening.

Letting his grandson slide to the floor, he stood.

"Raif Sevrance and his clan slew our women and children upon the
Bluddroad. In cold blood they drew steel, and with cold hearts they rode
down my grandchildren as if they were nothing more than sheep."  Vaylo
didn't take his eyes from the Surlord's daughter as he spoke.  Every
sense he had told him there was danger here, from this slip of a girl,
and he never questioned his instincts.  He was the Dog Lord: He lived by
them.

The girl stood perfectly still.  Light from the fire seemed pulled
toward her, as if she were sucking it from the hearth.  The air in the
room moved, puffing through the dogs' coats and the children's fine
black hair.

Unnerved, Vaylo continued speaking, his voice becoming louder as he
approached the center of the room.

"Raif Sevrance is a slayer of children.  A murderer.  An enemy to this
clan. I will kill him because I have no choice.  Nine gods demand it."
Barely an arm's length from the girl now, he reached out and touched her
cheek.  It was like touching stone.

Muscles in the girl's throat began to move.

Sorcery.

Recognizing it for what it was, Vaylo snatched back his hand and sent it
plunging downward to the gray iron clan sword at his waist.  As he drew
metal from the hound's-tail scabbard, the girl's lips fell open.

Something dark and liquid, like molten glass, purled on the tip of her
tongue.  Shadows lived within in it, floating slowly through its liquid
eye like specks of dust in oil.

Vaylo's skin cooled.  Deep within him, in the blood vessels that
connected his mind to his heart, he felt the nearness of something he
could only name as evil.  His dogs felt it, too.  Behind his back he was
aware of them, whimperingand scratchingat the floor.  He was aware also
of the wolf dog moving into place by his grandchildren.

"J shall not kill him yet."  Vaylo spoke because he knew exactly how
fast he was with the blade, exactly how long it would take him to cut
through the girl's neck .  .  .  and he knew it wasn't enough.

The words were softly spoken, whispered darts, each one making the girl
blink.  The light in her eyes brightened.  The dark mass on her tongue
hung, half in the Dog Lord's world, half in the moist cavern of her
mouth.  Its surface rolled like hot tar.  Vaylo saw his own death
reflected there before the girl inhaled, sucking the substance she had
created back into her lungs.

The chiefs chamber trembled.  Ceiling timbers ticked and shuddered, and
a thin stream of masonry dust showered the hearth.

The dogs began to howl.

"Granda!  The lady looks sick!"  Vaylo's granddaughter spoke in a
child's idea of a whisper that was actually louder than her normal
speaking voice.

"Shall I bring her the stool?"

Vaylo considered the Surlord's daughter.  The blankness of moments
earlier had gone from her face, leaving her looking like a young girl
who had played too hard and stayed up too late.  She swayed, and Vaylo
automatically put out his sword hand to steady her.  Glancing over his
shoulder, he said to his granddaughter,

"Yes, fetch the stool.

Quickly, now.  " Then, to the dogs,

"Silence!"

Vaylo couched his sword.  His hands were trembling, but the blade slid
into the scabbard on first attempt.  What had just

happened here?  Part of him almost knew, almost recognized what the girl
had brought forth, yet when he probed for a memory that might explain
it, he drew blank.  All sense of evil had left him.  The girl was just
that: a girl.  As his granddaughter dragged the maid's stool across the
floor, Vaylo shouldered more of Ash's weight.

Blood trickled from her nostrils to her mouth as he lowered her onto the
stool.  She was trembling, and Vaylo sent his granddaughter and grandson
to fetch a good malt from Nan Culldayis.  He was glad to have them gone
from the room.

"Here."  Vaylo handed the girl the soft red kerchief from around his
neck.

"Clean yourself."

He watched her do so, taking deep breaths to calm the worn muscle that
was his heart.  He needed a drink.  Badly.  The faint odor of urine in
the room testified to the fear of one of the bitches.  Vaylo could not
find it in himself to discipline her.

"I should slay you now, Surlord's Daughter.  Do the whole of the
Northern Territories a favor."

She looked up at him, her gray eyes as clear as a child's.

"But you won't."

She had the truth of it; he needed her alive and well.  Yet he would not
let her know that.

"What are you?"

"You do not want to know."

She was right.  He was the Dog Lord, and he existed in a world of earth
and clay, where roundhouses were seldom built more than three stories
above the ground and all gods worshiped lived in stone.  What he had
seen upon her tongue was something else, something that belonged to
another people and another place.  And as that thought turned over in
his mind, he finally realized what part of him already knew.

This girl did not belong with Penthero Iss in Spire Vanis.  This girl
belonged to the Sull.

Seventeen teeth ached with raw, needling pain as Vaylo thought upon his
old enemies.  Bludd shared borders with the Sull, with the Trenchlanders
who were part Sull, part clansmen, part anyone else who stayed long
enough in their slash-and-burn settlements to give birth or spread their
seed.  Trenchlanders were one thing.  The real Sull, the pure Sull, were
something Vaylo feared above all else.

He clearly remembered the day, thirty-four years ago now, when he had
led a raid on the Trenchlander settlement ofCedarlode.  He had been
chief less than a year, and a dry spring had forced the Cedarlode
Trenchlanders out of their forests and onto his borders to search for
game.  Trenchlanders hunted by setting fires.  They torched whole
corridors of forest to force the creatures living there to flee ahead of
the flames.  If a fire went well and the winds blew true, they could
kill enough game in a single day to feed an entire settlement for a
season.  While Trenchland hunters stood at the fire's mouth, waiting to
spear fleeing game, cinder men moved across the scorched and smoking
charnel, bagging freshly charred carcasses.

Vaylo shuddered.  He hated Trenchlanders.  He had seen them destroy a
thousand-year-old timber line in half a day.

When they started lighting fires on his borders, he had been quick to
act. Eight score of his best ham mermen and spear men rode east with him
to Cedarlode.  A skirmish of sorts had taken place.  Trenchlanders were
no match for Bluddsmen, and even before the battle was met the
Trenchlanders began to withdraw.  Vaylo's lips stretched in something
close to a smile.  Stone Gods! He had been arrogant that day.

Suddenly, in the heat of easy victory, it wasn't enough to force them
back to their own bounds.  Why not drive them farther?  Claim land along
the Choke River that Bludd had always coveted?  It was so easy.

Vaylo clearly remembered laughing with Jon Grubber and Masgro Faa as
they'd bludgeoned a dozen Trenchlander cinder men along the red mud
banks of the Choke.

Four hours it took them.  Four hours to claim the river and the high
bluffs beyond.  Afterward they danced in the shallows.  Masgro Faa found
women, as Masgro always did, and although Vaylo himself didn't take part
in the rapings, he watched as others did.  When they had done with the
women, they drank themselves stupid on elk milk turned green and beer as
watery as piss. In the morning, still drunk with victory and the
lingering effects of green milk ale, they headed back to the Bluddhold.

Less than an hour later the Sull halted them in their tracks.

Five hundred of their warriors surrounded them.  Pure Sull, dressed in
lynx furs so rich and supple, it seemed as if they rode with living
predators at their backs.  Their horses were like no others:
breathtaking, silent, oiled like machines.  Long recurve bows gleaming
with rendered wolf fat rose above the horses' haunches like masts.

Until the Sull had shown themselves, Vaylo had not seen or heard a
thing, so softly did their horses' hooves break ground.

Vaylo clearly remembered that not one Sull--not even the fore
guard--drew a single arrow from his case.  They didn't need to; Vaylo
knew that straightaway.  Superior numbers, superior ground, superior
weapons, formation, and fore planning were all theirs.  He also knew
that if he'd had twice or even three times their number, the Sull would
still have bettered him.

It was the first real lesson he had learned as the Dog Lord: The Sull
were not to be crossed.

The Sull held their positions for as long as they chose to.  To this
day, Vaylo could not decide how much time passed as the two mounted
camps faced each other.  Sometimes he thought perhaps it was minutes.

Other times he knew it was hours.  Then, suddenly, without an order
being called or any signal that Vaylo could see being made, the Sull
turned as a single body and headed back into the woods.  Vaylo could
still remember the breeze of air and clay dust they created, still
recall the equal mix of fear and wonder he had felt.

No words had been exchanged, no weapons drawn, yet the message was
unmistakable: Trenchland is Sull land.  Stay clear.

Vaylo had never set foot on Trenchland since.  He protected his
borders--vigorously--yet never once had he or any Bluddsman under him
claimed as much as a hair-thin strip of Sull land for his own.  Sull
borders were sacred.  He had known that even as he had ridden to
Cedarlode with his men that first day, yet he was chief, and he was
shiny with new power and brash with jaw, and he'd thought he could take
them on.

Thinking back on it now, Vaylo knew he had gotten off lightly.  The Sull
could have slaughtered them all that day.  Yet they had chosen to teach
a lesson in might instead.

And the Dog Lord never forgot those.

Frowning, Vaylo studied the Surlord's daughter from the safe haven of
the hearth as she sat on the maid's stool and held the bloody kerchief
to her nose.  If she had any Sull blood in her, nothing in her coloring
or face betrayed it.  Still, he could not discard what his instinct told
him.  The Sull were not people of earth and clay like clansmen; they
lived in a land of cool nights and silver moons, surrounded by oceans of
rippling ice woods as tall as mountains and pale as frost.  Sorcery
lived in their blood.  All their cities were built to let in the light
of the moon.  The Sull were night and twilight, shadow and shade, and
Vaylo knew in his bones that the substance he had seen rolling upon
Asarhia March's tongue was something they would recognize and claim as
their own.

"Vaylo," came a soft voice through the wood of the door.

"I have brought food and malt."

"Enter, Nan," he called.

At nearly fifty years of age.  Nan Culldayis moved more gracefully than
any other woman in the clan.  Vaylo watched her as she walked across the
room, her fine head held perfectly level as she bore, then deposited,
the tray.  He noticed how little lines above her brow deepened as she
looked at the girl. The habit of care ran deep within her.  Like Cluff
Drybannock an hour earlier, she left the room without a word.

Vaylo took the malt and drank from the jar.  Food, all his
favorites--charred blood sausage and pork leg roasted so slowly that it
fainted from the bone--had been laid out on a platter with sot ted oaks
and the kind of fancy honey cakes that all women loved yet Nan knew he
hated.  Vaylo took a second mouthful of malt, letting its sweet, hellish
flames burn his tongue.  Nan thought to slip a treat to the girl.

Shrugging, he tipped a full measure of malt into the hollow jug stopper
and handed it to the girl.  She drank it in one, then looked up for
more.

Vaylo brought the jug.

"There's fancies if you want them," he said, topping up the stopper.

"Honey and spices and like."

The girl looked at him.

"I'd rather have the meat."

It was then, under the scrutiny of those clear gray eyes, that Vaylo
Bludd began to regret what he had done.  Asarhia March didn't belong
with Penthero Iss in Spire Vanis, in his world of silk- lined walls,
rose-scented candles, and chamber pots with lids that fit so tightly
that not even light could escape.  Yet he was going to send her back
there all the same.

Breakinga knuckle of pork, he said,

"I've sent an osprey to your foster father, telling him you're here.  It
will only be a matter of days before a sept comes to fetch you."

The girl's face registered no surprise.

"What?  No ransom?"

"That's my business."  Vaylo's voice was harsh.  His teeth ached
savagely, and he pushed away the tray of food.  The girl was right: She
would not be ransomed, just handed over as quickly as copper pennies
between a trapper and his whore.

The Dog Lord owed the Surlord.  Oh, Iss and his devil's helper denied
the existence of any such debt.  It was always My master wants nothing
in return for his assistance with the Dhoone raid, or We think that
you're the best man to take control of the clans.  Yet the words held no
truth.  Vaylo had been a chief for too long not to know that all things
came at a price.  Iss wanted something.  Vaylo wasn't sure what, but he
knew enough to suspect that war in the clan holds suited the Surlord
nicely.  And helping the Bludd chief take the Dhooneseat was as good a
way as any to start one.

Whatever the motive, the deed was done.  Vaylo would not look back on
his past and wish things different.  He would not allow himself that
weakness. He and his clan were at war, and every day that war got bigger
as each and every clan was drawn into the dance of swords.  Old hates
resurfaced and new hates were created, and Vaylo was cold enough a man
to see that if he was canny enough and moved quickly enough, there was
much to be gained amid the madness.  He, the Dog Lord, bastard son
ofGullit Bludd, born with

only half a name and half a future, might be the first Bludd chief yet
to name himself Lord of the Clans.

Yet for now he had a smaller goal on his mind.  Vaylo glanced at the
girl. He hated being indebted to any man, most especially when that debt
was as cloudy as Trenchland beer and reeked in the same foul way.
Penthero Iss held his marker, and now, thanks to the keen eyes
ofCluffDrybannock, Vaylo had a way to get it back.

The Surlord's daughter.  Return her to Iss and all debts were paid in
full. There'd be no more devil's helpers scratchingat his door,
upsetting his dogs, and suggesting courses of action he might like to
take in voices more fitting to milkmaids than men.  He and the Surlord
would be free of each other.  And that was fine with the Dog Lord.  As
fine as fine could be.

The day the news of the girl's capture had arrived at the Dhoonehold,
Vaylo had thrown the osprey into the air himself.  She was a comely
bird, heavy as a newborn, trained by the cloistresses in their mountain
tower, capable of flying the cold currents of dawn and twilight, and
inbred with ancestral memories of Spire Vanis.  She would be there now,
or perhaps even on her way home, her left leg no longer burdened by the
message she had carried south. The Surlord's well-manicured fingers had
probably stroked her gray- and-white flight feathers as one of his
helpers broke the seal.

Uncomfortable with his thoughts, Vaylo banged on the door with his fist
to summon Drybone.  He could look at the girl no longer.  The message
had been sent before he'd met her.  What was done was done.  So she
wasn't what he had expected Iss' foster daughter to be: That was no
reason to change his plans.

The girl's gaze was hot on his back as he waited for Drybone to enter.
She did not speak, but he heard the malt stopper she had been holding in
her hand roll to the floor.  The ghosts of grandchildren lost were
suddenly heavy in the room, and for a moment he expected to hear the
words Granda, don't send me away.

Drybone entered the chiefs chamber.  His blue eyes met once with Vaylo's
own and took from them what orders he needed.  He crossed immediately to
the girl, seized her wrist, and forced her to stand.

"Take the meat and see she eats it."  Vaylo jerked his head toward the
tray.

Drybone led the girl to the table and picked up the pork joint by the
bone. His strength was such that even with one hand he could hold her.
One of the dogs whined as Drybone, the girl, and more importantly the
bone made their way toward the door.

The girl turned on the threshold.  Holding her head high, she waited for
the Dog Lord to acknowledge her.

"When do you intend to kill Raif Sevrance?"

Vaylo breathed deeply.  Suddenly he felt very tired and very old.  The
girl was exhausted, too; the corners other mouth hung down as she waited
for him to speak.

"I will stay his execution until the day after you leave."  His own
words surprised him, yet he made both his face and his voice hard as he
added,

"On that you have my oath."

The girl looked at him for a moment longer, then turned and walked away.

Puttinga hand against the green river stone wall for support, Vaylo
waited to hear the door latch click.  He had not expected her to thank
him, yet he felt her lack of response like a coldness against his heart.
She would draw no more sorcery tonight, he was sure of that, yet he knew
she was someone he could not control.  Like the Sull that day in
Cedarlode, it was a matter of superior might.

Better to have her gone.  Soon.

After a time he pushed himself off from the wall and unhooked the dogs'
leashes from the spit hook above the hearth.  Part of him wanted to
climb up the three flights of stairs that separated him from Nan's
chamber and lose himself in her hay-scented flesh.  Nan knew him well.

She would offer the kind of familiar, homely comforts he was content
with. Yet another part of him wanted to be outside, with his dogs,
walking through the sharp river-scented air ofGanmiddich.

No one stopped or spoke to him as he crossed the entrance hall and made
his way outside.  The Ganmiddich roundhouse was high ceilinged, damp,
lit by fish-oil lanterns that made the walls slick with grease.

Vaylo was glad to be free of it.  As soon as the great door closed
behind him, he let the dogs run free.  Normally at such a time they
would race off in all directions, their massive lungs pulling scents of
foxes, hares, and rats from thin air.  Tonight they chose to stay close
to their master.  Vaylo cuffed them, told them to go and find some
supper for themselves, as he had no intention of feeding them, yet still
they would not go.  Cursing softly, he let them stay.

He led them to the river shore, and together master and dogs watched the
Ganmiddich Tower through the dark hours of the night.

t t t The assassin sat in a chair well illuminated by the amber-burning
lamp, yet Penthero Iss still found it hard to behold her.  He thought at
first that the light had perhaps dimmed owing to impurities in the fuel,
yet he could detect no increase or darkening of smoke, Finally, after
several minutes of study, he was forced to conclude that Magdalena
Crouch was the sort of woman whom it was difficult to see.

Magdalena Crouch, or the Crouching Maiden, as she was known to the very
few people in the Northern Territories who could afford to deal death at
the rate of one hundred golds a head, waited for Penthero Iss to speak.
She was perhaps twenty, no, thirty, no, forty, years of age, with hair
that may have been either brown, red, or golden depending on the
vagaries of light.  Her eyes he had given up hope on.

Looking straight into them when he had opened the door, he had seen
nothing but his own reflection staring back.  She was slim, but somehow
fleshy, small, but with the limb length and bearing of someone much
taller.  Or was she simply tall?

She was not attractive, yet Iss found himself attracted to her.  She was
not repulsive, yet he found himself repulsed.

"Did you have a good journey from .  .."  Iss let the question trail
away as he realized he did not know where she had journeyed from.

Rumor had it that she lived within the city.  But all rumors surrounding
the Crouching Maiden were invariably false.

The maiden did not blink as she said,

"Any journey, no matter how briefer prolonged, can tire one at this time
of year."

The voice was one thing she possessed that could be pinned down and
classified: that beautiful, honey-poured voice.  Iss smiled both in
acknowledgment of an answer well given and in satisfaction that he
finally had something on her.

He had dealt with the Crouching Maiden before, of course, but only by
proxy. Caydis Zerbina--who, with his network of liquid- eyed brothers,
priests, under scribes personal servants, bath boys, errand boys, and
musicians, knew most things about most people who lived in or passed
through Spire Vanis--had always taken care of the details.  Meeting the
assassin in places other choosing, Caydis gave her Iss' instructions and
paid her fees in gold, always gold.

This time Iss had chosen to summon her himself.  It had not been an easy
task, for the Crouching Maiden ill liked to be summoned by any man and
valued her celebrated anonymity highly.  Yet she had come.  One week
following the original summons, she had come.

Why?  Iss could only speculate.  Beforehand, he had assumed she had come
because he was the Surlord of Spire Vanis and one never refused a direct
request from a man such as he.  Yet now, standing in the switching, blue
smoke shadows of her presence, he knew that not to be so.  The Crouching
Maiden came only because she chose to.

"Would you care for some wine ... a liqueur perhaps, a cup of rose water
spiked with cloves?"

"No."  The word was spoken easily enough, yet the Crouching Maiden
rippled her muscles like a tundra cat displaying to a rival as she spoke
it.

She was a woman of business, then.  Iss respected that.  He found it
quite delicious.

"I have a problem, Magdalena," he said, fingers closingaround a piece of
kill hound bone as he spoke.

"There are people, a family, whom I would like to see .  .  .  removed,
yet I don't know the exact location of the village in which they live. I
have, thanks to one of my informants, a good idea of the whereabouts of
the village .  .  .  the general area, should we say."

Iss paused, expecting to hear some small murmur of encouragement from
the maiden.  None came, and he was forced to continue

speaking.

"The family lives in a farmhouse situated a day's ride northeast from
Ille Glaive.  My informant named three villages which he thinks are most
likely to contain them."  Iss gave the names.

"What I need is someone to move about through these villages and
discreetly, very discreetly, discover where the family lives, and do
what is necessary to slay them."

A pause followed.  Iss, who was not used to being left hanging by
anyone, began to feel the first stirrings of anger in his chest.  True,
the Crouching Maiden was the greatest assassin in the North, her name
spoken in whispered awe by those who had used, and continued to use, her
services.  Yet he was Surlord of Spire Vanis.  Just as Iss' jaw moved to
rebuke her, she spoke.

"Ille Glaive is nine days to the north.  It will cost more."

Iss felt a measure of relief but did not show it.

"Of course."

"And the family?  How many are there?"

"I'm not sure.  The mother, one daughter that I'm certain of, perhaps a
few more."

"Uncertainty costs more."

Iss had expected it would.

"I will pay whatever it costs."

The Crouching Maiden made a small movement with her mouth, flashing
teeth that were dry of saliva.  Iss resisted the temptation to step
back.  Her presence was beginning to wear on him.  It took too much
effort to look at her.  It was like staringat a landscape through a
distorted piece of glass.

Most held that the maiden's success lay in her appearance.  She looked
like everyone's maid.  When glimpsed sideways as she made her escape
from assassinations in granges, guild houses palaces, and private homes,
all who saw her assumed she was a maid, a messenger, an ash girl, an old
washerwoman, a nanny, a wet nurse, or a scullion.  Unlike the handful of
other female assassins who could be hired in the Northern Territories
for a handful of golds or a ruby the size of a housefly, the Crouching
Maiden did not look like a whore.  She never seduced men, never slipped
in her blade as the man slipped in his manhood, never used guile or
beauty to gain access to forbidden places or hid her knife beneath a
froth of lace-bound cleavage. She had no need of feminine traps.  Her
appearance was such that people who looked at her saw what they expected
to see: someone who belonged in their setting.

And of course she was as subtle as a fox.

The night Sarga Veys had sent word that he had the location of the Lok
farm pinpointed to a handful of villages, Iss' first thought was, I must
send for the maiden.  Sarga Veys would be no good for the job.

No one would willingly pour information down the Half- man's throat, and
even if they did, he had no belly for blood.  The Knife had the belly,
but not the guile.  He would break bones for information, scare the
entire population of each village he visited, and alert the very people
he had come to kill.

Iss returned the piece ofkillhound to his desk.  Besides, the Knife and
the Halfman had other business to tend to.  They must bring Asarhia home
from Ganmiddich.  She must not be lost again.

"Tell me the details," said the Crouching Maiden in her silken ribbon of
a voice.

Iss thought of Angus Lok, thought of the Phage, of old hates and old
worries that had prayed on his mind for sixteen years.  He gave the
details.  The meeting lasted scant minutes after that.

CHAPTER THIRTY-NINE.

Watcher of the Dead Raif burned.  His skin was hot to the touch, wet,
swollen.  When he touched the broken flesh on his arms, it was like
probinga roast pulled from the fire.  All of him ached, yet he could
barely make sense of the pain.  Mostly his body plunged him into sleep.
Fever thrived in the darkness, shooting out purple bloodlines along his
chest and rattling his bones with shivers so intense, he felt them even
as he slept.

His dreams were no longer filled with people and places he knew.

Strangers spoke to him, calling him Watcher of the Dead, massive
silver-pelted wolves chased him through forests of pale trees and across
frozen lakes polished so highly they reflected the moon and stars.  A
pair of mated ravens flew overhead, leading him north, always north.
Sometimes he glimpsed the broken walls and skeletal arches of a ruined
city above the treetops.  Once he looked down at his feet and saw that
the hard surface he walked upon was a sea of frozen blood.

In and out of sleep, he weaved, waking for short, dizzying moments when
even the effort to lift his tongue from the base of his mouth was too
much to be endured.

No one beat him now.  They came, once or twice a day, bringing swim
bladders full of freshwater and sot ted oats cooked in beer.  Most spat
as they made for the door, as if tending him had left a bad taste in
their mouths, one they had no wish to carry home to their womenfolk and
hearths.  Some signed to the Stone Cods if they happened to touch him.
Others swore under their breaths, calling him the Hail Wolfs Firstborn
or other damning curses.  All desired his death; Raifsaw it in the cold
black centers of their eyes.

Close and unharmed.  Even now, after he had long forgotten their
meaning, those words held power over him.  Sometimes when he was lost in
the deep well of fever bliss, his lungs hissing like war engines, the
heat on his forehead raising hard, clear blisters, he would hear himself
say those words.

Always they brought him back.  He'd wake, dry mouthed and blinking, to
find his hand at his throat and his fingers glued fast to his lore.

It was enough to keep his mind intact.

When the worst night came and he lay shivering on the stone bench, his
clothes wet as a drowned man's, his mind shifting between real dreams
and hallucinations the fever sent him, he felt himself slide closer to
the world's edge.  Death was a pale presence in the cell.

Raifdid not have to see her to know what she was.  Like a brother parted
from his sister at birth, he recognized her in an instant.

We are alike, you and 1.

The words came from nowhere, sliding down his spine like beads of ice.
Half beings, tall and distorted as children's shadows at sunset, danced
in the far quarters of his vision.  Raif licked lips as thy as paper. He
thought he should be afraid, but neither his body nor his mind could
generate the physical state of fear.  He blinked, because that was one
thing he could do.

Shall 1 take you, Watcher?

The voice sounded in the space beneath his jaw, causinga soft, intimate
pain like a lover's bite or a sister's pinch.  The shadow beings rippled
and grew larger with every word.

Raif held himself still.  Something brushed against his cheek.  An
exhaled breath condensed against his teeth and retinas.  The sweet, just
turned odor of sour milk filled his mouth.  The scent of new death.

Close and unharmed.  He didn't know where the words came from.  They
were simply there inside his head, tuggingaway like a

child at his father's coattails.  Close and unharmed.  Raif strained for
the memory.  Who?

The shadow beings filled his vision, their limbs of smoke curling around
his fingers and thighs, the vacant sockets of their eyes and mouths
sucking the life heat from him.  Cold entered through pores in his skin,
sinking downward through layers of fat, muscle, membranes, and bone
toward the one thing Death wanted: his soul.

Raif gasped.  Something glimpsed or half glimpsed in the center of the
cell stopped his heart.  Death showed her wares.  Raif knew terror then,
knew in every particle of his being that he did not want to travel that
path, did not want to visit the hell that was waiting for him in the
space between her arms.

Close and unharmed.  The words thundered through his skull.  Close and
unharmed.  Close and unharmed.  Raif thrashed against the stone bench.

He had to know, had to remember, had to find a reason to fight back.

The shadow beings began to feed.  Painless as mosquitoes drawing blood,
they sank their diamond fangs into his flesh.  Strings of saliva flashed
like spider's silk, each one landing on his skin with a hiss of utter
coldness.

Raif raised his hand toward his throat.  A dozen of Death's creatures
fed on his arm, weighing it down, sucking its juice, but he fought them
with jaws clenched.  He was Raif Sevrance, Raven Born, Oath Breaker, and
Watcher of the Dead, and nothing would stop him from reaching his lore.

Anger was hot within him, pumping blood to the far reaches of his body,
where necrosis had already begun.  More half beings gathered, drawn to
the heat that was their one stock in trade.  His arm shredded their in
substance split their death's-heads in two.  C/ose and unharmed. Fingers
stabbingat hollow eyes, Raif reached for his lore.

As his fingertip grazed the cool black horn.  Death fought him, but he
was too close and too angry to let her have her way.  Wrenching his arm
free, he grabbed the raven's bill.

Close and unharmed.

A moment stretched to breakingas Raif pressed the lore against the meat
of his palm.  The creatures continued to feed, but he did

not heed them.  His heart beat, just once, as the lore spoke a name for
his ears alone.

Ash.

Ash was close and unharmed.  And that was reason enough to fight Death
tooth and nail.

Letting the lore drop against his chest, Raif braced himself for war.

He had made Ash a promise, and he would not fail her, and if he had to
battle his namesake, then so be it.

As he raised his torso from the stone bench, a murmur passed through the
half beings.  In an instant they were gone.  Fled.

Soft laughter tinkled through the cell.  Shadows grew within shadows,
becoming darker and darker until it seemed as if the very substance of
time collapsed under their weight.  Perhaps I won't take you yet,
Watcher.  You fight in my image and live in my shadow, and if I leave
you where you are, I know you'll provide much fresh meat for my
children.  Death smiled as she withdrew.  Kill an army for me, Raif
Sevrance.  Any less and I just might call you back.

"No!"  Raif screamed into the emptiness of his cell.  N000000000.  A
thin keyhole of sunlight shining down upon his face woke him.  Even
before he opened his eyes he knew the fever had broken.  Lying there
motionless, enjoying the sun's warmth upon his face, he let the aches
and hurts of his body occupy his mind.  Memories hovered close, and he
knew he could retrieve them, but first he had to deal with the pain.

Thirst made him probe the bench's ledge for the water bladder.  His
tongue felt large in his mouth, bloated and sore with many cuts.  When
he found the skin he spilled more water than he drank, letting the cool
liquid run down his chin and neck.  His throat stung as he swallowed,
and he found he was quickly sated.  He didn't have the strength to
return the bladder to its place, so he let it drop into the water, where
it floated for a while and then sank.

He slept for some time after that, and when he next woke the cell was
dark. He missed the sun.  He had not intended to sleep.

More water and a fresh bowl of sot ted oats lay at his feet.  Their
presence reassured him: The world he had come to know remained
unchanged.  He drank the water--all of it this time--but had no stomach
for the oats.  Pain shot up his arm as he pushed the bowl away, and
memories of the night before came with it.  Creatures feeding on his
flesh. Fangs as cold as ice.  Raif shook his head, drove the images
back.

He relieved himself in the corner of the cell and then let sleep take
him once more.

He did not dream, or if he did, it was of simple things that had no
meaning. He slept well and long, and when he next opened his eyes it was
dawn.

His body moved more easily from the bench this time.  His head pounded
less. When he reached for the freshwater bladder, he tensed, but the
pain when it came was less than expected.  Having drunk his fill, he
probed the cuts, bruises, and sore points on his body.  A rib broken
during the first of many beatings had already begun to mend.  It hurt
when he touched it, but the join seemed surprisingly smooth.  A bruise
the size and shape of a ewe's heart colored the skin above his left
kidney.  The organ beneath was tender, and he winced as his fingers
examined it.  The split stitch work on his chest was hard with scabbed
flesh, and his arms and legs were striped with cuts at various stages of
healing.  All of his muscles ached.  When he probed the glands that lay
beneath his jawline, his fingers brushed against the cord that held his
lore.

Ash.  Close and unharmed.  He didn't even need to touch the lore itself
to know it.

After that he stopped tending his wounds and lay down on the bench to
rest and think of Ash.  The knowledge she was safe soothed him, and he
soon fell asleep.

He awoke to the awareness that he was not alone in the cell.  Without
opening his eyes or changing his breathing pattern, he tested the light
levels through his eyelids and drew air across his tongue.  It was full
dark.  It could have been anytime in the long winter's night, but the
darkness had a weight and complexity to it that came only with many
hours of nightfall.  The air tasted ofdogskins and rendered dog fat, and
Raif knew he was in the presence of the Dog Lord.

He opened his eyes.

Moonlight silvered the cell, glinting upon the water and turning stone
walls to blocks of ice.  The Dog Lord was looking straight at him, his
face half-hidden by shadow, his eyes the color of ink.  Takinga breath,
he filled his chest with air that stank of death.

"They told me the fever would not take you."

Raif acknowledged the words with a small movement of his jaw.  The
movement annoyed the Dog Lord, and he kicked the water at his feet,
sending it spraying into RaiPs face.

"Why is it that you live so easily when those who cross you die more
quickly than newborns in a wolfs jaw?"

Shaking drops of river water from his face, Raif rose to sit upright on
the bench.  He made no reply.  The only sound was the water sloshing
against the walls of the cell.

The Dog Lord ran a large red hand over his face and his braids.  For a
moment he looked very old.  When he spoke his voice trembled.

"Tell me, what evil lies at the heart of your clan, that men such as you
and the Hail Welfare born?"

The Hail Wolf.  So that's what they were calling Mace Blackhail these
days. Raif said,

"Do not link my name with his."

"Why?  You slew in his name on the Bluddroad, then again in the snow
outside Duff's."

Raifs face burned.  There was nothing to say.

"Answer me!"

He flinched but did not speak.  To answer would be a betrayal of his
clan . of Drey.  The truth had died that day on the Bluddroad.  He would
not be the one to resurrect it.

The Dog Lord came for him, lunging through the river water to take RaiPs
throat in his hands.  Pressing his thumbs into RaiPs windpipe, he cried,

"You slew my babies.  Out there, in the cold and the snow.

Children, they were, just children.  Scared, shivering, clutchingat
their mothers' skirts.  " His voice was terrible to hear, rough with
grief so powerful that each word shook him like a fever.  The image he
created was so close to the truth that Raif could not meet his eyes.

"And they called for their granda to help them.  And their granda did
not hear."

Abruptly the Dog Lord released his hold and turned away.  Muscles to
either side of his neck jerked powerfully, yet within a second he had
stilled them.

Raif spat blood.  His throat was on fire, but he made his voice hard as
he said,

"You slew our chief in the badlands, him and a dozen more.  You started
this dance of swords.  You struck the first blow."

The Dog Lord lashed at air with his hand, pushing Raifs words from him.

"Clan Bludd made no raid on Blackhail.  It may have suited the Hail Wolf
to claim it, but Dagro Blackhail did not die by my hand."

Raif stood.  He knew he should be surprised at what the Dog Lord said,
but he wasn't.  A cold anger grew within him, and he felt his face
tighten as he stared at the Dog Lord's turned back.

"Why didn't you deny it?"

"Who would?  When half of the clan holds is praising your jaw for
carrying off such a raid, and the other half are so scared that it might
happen to them that the piss freezes to their thighs at the sound of
your name, who's going to stand up and forswear it?"  The Dog Lord shook
his head.

"Not me."

"Who, then?  Who did it?"

Something in Raifs voice made the Dog Lord turn to face him.  His eyes
were hard as sapphires, yet Raif met them with a hardness of his own.

This man standing before him possessed knowledge that could have stopped
a war.

The Dog Lord's braids rose and fell against his chest as he gathered
breath to speak.  His voice, when it came, was unrepentant.  "You'll
hear no answers about the badlands raid from me.  I wasn't the one who
rode home from a killing field and named myself a chief."

Raif felt a portion of his anger leave him.  The Dog Lord had spoken his
own thoughts right back to him.  Struggling to find sense, Raif said,

"What of the wounds?  Bron Hawk was there the night you made raid on the
Dhoonehouse.  He said your swords entered flesh but drew no blood.  I
saw the same thingat the badlands camp.  My father's rib cage was
smashed to pieces, yet there was barely enough blood to dye his shirt."

The Dog Lord swore.  Placing a hand upon the cell wall, he let the
ancient stone of the Ganmiddich Tower bear a portion of his weight.

"I should have known," he murmured.

"The devil is playing both sides."

Hairs on Raifs arms prickled, and in the space of one second he
remembered all that Death had said.  K;7/ an army for me, Raif Sevrance.
Raif shivered. He heard his voice say,

"What do you mean?"

The Dog Lord turned on him.

"What do I mean?  What do I mean?  You dare ask me what I mean?  You,
who have slain children in cold blood and butchered three of my warriors
so badly that I could not let the widows tend their corpses."  Spittle
flew from his lips as he spoke, and his braids cracked against his
shoulders like whips.

"I will answer no questions from Watcher of the Dead.  Cluff Drybannock
was right.  You must be finished, and quickly.  Would that he and his
men had cut you down where they found you, and not thought to save you
for me.  Would that the deed had been done, and my hands need not be
stained with your blood."

Raif stood tall and silent in the face of the Dog Lord's fury.  He
wondered how much of it had to do with him.  The Bludd chief had not
known about the wounds at the badlands camp.  Yet he knew now, and that
knowledge had shaken him.

The Dog Lord took the three steps necessary to bring himself opposite
Raif. Reaching out, he closed his hands around Raifs lore.  "They said
your guide had named you a raven."  With one quick movement he snapped
the twine.

"If it wasn't for an oath spoken to the Surlord's daughter, you would be
dead this night, Raif Sevrance.  Know that.

Think on that.  And then spend the next night praying to the Stone Gods
for mercy, for when the time comes you shall get none from me.  "

With that he turned and walked toward the door.  Before he reached
inside the lock hole to open it, he dropped the raven lore into the
dark, greasy water at his feet.

Raif swayed, forced himself to stay upright until the Dog Lord had gone.

CHAPTER FORTY.

In the Crab Chiefs Chamber Noticing that the smoke from the fish-oil
lanterns irritated Sarga Veys' eyes, Vaylo Bludd ordered another two to
be lit.  He couldn't stand the stench of them himself--he'd been in this
blasted tall roundhouse for six days now, and his clothes and braids
reeked of river trout--but he'd be damned if he'd make this meetingany
easier for the Halfman.  They could call him the Fish Lord first!

Neither Marafice Eye nor the Halfman looked at ease.  The Knife had
already staked out a corner of the chiefs chamber and made it his own.
He walked it now, his massive body strainingagainst his urine-softened
leathers as he moved.  Every now and then he would look around, his gaze
alighting on blunt objects, metal pokers, and ceremonial weaponry like a
prisoner contemplating escape.  The Dog Lord detected a limp, carefully
concealed.  As for the Halfman, well, he looked no different from when
Vaylo had seen him last. Despite the long ride from Ille Glaive, his
white robe and kidskin boots were barely soiled, and he must have shaved
on the hoof for his \aw was smoother than a purse made of silk.

They had arrived at noon.  Ten men in all: the Knife, the Half- man, a
sworn brother with only three fingers on his right hand, and a full Rive
Watch sept.  The sept's appearance upon the bluff south of the
roundhouse had caused a stir among the clan.  The Rive Watch, with their
bloodred blades, their black leather cloaks, and the Killhound
embroidered at their breasts, represented the might of Spire Vanis to
the clansmen.  They wore iron bird helms, which none removed until they
were challenged by a dozen spear men a hundred paces from the roundhouse
door.  It was an act of arrogance and hostility thatVaylo had made them
pay for.

After four hours' forced wait in the ewe pen, the sept's manners seemed
little improved.

It was dark now, early evening.  A high wind rattled the shutters and
breathed down the chimney, causing the flames in the hearth to leap into
the room.  The sept and the man with eight fingers had been led to the
Ganmiddich kitchen, where Molo Bean had them well in hand.

Vaylo almost pitied them, for Molo was an excellent ham merman and a
fine cook, yet he hated city men with a vengeance.  Eighteen summers ago
a troop of white helms from Morning Star had killed his brother in a
dawn raid upon his father's homestead in Clan Otier.  The white helms
had taken offense at a damn built by Shaunie Bean to direct water from
the Wolf River northward to wet his fields.  " Vaylo sucked on his
aching teeth.  The city of Morning Star was no friend to Clan Bludd.  He
would have to remember to send an osprey to his first son, Quarro, tell
him to set more watches on the Bluddhold's southern borders.  The Lord
Risingand his white- helmed cockerels would get no land from Vaylo
Bludd.

Troubled, the Dog Lord turned his attention to Marafice Eye and Sarga
Veys. He had left them to stew for an extra hour in the chief's chamber
while he fed and kenneled his dogs.  It had seemed a fair idea at the
time, yet now he wished he hadn't bothered.  This matter was better over
and done.

"Has she been given supper yet?"  Sarga Veys said, his voice as high and
gratingas the sound of a sack pipe leakingair.

"I am not her nursemaid."  Vaylo sat at the head of the chiefs table, a
block of green river stone pitted with ancient fish fossils and
petrified shells. A dozen horseshoe crabs, perfectly preserved, formed a
circle below the Dog Lord's hand.

"How would I know if she's been fed or not? What does it matter to you?"
The anger was quick to come.  His two remaining grandchildren were on
their way home to Dhoone, escorted by Drybone and his crew.  Nan had
returned with them.  By Vaylo's reckoning they would have reached the
halfway point by now.  Stone Gods protect them.

"It matters," said Sarga Veys with a sharp little jab of his chin,
"because I need to drug her."

Vaylo didn't like the sound of that.

"What with?"

"Nothing.  A little posy to make her sleep."

"I said, what with?"

Marafice Eye stopped pacingand dropped his hand to his weapon's belt.
It was empty, of course--the first Bluddsmen to meet the sept and its
leader had ransomed their weapons until such time as they departed--yet
the Knife had a way of making the gesture look threatening even when his
scabbard lay slack against his thigh.  He was a dangerous man, Vaylo
reckoned, yet he still feared the Halfman more.

Sarga Veys sent the Knife a superior glance, one that assumed command of
him by warning, Easy with your hostilities.  Not surprisingly the Knife
ignored it.  No love lost between those two there.

"Very well," Sarga Veys said.

"If you must know, I intend to give Asarhia blood of the poppy and the
pulverized seeds of henbane."

So he meant to carry her away from the roundhouse without her knowledge
or consent.  By the time those two mind-deadening drugs wore off, the
Knife and the Halfman would be well away from Ganmiddich, on the far
side of the Bitter Hills.  And the girl herself would be left so weak,
she'd be lucky if she could swallow water and sit a horse.

Vaylo took a wad of black curd from his pouch and chewed on it.  He had
seen for himself what the Surlord's daughter could do when she was
cornered, so he understood the need for caution.  Yet henbane could be
poisonous in heavy doses.  And that he would not have.

"You will not give the girl henbane under my roof."

"Why not?"  The Knife leered.

"Are you smitten with the bitch, too?"

Vaylo stood.

"I would have the girl delivered safely to your master.

If you and your men had done your jobs properly and found the girl
yourselves, you would not be dealing with me now.  But you didn't, and
you are here, on newly made Bluddground, and you will abide by the Bludd
chief's terms.  "

Marafice Eye listened to Vaylo Bludd in silence.

Sarga Veys made a thin, snorting noise.

"I know my master's wishes.

The girl must"-- " Silence!  " The Knife took a step toward Sarga Veys.

"Do as he says."

Sarga Veys took five steps back and might have taken more if it hadn't
been for the fact that his shoulders came in contact with the wall.  His
lower jaw shook violently as he said,

"Very well.  As you wish."  Slender fingers unhooked a dun-colored pouch
from his belt and retrieved a vial from within.  The vial was the length
of a pea pod and sealed with brown wax.  Veys held it out toward the Dog
Lord.

Vaylo considered knocking it onto the floor.  He hated drugs and
sorceries-- all things that could play tricks with a man's mind--yet
there was little choice here.  Not because of the power of the two men
standing before him, or even the power of their master in Mask Fortress.
No, rather the power of the girl.  If she were awake when they carried
her away from Raif Sevrance, Vaylo did not know what she would do.

He took the vial.  In a harsh voice he called to Strom Carvo, who was
standing guard beyond the door.  Sarga Veys gave his instructions to the
dark-skinned swordsman: Use all the vial, pour it in her sot ted oats
and drinking water, and whip it in the butter and honey she spreads upon
her bread.  Vaylo spat out a wad of curd as the Halfman spoke.  He had a
bad taste in his mouth.

As Strom withdrew, Sarga Veys said,

"I think it best if I go with him to overlook the preparations.  I have
some skill in such matters."

Vaylo didn't doubt it.

"No.  You will stay here and wait."  He

slammed the door shut.  He would not have the Halfman walking freely
about the roundhouse.  With Drybone and his crew gone to Dhoone, they
were short of men, and that was one fact the Dog Lord didn't want anyone
to know.

Marafice Eye said,

"Name your terms for the other two prisoners."  His small mouth pulled
tight like scar tissue as he spoke, and his hands--the largest Vaylo
could recall seeing on any man- pushed against a rotten timber in the
wall.

Vaylo suddenly longed for the company of his dogs.  One of the bitches
was in heat, and the rest were half-crazy with jealousy or lust, and
he'd had little choice but to shut them away for the night in the dog
cote.  He ill liked being without them, but nature was one thing he knew
better than to fight. Marafice Eye was another thing entirely.

He said,

"Angus Lok and the Hailsman are not for ransom."

The Knife smiled, his lips splitting like a sausage on a grill.

"I

said, name your terms, Dog Lord.  " As he pushed himself off from the
wall, Vaylo marked the bulge of a hand knife concealed above his right
kidney.

"And I said the prisoners are not for ransom."

"You owe my master," hissed Sarga Veys.

"He won't be pleased when he hears of this.  I shall advise him to
withdraw all assistance" -- "Tell him do it!"  Vaylo roared.

"I want no more kindness from the Spire King.  Stone Gods help me, I
wish I'd never given ears to him or his schemes.  Tell him from me, the
Dog Lord, that once his foster daughter leaves Bluddground this night,
all agreements between us are sundered.  The girl is payment in full."

Sarga Veys opened his mouth to speak, but both Marafice Eye and Vaylo
Bludd moved forward to stop him.  For one moment the Knife and the Dog
Lord locked gazes, and shared intent and shared opinions on the Halfman
made passing comrades of them.  He was a fighting man, Marafice Eye.  He
knew better than to squawk and bluster when he was out manned and far
from home.

With a mock bow, Vaylo stepped back and let him deal with his man.

Marafice Eye approached Sarga Veys, drawing so close that their
shoulders touched.  Putting his small lips to the cartilage of the
Halfman's ear, he said,

"Silence," in a voice so cold it caused the flames in the Crab Hearth to
shrink.

Sarga Veys sat.  quietly.

Vaylo poured two drams of malt liquor, keeping the first for himself and
offering the second to Marafice Eye.  The Knife accepted it, and the two
men struck cups and drank.  Any other time Vaylo might have savored the
silent companionship that came with sharinga fine malt with a man he did
not hate, but his mind was too agitated, and he drank his liquor fast
and with little joy.  When the Knife returned the empty dram cup to the
stone surface of the chiefs table, Vaylo said,

"I'd have you take a message to your master."

The Knife raised his chin, indicating he would listen.

"Tell him to keep his fingers out of the clan holds I know what he's
doing, and if he doesn't stop, I'll gather all the clans that are loyal
to me--Clan Broddic, Clan HalfBludd, Clan Oder, Clan Frees, and Clan
Gray--and ride south to Mask Fortress and tear down his gates.

Iss has played me for a fool once, and I'm an old man with a high
opinion of myself and I'll not let him use me again.

"I know I wasn't the only chief he approached with his dirty little
promises of sorcery and aid; while one of his faces was busy whispering
Dhoone secrets to me, the other was talking treason to the Hail Wolf.
Mace Blackhail and your master arranged the raid on the hunt party in
the badlands, made it look as ifDagro and his clansmen were attacked by
a troop of my men.  The Hail Wolf got a chiefdom for his trouble, and
Iss drew Blackhail into the war. Now I don't know which other chiefs
he's approached and what other deals he struck, but I do know he'll make
no more.  The clan holds are no longer his business.  Tell him that from
me, the Dog Lord.  Tell him that from this day forth all wars we wage
will be of our own making."

Vaylo was shaking by the time he was finished, his throat raw.  He was
not one for speeches, but a warning needed to be sent.

Penthero Iss had to be told that the clan holds were no longer his field
of play.

Marafice Eye held Vaylo's gaze for a long moment, then said, "I'll pass
your message on, Dog Lord, though I see no easy end to the Clan Wars."

He was right.  Lines were too clearly drawn and hatred too deeply
entrenched for any clan chief to face another over a table and speak of
peace.  Yet that wasn't the point.

"It's a matter for the clans now."

Marafice Eye nodded, understanding immediately.  Vaylo respected him for
that.

They waited in silence for an hour.  Marafice Eye did not sit once
during that time, though Vaylo noticed that he rested his left leg from
time to time and favored his right when walking.  Sarga Veys sat exactly
where the Knife had placed him and neither moved nor spoke.

Vaylo resisted the urge to drink more.  Waiting made him weary.  He
longed for Nan's gentle company and the closeness of his dogs.  He
worried about his grandchildren and wondered ifDrybone had them riding
through the night.

Every now and then he would glance at the southeast wall in the chamber
and fix his eyes upon the window, shuttered and bolted, there.  Raif
Sevrance was never far from his thoughts.  Even to look in the direction
of the Inch brought on feelings so intense, he could taste them in his
mouth.  Vaylo wished Drybone had broken down just once in his
self-controlled, iron-willed life and beaten the lad to death where he
had found him.  At least that way there would have been swift,
unthinking justice.  Not this slow, ever more complicated torture of
truth and lies.

Vaylo pushed a hand through his braids.  It had been a mistake to see
him. He didn't want to see Raif Sevrance as a young year- man still
protecting the honor of his clan from a cell that stank of death.  He
wanted to look upon a Hailsman and see a murderer instead.

Vaylo called for Strom Carvo and gave the order to check on the girl.

Only when she was gone and a new dawn had come to the roundhouse could
he finally put steel to the Hailsman's throat.

"She's sleeping, Chief," Strom said when he returned four minutes later.

"I called her name, but she didn't respond.  I shook her arm, and still
she slept."

Vaylo nodded.

"Bring her to me, Strom.  Pull on her coat and boots as best you can"
"And make note of how much food she has eaten."

The Dog Lord raised an eyebrow Veys' way.  Hadn't anyone bothered to
tell him that no one interrupted a clan chief when he was speaking?

Strom's dark, storm-lined face brightened at the prospect of a verbal
lashing, but Vaylo let the incident pass.  He would not waste breath on
the Halfman.  Placing a hand on Strom's arm, he walked with the
swordsman out of the chiefs chamber.

When they were past earshot, Vaylo said,

"Do as the Halfman says, Strom.  But first, find Ranald or one of the
others and tell him to search the Halfman's saddlebags and remove all
powders or potions."  It was little, but it was something.  Henbane was
scarce in winter, and Sarga Veys would not easily lay his hands on more.

Strom nodded.

"And tell Branon that I want all clansmen and clanswomen war dressed and
mounted within the quarter.  When Marafice Eye and his sept leave
Ganmiddich I want the last thing they see to be the armed might of
Bludd."  Strom turned.  Vaylo halted him with a final caution.

"We must be careful, Strom.  Marafice Eye has a soldier's mind; he'll
spot our poor numbers given chance."

Strom Carvo, who was Cluff Drybannock's blood-brother and one of the
finest swordsmen in the clan, simply nodded and said, "Due care has
already been taken."

Vaylo felt better for hearing those words.  They made the next waiting
period bearable.

High winds blasted the walls of the roundhouse as the Knife, the
Halfman, and the Dog Lord stood in silence and waited for Strom to bring
the girl.  When hail began to batter the shutters, Vaylo was neither
worried nor surprised.  A storm suited his feelings well enough.

When the knock came it seemed too soon.  Sarga Veys' tongue came out to
moisten his lips.  Marafice Eye stopped pacingand shifted the massive
fact of his body toward the door.

"Enter," called the Dog Lord.

Strom Carvo carried the girl into the room.  The swordsman had taken
care to wrap her tightly against the storm, and her slim body was thick
with as many layers of wool and oilcloth as the remaining Bluddswomen
could spare.  Strom had even thought to tuck her lovely ash blond hair
beneath her collar, where the wind could not find it as she rode.  The
girl herself was lifeless.  Her head lolled back and forth with every
step Strom took.

Sarga Veys moved forward.  Vaylo heard the excited inhalation of his
breath. It sickened him.

"Lay her on the table."

Strom obeyed his chief, yet Vaylo saw the glint of anger in his eyes.

He didn't want to give her up to these men.

Sarga Veys was first to approach, pulling down the fox hood that Strom
had tied in place.

"Oh yes," he said.

"It's her."  Then to Strom: "How much food has she eaten?"

Muscles on the swordsman's face shifted with the deceptive smoothness of
ice plates ridinga rough sea.

"Nothing.  She drank only the water."

Vaylo closed his eyes.  Only water.  How strong is the drug the Halfman
gave her?

As Sarga Veys plucked open her eyes and picked up her limbs and dropped
them, Marafice Eye moved toward the table.  His face darkened as he
beheld Asarhia March, and his large hands came together to crush the air
above her chest. Watching those hands, Vaylo almost said, You cannot
have her.

Sarga Veys produced a second vial of poppy blood from his pouch.

"The few drops she drank with the water are not enough.  She'll wake in
the night if we're not careful."

Strom looked to his chief.  Vaylo said,

"Take the vial from him and put two drops only upon her tongue."  Strom
did his bidding in silence.

When all was done and Marafice Eye was busy cracking his knuckles in
readiness to bear Asarhia's weight, the Dog Lord approached the table.

The girl's face was pale, her lips almost blue.  Frozen.  It was easy to
imagine her mouth full of snow .  .  .

Abruptly he turned away.

"Go/" he commanded, chasing ghosts and men alike.

"And be sure to tell your master that all debts are paid in full."

t t t Ra if woke.

Ash.

His hand clutched at his throat, seeking his lore.  It wasn't there.

Memory flooded back to him; the Dog Lord had cast it into the standing
water at his feet.  It hadn't seemed important to search for it at the
time.  The raven lore always came back.

Steeling himself against pain and weakness, Raif rose from the stone
bench and waded through the shin-high water.  Storm darkness filled the
cell.  He couldn't see anything, not even his hands as he plunged them
into the black substance of the river and began questing for his lore.

Weeds wrapped around his fingers, slimy as uncooked meat.  Other things
floated by his wrists, soft things, jellylike things, bits of something
smooth like hollow bone.  He smelled his own filth and the filth of
those who had been here before him, yet he could find nothing within him
that was repulsed.  He had to get to his lore.

His body was weak, weak, and he cursed it a dozen times in the darkness.
When his legs began to tremble beneath him, he knelt in the water and
continued searching.  Raking his fingers along the cell floor, he probed
the cracks and creases and river-worn hollows, disturbing centuries of
mud and shit each time he moved a hand.  The water was bitterly cold,
yet he barely felt it.  Outside the storm howled like a wild beast,
swipingat the tower with claws of wind and hail, yet it mattered less
than the hiss of his own breath.  Something was wrong with Ash.

Icy water deadened his fingers, turning them into wooden sticks.  Skin
split and tore as he dredged through the silt.  Where is it?  Had the
current carried it away?  Raif shook his head.  No.  As a child he had
thrown the lore from him a dozen times, yet the clan guide had always
found it and brought it back.

It had to be here.

Water sloshed against the walls as he grew more frenzied.  His clothes
were sodden, stinking.  Knife cuts on his thighs and belly burned like
white fire. His rib cage felt big and swollen, the bones making
unnerving creaking noises every time he took a lungful of air.  He
thought he heard Death laugh at him, a high, tinkling chirr that chilled
him in ways no cold water could. Ash .  .  .

As he dragged his hand along the crease where the wall and floor met, a
length of twine tangled in his fingers.  Snatching his fist closed, he
caught it in his grip and pulled it through the water.  The moment his
hand broke the surface, he knew his lore had come back to him.

Here it is, RaifSevrance.  One day you may be glad of it.

The small length of bird horn came dripping from the water.  Raif held
the twine, only the twine, until he had returned to the dry island of
the bench. His heart beat against his rib cage with quiet force as he
moved.  He thought his hands might shake when he pulled the twine
through his fingers, but they held steady.  River water dripped from
every point of his body, pooling onto the bench where he sat.  He
thought about signing to the Stone Gods, asking them to keep Ash safe,
then decided against it.  Stone Gods were clan gods, and neither he nor
Ash was clan.

Forcing his lips together, he placed the lore in the palm of his right
hand and closed his fist around it.

The knowledge came to him instantly, warm as his own blood, slipping
into his mind like just another thought.  Ash was gone.  She was no
longer close and unharmed.  Someone had taken her away.

Spitting to clear the taste of river from his mouth, Raif rose from the
stone bench.  Slowly he crossed to the cell door.  When he was within
two paces of the oak and ironclad planking, he halted.  Tensing his body
for a long moment, he filled his lungs with air.  Then, with a movement
so fast it split the standing water in two, he sent his shoulder
smashing into the wood.

Ash was gone .  .  .  and the tower would have to fall so he could reach
her.

CHAPTER FORTY-ONE.

An Object Returned Raif let the madness take him.  Hours passed as he
tore at the darkness in his cell.  When his right shoulder became a
bruised and bloody mass, he began drivingat the door with his left. When
the door held firm, and whatever bar or bolts bracing it on the other
side failed to crack or jump their casings, he swung himself up onto the
bench and began punching the iron grating.  The bars of the grate were
as thick as arms, set deep into mortise holes and packed with burned
lime: They did not budge under his bombardment.

He shouted until his voice was hoarse, but no one came for him to kill.
He charged the walls, then kicked them, and when that failed he clawed
at the green river stone with bare hands.  Blood flowed from beneath his
fingernails, runningalong his palms and dripping from his wrists to the
river below.  Sweat stung his eyes and turned the clothes on his back to
sopping bandages packed with salt.  He wanted someone to come anyone.
The kill was upon him, and he imagined beating Bluddsmen senseless
against the stone walls, then using their swords to carve out their
hearts.  Watcher of the Dead, they called him.  Well, let them come and
see for themselves how quickly he could take a life.

Hours passed, and still he raged.  Terrible tremors shook him, making
his legs bend with exhaustion and his eyes see things that could not be
there. Tern was in the cell with him, lying on the stone bench, his arms
burned black, and his mouth open and full of worms.  When Raif looked
again it was his mother, her skin all yellow and loose, her eyes sealed
closed with sulfur paste.  Soon his legs could no longer hold him, and
he dropped into the water and began gouging rotten mortar with his lore.
Ash was all that mattered.

Getting to Ash.

Dimly, in some distant part of his mind that could still look ahead, he
knew his best course would be to lie low until morning, wait until a
Bluddsman entered the cell--one hand busy with the bolt, the other
balancinga water bladder and a bowl of sot ted oats-- and take him as he
entered.  Smash the door in his face, seize his weapon, and run.

Yet the idea of doing nothing until morning was unthinkable.  Somehow it
was all mixed up with Drey .  he could not break another oath.

As the night wore on, he fought sleep.  His mind lapsed for seconds at a
time, leaving him blinking in the darkness, gripping his lore.

After a time his neck could no longer support the weight of his head,
and he rested his chin on his chest as he worked.  His eyes closed, but
he continued to jab bloody fingers against stone, using the pain to stay
awake.

Eventually the pain stopped hurting, and the line between sleepingand
waking began to fade.  He lost seconds, then minutes, then hours.

Still fighting, he fell asleep.

Clacking noises, like the sound of wooden training swords bashing
together, filled his dreams.  He saw Shor Gormalin parrying with Banron
Lye on the court, dead men dueling with swords.  Clack!  Clack!

Clack!

Raif turned in his sleep.  The clacking followed him, only now it
sounded different, higher, sharper, like steel meeting steel.  Someone
screamed. Footsteps thudded in the distance.  Dogs wailed, their cries
growing higher and more desperate until they stopped sounding like
things bred by man and howled like wolves instead.

A mighty crash shook the tower.  RaiPs right arm skidded from the stone
bench and fell into the water below.  He opened his eyes.  The pale
light of winter dawn filled the cell like gray smoke.  Something red and
bloody lay directly in front of his face, and he stared at it for a long
moment before realizing it was his own left hand.  As he

pulled his right free from the water, he heard a salvo of shouted
orders. Sword metal clattered against stone.  Footsteps drew close.

Breath exploded in a violent hiss.  Something, very probably a body,
fell with the thud of a rolled carpet toppling onto the floor.

Even as Raifdrew himself upright, the cell door burst open.

ke cut ice.  A fist, gloved in black, balanced a lead-weighted sword
close to a chest plated in silvered steel.  A face, shadowed beneath a
thorn helm of acid-blackened iron, emerged from the darkness behind the
door.

Blackball.  Pride stabbed at Raifs heart: His clan had taken Ganmiddich
back.

"On your feet."

Raif turned cold.  His pride drained away as quickly as an exhaled
breath. The voice behind the thorn helm was known to him.  "Take off
your helm."

The figure shook his head.  Eyes gleamed cold beneath a mesh of iron
thorns. Raising the tip of his sword, he said,

"Stand."

Raif stood and faced the figure by the door.  He was shaking, but the
helmed man was not.  The hand that gripped the sword was as solid as
rock.  The chest beneath the armor rose and fell with powerful, even
breaths.

"Drey?"

The figure stiffened.

"Brother."  It was almost, yet not quite, a question.  The figure before
him was barely recognizable as Drey; his voice was deeper, his shoulders
broader. Even his attire was different.  War dressed in tempered steel
and black leathers, Drey had shed the rough hand me-downs that were the
stock of all year men and clan sons.  He was all hard edges now.

"We are not brothers, you and I.  Blood ceased flowing between us the
day you broke your oath."

Raif controlled the muscles in his face.  Inside, the coldness in his
chest contracted to a single rigid point.  Drey was not here to save
him.  It was a child's thought, a sudden realization that those you
trusted could hurt you, and Raif felt the same sickening shock as if
Drey had smacked him in the face.  He knew he shouldn't have been
surprised, but the habit of Drey's loyalty ran deep within him.

Drey was always there to pull him out of scrapes, to conceal bloody
knees from Tern and broken saplings from Longhead, and to back up
incredible stories about bears fleeing over thin ice and lone elk
trampling tents.  Drey always waited.

Swords clashed in the chamber above.  The ceiling shuddered as something
heavy and metallic, like a charcoal burner or an arms rack, crashed to
the floor.  Drey stepped forward, jabbing the air next to RaiPs throat
with his sword.

"Move!"

Raif cursed the reflex action that made him flinch.  Fixing his gaze on
what was visible of his brother's eyes through the thorn helm, he walked
around the blade.

"Up the steps.  One pace ahead of me, no more."

Raif climbed the spiral stair in silence.  Light stung his eyes.  Fresh
air and new sounds made his head swim.  Once he stumbled and had to put
a hand upon the wall to steady himself.  Drey's sword drew blood from
the center of his spine, and he did not stumble or slow down again.

Two Bailsmen stood guard on the floor above.  Both men's breastplates
were beaten out of shape, and one man's gorget was punctured and leaking
blood. Their blade edges were caked with chunks of hair and skin.
Through the wire of their helms, Raif recognized Rory Cleet and Arlec
Byce.  As he drew closer, Raif saw that Rory's handsome face was now
marred by a thick white scar running from the crease of his eye to his
mouth.

"Stone Gods!"  Rory hissed as Raif approached.

"What have they done to him?"  Rory received no answer, nor did he say
anything more.  Drey sent a look to silence him.

Raif kept his face hard.  He could not stop them from seeing the hurts
on his body, but that was all they would see.

"To the skiff."

Hearing his brother speak those words, Raif realized that Drey had
changed more than his appearance.  Arlec Byce, a full clansman of five
winters, moved on his say.

They climbed through the base of the tower, past snuffed torches,
unhinged doors, and a Bluddsman's decapitated corpse. Black smoke pumped
from a doorway, twistingaround itself to form a tunnelingafterbirth of
soot and fumes.  Raif considered the band of darkness it created,
noticed how Rory Cleet lifted his visor so he could rub his stinging
eyes and how Arlec Byce held his sword hand to his helm to block the
stench of burning flesh.

It would be so easy to take them.

Kill an army for me, Raif Sevrance.

Raif shook his head with quiet force.  He would not slay his clansmen.

Not even for Ash.

A fourth Bailsman joined them as they filed out of the tower into the
gray storm light that shone upon the Inch.  Raif paid him no heed, yet
he knew well enough that it was Bev Shank, kit ted out in new-made plate
armor and guard chains.  His sword was badly notched and would have to
be sent to Brog Widdie to be retired.  Then again, perhaps his father
would buy him a new one; Orwin Shank could well afford it.

Raif was aware that Bev's gaze was upon him, yet he kept his thoughts
and his eyes upon the sword.

Spray from the river lashed his cheek as he waited to board the skiff.
High winds shaved the surface, slicing the heads off waves and driving
dark swells against the Inch.  Hailstones battered the tower, drowning
out the sound of battle to the north.  On the far bank, the Ganmiddich
roundhouse glowed orange and green, lit by a moat of soaring flames.
Strip fires, Raif thought, to stop the Bluddsmen from forming lines.

The skiff rocked as he stepped into it.  Gray water lay two hands deep
in the hull, yet Raif barely felt it.  Compared with the water in his
cell, it was warm and fragrant.  Hailstones as big as peas bobbed on the
surface.

"Tie his hands."  Drey's voice was hard.  His brown eyes dared Rory
Cleet to defy him.

Rory was no river man and when he stood to do Drey's bidding, he sent
the keel of the boat pitching into the storm-stripped water.  Bev Shank
and Arlec Byce struggled to keep the oars in their locks.

Raif held himself perfectly still as he allowed his wrists to be tied.

He thought he was going mad.  He saw death everywhere he looked.

It would be so easy to push Rory against the gunwales and capsize the
boat.  All of them would be thrown into the water.  Some would die.  Bev
Shank could swim, but his new armor must weigh two stone and a half and
he'd sink straight to the bottom.  All four of the Bailsmen were wearing
helms and plate.  The water was cold.  Icy.  Undertows and storm tows
would pull them under in an instant, send them smashingagainst the Inch.
Raifknew he would survive.  Cold water was nothing to him .

.  and there was no steel on his back, only rags.

Raif sat and did not move.  Salt from the river burned his skin.  He
watched Drey yet did not seem to.  He thought of death yet did not act.

It was a long journey to the shore.  All four clansmen took up oars.

Instead of fighting the current, Drey used it to steer the skiff to the
bank, allowing the river to carry the craft downstream.  Mounted figures
milled upon the bank, rippling in the heat of the strip fires like
demons.  Hailsmen and Bluddsmen.  Raif thought he saw the barrel chest
and chestnut braids of Corbie Meese amid a melee of sixty men.

He heard the screams of wounded horses and the furious rattle of ham
mermen chains.

"Raise the oars."  Drey snapped the order even though they were still
some distance from the north shore, and the skiff carried them even
farther downstream.  By the time the skiffs keel scraped gravel, they
were clear of the roundhouse and the fighting.  Raif looked from face to
face as the four clansmen dragged the skiff ashore.  No one would meet
his eyes.

Mace Blackhail.  The thought came with the strength and speed of a
reflex action.  Mace Blackhail wanted him taken quietly, away from the
fightingand the other clansmen.  Far better to deal with the traitor
alone, get the whole thing over and done, with no interference from the
clan.  Raif looked across the bank, his eyes skimming over the wooded
slopes and wet meadows of Ganmiddich.  Any moment he expected Mace
Blackhail to ride forward on his roan.

Drey secured the skiff's lines himself and then straightened to address
his men.

"Rory.  Arlec.  Head upstream on foot, find Corbie and Hugh Banneringand
tell them the Inch has been taken."  He unsheathed his sword as he
spoke.  It was the same sword he always carried at his back along with
his hammer, yet the grip was new doeskin and the blade had been oiled
and whetted to a high sheen.  The metal gleamed with all the colors of
the storm.

"Bev.  You go with them.  Fetch my horse and a spare pony for the
prisoner. Ride them back at haste."

Arlec Byce and Rory Cleet exchanged a glance.  Drey trained the tip of
his sword on Raifs kneecap.

"Go," he murmured, stabbing the bone.

"I'll hold the prisoner until you return."

Bev Shank was first to start east.  Rory Cleet and Arlec Byce were
slower getting started, and Arlec looked back several times as he headed
along the bank.  Raif wondered what had happened to the axman's twin;
the two were seldom far apart.

Drey held his position as he watched the three men scramble over the wet
gravel and storm-greased rocks along the shore.  Hailstones bouncing off
his breastplate made ticking sounds as seconds passed.

Rail's throat was dry.  He was aware of the blade point at his knee yet
didn't look down to check for blood.  His eyes were on his brother.
Drey's face was banded by shadow.  The glove that held the sword was
stretched white at the seams.  I'll stand second to his oath.

Drey's words were suddenly there in Raifs head.  That and the image of
Drey kicking his black gelding forward on the court, one man among
twenty-nine. The only one willing to back his oath.

Raif almost didn't feel the rope being cut.  Drey's sword ran with light
as he sliced through the horsehair twine at Raifs wrist, yet no
brightness found its way to his face.  Raif saw him glance east, to the
grove of ancient water oaks that had hidden Rory, Arlec, and Bev from
view.  Slowly, not meeting his brother's eyes, Drey shifted his grip on
the sword.

"Take it."

Raif blinked.  Drey pushed the hilt of the sword toward him.

"I said take it."

Confused, Raif shook his head.

Drey sucked in breath.  His eyes darted left then right.  With a sudden
movement he grabbed the edge of the blade and drove the pommel into
Raifs chest.

"Cut me!"

No.  Raiftook a step back.  He saw where the sword edge had bitten
through Drey's glove and drawn a line of blood.  Even as he watched the
steel turn red.  Drey moved forward, grabbing Raif's hand and forcing it
around the hilt.  Raif fought him, but Drey had always been stronger,
and even before he could pull away, Drey stepped onto the tip of the
sword.

Metal punctured with a quiet hiss.  Drey tensed.  His eyes darkened, and
his lips twisted as he fought to take the pain soundlessly .  as Tern
had taught him.  Horrified, Raif pulled the sword back.  Blood, shiny
and nearly black, oozed from a jagged slit in Drey's breastplate.  Raif
lost his grip on the sword, and it clattered against the rocks, making a
sound that seemed too loud.

"Go," Drey said, fingers working to release the leather straps on his
breastplate.

"We fought.  You took my weapon from me, wounded me, then fled."

Raif moved forward to help Drey with the straps, but Drey warned him
back with a single glance.  His face was gray.  Blood rolling down his
armor pooled in the waist crease and dripped from the runnels.  The
wound was high in the belly, just below his ribs.  How deep had the
blade gone?  Could it have punctured his stomach or lungs?

"GO?"

Raifs body swayed at the force of the word.  How can you expect me to
leave while you are bleeding?  he wanted to scream.  We are brothers,
you and I. Drey sucked in breath as he peeled the breastplate from his
chest.

Fresh blood gouted from the wound, and he forced his knuckles into the
wetness.  Seconds passed as he dealt with the pain.

Raif forced himself to watch.  He could not believe what Drey had done.
Drey Sevrance was not the sort of man to commit treason lightly.  He
lived for clan, like Tern before him, and his bear lore drove him hard
and true.

When Drey next looked up his eyes were clouded.  With hands bloody from
his wound, he poked at the packages hanging from his

belt.

"Here," he said, snapping the horn containing his portion of guide stone
from its brass hook, "take this.  Inigar has hewn your memory from the
guide stone He cut a portion of stone the size and shape of a man's
heart and gave it to Longhead to cart away.  Mace had him smash it to
dust."

Raiftook a breath and held it.  Excised from the guide stone like Ayan
Blackhail, second son to Ornfel Blackball, who killed the last of the
Clan Kings, Roddie Dhoone.  Ayan Blackhail had thought his father would
thank him for puttingan arrow in Roddie Dhoone's throat, yet Ornfel
Blackhail had turned on his son and cut off both his hands.

"An arrow is no way to kill a king," he had said.

"You should have used your sword, or naught at all."

"You are no longer my brother or my clan," Drey said quietly, pulling
Raif back.

"We part here.  For always.  Take my portion of guide stone ... I would
not see you unprotected."

Their eyes met.  Raif looked at his brother and saw a man who could be
chief. He did not speak.  There was no place for questions about Angus
and Effie and clan.  There was only enough time to look at Drey, lock
his face and his presence into memory.

And in the end there wasn't even enough time for that.

A shout sounded downstream.  A mounted figure crested the high bank
above the river, pushing his likeness in woodsmoke before him.  A wolf's
head cut into his breastplate had been rubbed with acid until it burned,
then worked with pure carbon so that its blackness was one of empty eye
sockets, open mouths, and charred wood.  Mace Blackhail.

He had not spotted them yet.

For one brief moment Raif let himself imagine that Drey was coming with
him, that they would ride through the Northern Territories, swords in
hand, warriors and exiled clansmen alike.  It wasn't to be.

There was Effie and clan .  .  .  and Ash.  And days darker than night
lay ahead.

Raif took the tine from his brother.  He had to leave now, before Mace
Blackhail saw them together.  Raif had little care about him- self--and
there was something in him that welcomed the chance of getting close
enough to kill Mace Blackhail--yet he would not endanger Drey.  Not
after this.  Not ever.

Drey's fingers were sticky with drying blood; for a moment when he
touched them, Raiffelt them cleave to his own.

"Go, Raif," Drey said.

"I'll watch over the clan."

It was the softest Raif had heard Drey speak since he had burst into the
cell what seemed like a lifetime ago.  Raif looked into his

"I

brother's eyes one last time, then turned away.

As he took his first step, he felt Drey's hand capture his trailing /;
fist. Something small and cool was pressed into his palm.  Feeling it, i
Raif thought his heart would break.

The swear stone Drey had kept it whole and safe until today.  1 Lowering
his head against the storm, Raif headed west.

CHAPTER FORTY-TWO.

Ganmiddich Pass

Carga Veys lay beneath the overhang formed by a shelf of compressed and
buckled slate.  The great glacier tongues ^^^< that had once reached
from the Breaking Grounds to the Bitter Hills had churned up entire
quarries of bedrock from the earth as they withdrew.  Even now,
thousands of years later, the violence of the glacier's retreat could
still be observed in places.  The northern slopes of the Bitter Hills,
just below the Ganmiddich Pass, was one such place.  A few lichen had
sunk their root anchors into the hard glassy crust, yet no trees or
shrubs of any kind had managed to take seed amid the rocks.  The wind
would have their heads off in an instant.

Wrapped in blankets spun of the softest goat's hair, Veys endured the
wind now.  Hood had wedged his strong, fleshy body behind Veys' back,
claiming the deepest refuge--the crease directly beneath the
overhang--for himself.  Veys was distressed by the man's nearness,
repulsed by his own physical reaction to the warm, respiring body next
to his.

It did not occur to him to move.  Here, lying beneath a broken plate of
slate, feigning sleep in the face of a storm, he could watch both
Marafice Eye and Asarhia March closely.

After taking his leave of the Dog Lord yesterday evening, Marafice Eye
had driven his party of eleven through the night.  A spare pony had been
purchased in Ille Glaive to carry Asarhia's drugged body back to Spire
Vanis, yet the Knife had chosen to ride with the girl himself.  He was
determined to make the best time that he could.

"Put the stench of clannish inbreeding behind me."  Veys was inclined to
agree with him.

A storm thundering down from the north had stopped their journey two
leagues short of the pass.  At first the Knife had tried to ride with
it, declaring that no clannish storm could slow a brother-in-the-watch,
yet when a hellish gust of wind had ripped the saddlebags from his
horse's rump, he'd had little choice but to eat his words and call a
halt.

Camp had been made in the deep rocky draw between two opposing ledges of
slate.  Veys supposed it was the best place to be found under the
circumstances and had wasted no time staking out his own claim beneath
the narrowest and least desirable ledge.  He had assumed that no one
would be willing to share space with him, yet Hood had found it amusing
to force himself into the dark airless cavity at his back.

"As long as I'm behind him and he's not behind me, I reckon I'll be
safe." Much laughter had followed Hood's declaration, and Veys had felt
his face heat in the darkness.  Thoughts of revenge had followed him to
sleep.

Now it was dawn, and a red and weary sun was rising in the east, and the
sept that had found Hood so amusing the night before was stirring with
the increase in light.  Their leather cloaks were poor cover for a
storm, and such lambskins that had been hastily purchased in Ille Glaive
were wet and stinking.  One sworn brother, a brawny giant with a slow
eye, was meltinga cake of elk lard in a tin cup.  The smell nauseated
Veys.

Marafice Eye was awake.  He had relieved himself some distance from the
campground and had now returned to his place by the wool-and-alcohol
fueled fire.  He poked the fire with a stick for a while, managing to
coax some real heat from the flames, before turning his attention to
Asarhia March.  The girl lay on the bedroll next to his, covered by
sheepskins and cloaks. Something unpleasant happened to Marafice Eye's
face as he beheld her, and Veys thought it likely that he was
considering the men he'd lost by the Spill.  The Knife was strange like
that.  My men, he called his brothers-in-the-watch.  Last night when the
wind had dragged the

saddlebags from his warhorse, two red swords had clattered onto the
slate. Veys knew what they were in an instant: Crosshead's and
Malharic's swords. The Knife meant to carry them back to the forge, heat
them in that great black furnace, and return their steel to the Watch.
As if that could do Crosshead and Malharic any good.

Veys snorted softly as he watched Asarhia March's face for signs of
waking. The poppy blood the girl had been given last night in the
Ganmiddich roundhouse was a strong agent of sleep.  Veys had distilled
it himself, turning liquid that was normally thinner than water into
something that poured as slowly as cream.  It was more potent than the
Dog Lord knew, a fact that Veys congratulated himself on later when he
found his saddlebags had been rifled and his supply of henbane seeds, so
carefully concealed within the handle of his cane-and-leather horsewhip,
gone.

The Dog Lord had thought to protect the girl on her journey home.

Veys smiled, allowing icy drops of rain to tap against his teeth.  The
small quantity of poppy blood he had on him--barely enough liquid to
sauce a lamb chop--was more than enough to render Asarhia March
senseless all the way to the obsidian deserts of the Far South.

The smile on Veys' face shrank as he noticed Asarhia March's gloved hand
fall free of the sheepskin.  Did the fingers contract?

Marafice Eye was oblivious of the movement.  He was busy working on the
girl's chest, whipping bodice strings through eyelets and pushing back
the collar other dress.  His mouth was pulled tight like a sphincter
muscle.  The sworn brother heating the elk cake turned to watch.

Veys reached down beneath his blankets, questing for the vial of poppy
blood. Even as his physical self was bent on the task, he probed out
toward Asarhia with his mind.  If she was waking, he needed to know.
Normally a girl her age and size could be expected to sleep until noon
on the dose of poppy blood she'd been given.  Yet the more Veys learned
of the Surlord's almost-daughter, the more he realized there was little
normal about her.

Cold air buffeted his thoughts as he pushed his mind against her skin.
Quickly in and quickly out, he cautioned himself, fear rising within his
spine like cold water.  A gasp exploded from his lips as he entered
Asarhia's body and ran with her blood.  Her chest cavity was riddled
with opposing forces.  Hard strands of sorcery were coiled about her
organs like snakes made of glass.  Wards, Veys realized, subtle ones
cast by a master.  Pushing from the outside in, they exerted control
over her liver, lungs, and heart.

Yet something was pushing the other way.

Veys perceived something.  a soft, malleable force, shining dully like
the skin that formed over cooling magma.

Pure darkness.

Externally, Veys did not move.  Not one fiber on the goat's-hair blanket
shivered as he withdrew his in substance from the body of | Asarhia
March. Slowly he went, like a servant backing out of a i throne room. As
he slipped the last tendrils of self through the , upper reaches other
skin, the force that pressed from the inside out raised a finger of
darkness toward him.  i Veys did not recoil.  Reverence and fear
tightened his chest.  Raw i power, clean of emotion, filled him with the
complete opposite of .

light.  His mouth watered.  The tendons supporting his scrotum 5 ached
with sweet pain.  Here at last was something worthy of Sarga ] Veys.  i
Too soon the connection was gone.  Veys' neck strained forward, ;|
trying to hold on to the last filament of power for as long as he |
could.  Yet even as he did so, he was aware of something cold drip1 ping
through his fingers.  Rain, he thought, annoyed at such an| earthly
intrusion at that moment.  He wanted the power back.  | It was gone,
though, the connection broken, and Veys had no | choice but to return to
his flesh.  Pain tugged at his mind as he set-; tied himself back into
his cage of bones, and his gaze was drawn tcr| his hand, where a streaky
pink substance, part blood of the poppy < and part blood of Sarga Veys,
dribbled along his wrist.  Spikes of| glass were embedded in the meat of
his palm.  Veys hissed.  The vial|f had broken!  | Breathless from his
contact with darkness and irritated by the| potential loss of such a
crucial drug, Veys barely noticed what was happeningat the center of the
campground.  More sworn brothers had gathered around Asarhia March and
the Knife.  One man was laughing in a hard self-conscious way, yet the
others were uncharacteristically silent.  Veys hardly cared.  Turning
his arm slowly, he let the pink emulsion roll around his wrists like
honey around a jar.  As long as it didn't drip into the snow or smear on
his clothes or blanket, it could be saved.  Once it had dried
sufficiently he could scrape it off, store it liice whore's rouge
between two squares of waxed paper.

Veys was content to wait.  The revelation of darkness filled his
thoughts. So much power .  .  .

For the taking.

Hood shifted at Veys' back, still fast asleep and snoring softly.

Sarga Veys edged minutely away.

The darkness within Asarhia March explained many things: why Penthero
Iss had been so desperate to find her, why he had sent the Protector
General of the Rive Watch to bring her back, and why he had isolated the
girl from the sharp eyes and nails of the Spire Vanis court.  The girl
was dangerous.  .  .  and powerful in ways Veys could hardly comprehend.
Whoever controlled her could have that power for himself.

Veys turned his arm, allowing the last pink droplet to run flat, as he
recalled the last time he and his master had spoken.  The force with
which Iss had taken control of his body had left Veys feeling dirty.
Raped.  The memory of the domination made the sweet ache in Veys' groin
turn to something bitter and wanting.  He glanced in the direction of
Asarhia March.  Iss already had one special access to power.  Why should
he have two?

"Strip her."

Veys' heart chilled as he heard Marafice Eye's spoken command.  He
looked up but could no longer see Asarhia March due to the crowd of
sworn brothers that surrounded her.  Marafice Eye stood in the center of
the black-and-red coven, his face all shadows and hard lines.

She killed our brothers-in-the-watch," he murmured.

"Iss wants her alive, and that's well and good, but I know one way to
destroy a life without actually taking it."

A taut murmur of agreement united the sept.  Two brothers pushed toward
the girl, cheeks sucked against their teeth, eyes glinting with wind
tears, hands already forming the shapes needed to hold her down.

"No?"  Veys screamed, scrambling to his feet.  He had a vision of
Asarhia March wakingand blasting them all to hell.  The wards that
shored up her body were nothing compared to that.  .  .  thing that
lived within her. IfMarafice Eye tried to harm her in any way, there was
no telling what she would do.

"Stop!  She'll kill us all."

Marafice Eye and his sept turned to look at him.  For one moment Veys
saw himself through their eyes: a narrow-shouldered figure dressed in
cleric's white, with fine eyes and fine hands, clutchinga blanket to his
chest like a baby.  Veys stood tall, let the goat blanket drop to the
ground.

The Knife said something to his men.  All laughed quickly.  The two
sworn brothers who were working on the girl straightened their bent
backs.  The Knife touched both men on their shoulders in turn,
encouraging them to carry on.  Veys caught a fleeting glimpse of the
girl's body, saw pale skin peeking through wool.  Raindrops fell upon
her closed eyelids, gray and frothy like spit.

Marafice Eye said,

"This does not concern you, Halfman.  You are not one of us.  If the
manner of such things offends you, turn your back."

Blood colored Veys' cheeks.

"Fool!  Haven't you taken notice of anything I have said?  The girl is
dangerous.  Sorcery" -- "Hood."

One word spoken by the Knife was enough to waken the eight- fingered
man. Veys heard footsteps crunch wet snow.  He smelled Hoods ripe breath
at his back.

"Take him in hand.  Mind he sees nothing that his mam wouldn't be glad
to show him."

Hood slapped Veys' shoulder blade with somethingakin to affection.

"Looks like you and me will be sitting out the storm, Half- man."

Then, to Marafice Eye,

"Save me a portion of the girl."

The Knife nodded.  A command was spoken, and the sept turned back to
their business.  Marafice Eye stood and watched as Hood led Veys back to
the overhang.

"The drugs have worn off," Veys cried, making a feeble attempt to break
away from Hood's three-fingered grip.

"She'll kill us all!"

"Hush him."  Marafice Eye peeled off his black leather gloves as he
spoke.

Hood punched Veys in the spine.

"You heard the Knife, Half- man.  No whining."

Veys tucked himself back into the space where he had slept.  Pain from
Hood's blow made his eyes water, yet pride kept him from crying out.

Hood stood directly in front of him, his fleshy drinking- man's body
blocking the view.

The wind carried the metallic snap of a belt buckle.  Nervous laughter
followed, then silence.  Veys felt the hairs on his arm rise one by one.
Through the space between Hood's legs, he watched as Marafice Eye walked
a short distance from the group, found himself a section of slate to
lean against, then settled down to watch the show.  Of course, Veys
thought, the Knife is doing this just for his men.  He won't take part
himself.  Everyone knows he prefers to keep his own whoring private.
Veys did not know why.

All thoughts except those concerned with self-protection left Sarga Veys
as the first man fell upon the girl.  The wind pattern changed.

Gusts began swirling round and round in the space between the ledges.

.  and then suddenly there was no wind at all.

Raif!

Veys heard the girl's cry plainly, but not in the way a man normally
heard sound.  The cry passed through his skin, not his eardrums, making
his flesh pucker and turn cold.  Hood shifted position, and Veys saw the
sept standing tense, eyes focused hard upon the girl.  No man among them
had heard her cry.

Stop!  Veys wanted to shout.  Can't you see what is happening?  Can't
you feel it?

The stench of metal filled the air.  Frost glittered on the surrounding
slopes like a thousand winking eyes as the first brother fell upon the
girl. Veys felt the first push other power; it was nothing, a mere nudge
as she struggled to wake.  Yet it was enough to turn the breath in his
lungs to ice.

Quietly, discreetly, he began work upon a drawing of his own.  He had
caught a glimpse of the darkness that was inside her, and although it
fascinated and attracted him, he knew he would be a fool not to fear it.
Slowly, over the course of many seconds, he drew small shavings of power
to him.  He could not stand against her, that much was clear, so he
concentrated upon the only thing that mattered: Saving Sarga Veys' neck.

He knew the instant she became fully awake.  A quarter second of pure
quiet followed as she opened her eyes and gazed into the face of the man
who knelt above her.

Terror threatened to crush Veys then.  Sorcery had been his sole
advantage for as long as he could remember, the one thing he held over
every man, woman, and child he had ever met.  Even Penthero Iss, magic
user and Surlord of Spire Vanis, could not better Sarga Veys when it
came to drawing power. It was the source of his arrogance and his pride.
No matter what humiliations Marafice Eye and his like heaped upon him,
Veys could always console himself with the thought that when the time
came for out-and-out conflict, the advantage would be his.  A man could
not fight when his corneas were snapped from his eyes like badges from
his chest.  He could not focus his mind on winning when the air froze in
his lungs like a ghost made of ice.

Now, though, sensing the terrible pull that Asarhia March created, the
way the wind, the air, even the light itself, seemed to bend toward her
person, Veys knew that his one advantage was gone.

There was no fighting the darkness inside her.

He thought of calling out one last time, warning the sept to take cover
or run, but he was quick to remember their spiteful laughter, and in the
end he saved his strength for himself.

"Let me go!"  the girl cried, her voice high and panicky.

Veys saw pale fists pounding the sworn brother's chest, heard fabric
rip, then a man's voice, low and distracted, murmur,

"Shut up, bitch."

It was the last sound the man ever made.  Veys had no words for what
happened next.  Panic and terror reduced him to a cowering child.

Light and air split, tearing open the fabric of the world.  Darkness of
an alien kind bled through the rents, smelling sweet and cold and wholly
corrupt, rippling like black oil.  A mushrooming band of air blasted
into the sept, sending bodies crashing into walls of slate.

Horses squealed and thrashed, bucking their hindquarters and throwing
their heads from side to side.  Men screamed and screamed .  and then
fell silent. A cloud of churned snow rose high into the sky, where the
storm dogs tore it to shreds.

Veys thought he was prepared, but he wasn't.  Hoods body slammed into
his, cracking his ribs like dry sticks.  All breath left him, and the
clever little drawing he had devised to save himself came out half
formed, ill timed, and without force.  It was barely enough to shield
his brain and his heart.  His mouth and nose filled with rushing snow.

He tried to keep his eyes open to see what would enter through the rents
the girl's power had torn open, but ice crystals scoured his violet
retinas, and in the end his eyelids were forced shut.

The force of the blast wedged him into the rear of the overhang, Hood's
body pinning him in place.  Fear, so complete it was like a wholly new
emotion, robbed all moisture from his throat This was what he wanted.
This.

His eardrums popped as air that had been moving outward began to
contract.  A breeze exactly the same temperature as body heat ruffled
his hair, then his clothes, then the hair and clothes of Hood.

She's pulling it back.

Something howled, high and terrible, almost beyond hearing.  Veys knew
then that the creature issuing it came not from this world.  No animal
or beast he had ever heard of made a sound that could stop a man's
heart.

Then everything ceased.

Silence followed.  The snow that had been churned up in a great white
cloud fell again, gently, floating to earth as if for the first time.

Wind picked up, pushing here and there, unsure of which way to blow.
Veys stole a breath.  His rib cage was on fire, but he dared not move to
relieve the pain.  Hood's thigh was crushing his foot, and ice crystals
were working their way down his throat.  Still he did nothing but open
his eyes.

Through a curtain of twice fallen snow, he saw the girl rise to her
feet. Her dress was torn to the waist, and her breasts were bare.  Her
hair blew around her face, ripplingas if each strand moved through
water, not air. Gray eyes took in the cleared ground surrounding her,
then the flopping, leaking bodies of the sept.  Her lips came together.

Her right hand began to shake, but she quickly gave it purpose, using it
to pull at the tattered shreds of her bodice.  Veys noticed the poppy
blood bruises under her eyes as she turned to look his way.

If she saw him in the shadows of the overhang, she did not show it.

She took a few steps his way, but only to reach for the goat's-hair
blanket that he had dropped earlier.  Hands shaking no longer, she
wrapped the blanket around her shoulders and turned her back on Veys.

On the far side of the campground someone groaned.

Asarhia March stiffened.  Veys thought she might turn and heed the cry,
but she didn't, simply continued walkingaway from the campground in the
direction of the hobbled horses.

Sarga Veys waited as quietly and silently as he knew how.  The memory of
the darkness he had seen eclipsed the pain of his chest and foot.

It had called to him as surely as if it had spoken his name out loud.

A small movement against his foot made him realize that Hood was still
alive. Hearing the muffled sound of a horse's hooves heading north, Veys
pulled his foot free.

"Hood?"  he hissed.

"Hood?"

Hood gurgled.

It took Veys several minutes to locate the man's knife.  The tip of a
broken rib pressingagainst his lungs made Veys wary of quick movements.
To add to his difficulties, Hood had fallen awkwardly on his side, and
his body had to be levered before Veys could gain access to his
equipment belt and knife. Hood's tunic had ridden up, and his bare belly
was in contact with icy ground.  Already the rolls of flesh hanging from
his gut had taken on the yellowy gray stiffness of frozen flesh.

Veys found nothing to be concerned with as he raised the knife to Hood's
throat.

Frostbite was not a problem for a corpse.

CHAPTER FORTY-THREE.

Meetings ull Moler, owner and sole proprietor of Drover Jack's 'tavern,
was cleaning up the mess from last night's fight.  He had a good broom
in his hands, but even the stiff shire horse bristles weren't enough to
scrub the dried-on vomit off the floor.  Gull shook his head in
exasperation. Fistfights were bad enough.  But why was there always some
damn fool who kicked someone else in the knackers?  Guaranteed to make a
man lose his supper, was a blow to the knacks.  Right disrespectful to
the owner of the establishment.  Right disrespectful when that owner had
to get down on his hands and knees and scrape rubbery, partially
digested oatmeal off the floor.

It was all Desmi's fault, of course.  It usually was.  If that daughter
of his had one talent in life it was surely for starting fights.  She
was just too comely for her own good.  Who would have guessed that she
would have turned out to be a head turner, especially with her dear
departed mother looking the way she did?  Not that Pegratty Moler hadn't
been a good woman and an excellent wife.  Heavens, no!  She just wasn't
known for her beauty, that was all.

Feeling a small twinge of guilt, Gull put down the broom and headed for
the stove.  He needed a bucket of warm water for the floor and a dram or
two of malt for his soul.

Drover Jack's was a one-room tavern.  Kitchen, beer cellar, dining
tables, gaming tables, minstrel's stoop, and great copper bath were all
crammed into an area the size of a modest vegetable

garden.  It had occurred to Gull that he could in all honesty remove
both the stoop and the bath and suffer no ill effects to his trade.

Thirty leagues northeast of Ille Glaive as he was, in the shadow of the
Bitter Hills, deep in the heart of ewe country, Drover Jack's received
few musicians stopping by to play for their supper.  And those who did
never showed an interest in performing from the stoop.

Preferred to sit close to the stove, they did, or--even worse--walk
among the customers while they were playing!  Still, even in the face of
this traitorous disinterest Gull couldn't bring himself to part with the
stoop. His was the only tavern in the Three Villages that had one.

Same with the bath.  Drover Jack's was strictly a tavern; it sold food,
drink, and warmth.  It did not sell beds for the night.  Heavens, no!
That was one trade Gull Moler did not want.  Travelers.  They were
trouble, paid in foreign coin, spoke with accents Gull's one good ear
had trouble deciphering, and they always started fights.  True, Three
Village locals had been starting enough of their own ever since Desmi
came into bloom, but that was beside the point.  Locals were locals;
they fought in ways Gull knew and understood.  They never damaged the
stove, the beer taps, or the proprietor. Travelers damaged everything in
sight.

Which brought Gull to the copper bath.  No one except Radrow Peel had
used it in the fifteen years it had been sitting in the far corner below
the hung meat and drying herbs.  And even then he hadn't bathed in it
himself; he'd used it to thaw out a sheep.  Even so, a copper bath was a
copper bath, and Gull was inclined to keep it.  Not only did it glow
like a freshly struck penny, castinga warm, reflective light upon a
corner that had once been dark, but it gave him boasting rights as well.

Drover Jack's could warm-bathe a frostbitten limb, cold-bathe a fever,
and sulfur-bathe anyone with sheep ticks, scrofula, or the ghones.
Overcome with feelings of affection and pride.  Gull crossed to the bath
and patted its curled rim.  His sharp proprietor's eyes picked out
telltale blue flecks around the lip.  Gull Moler's soft well-fed belly
jiggled in consternation.

Rust!

Desmi had sworn she had polished it last week, yet Gull Moler knew a
month's worth of corrosion when he saw it.  That girl was turning out to
be nothing but trouble.  The fights among her suitors he could stand,
the girlish tantrums he could stand, but sloppy care of Drover Jack's
furnishings and fittings was where he, as owner-proprietor, drew the
line.  The girl needed to be talked to in the most serious terms.  Her
own good looks had turned her head!

"Desmi!"  he called, raising his head toward the oak-and-plaster
ceiling.

"Come down here, daughter!"

No response.  And it was already noon!  Gull Moler looked from the
ceiling to the bath.  He could climb the steps and bring her down, but
while he was doing that the tavern would not get opened, and the bath
would not get scrubbed, and those hateful blue flecks would remain.

For Gull Moler it was an easy choice.  From the back of his prized blood
wood serving counter, he took his basket of cloths, soft and coarse,
fuller's earth, pine wax, powdered pumice, white vinegar, and lye.  He
loved and honored his daughter, but he treasured his bath.

He did not hear the woman enter.  He was kneeling on the dark oak-plank
floor, his attention given wholly to the task of removing the rust from
the bath, when a voice said: "Milk steeped in phosphorus would do the
job better, and a few drops of tung oil rubbed into the surface when
you're done will stop the rust from coming back."

Gull Moler turned his head and looked into the face of a short, no,
average-size, woman of an age he guessed to be about thirty.  His first
reaction was one of disappointment.  From the golden loveliness of her
voice he had expected someone extraordinary.  Yet the woman was plain of
hair and face and clad in a shapeless dress of dove gray.

"I'm sorry if I distracted you," she said.

"The door was open, so I let myself in."

Gull Moler looked at the door.  Surely he hadn't pulled the latches yet?

"I thought of knocking, but then I said to myself.  What if a man, an
owner-proprietor, is at work inside here?  What right have I to pull him
from his tasks?"

Gull Moler put down his soft cloth and smoothed his collar, all thoughts
of latches forgotten.  He stood upright.

"Such consideration does you credit, miss."

The woman, whose hair he had first thought dark and graying but now saw
was a delicate shade of ash brown, nodded in a polite way.

"Thank you, sir.  And it's not miss, by the way, it's madam.  I'm a
widow."

"Oh.  I am sorry to hear that, madam.  Can I offer you a dram of malt?"

"I never drink."

Gull Moler began to frown.  Experience told him never to trust
abstainers.

"Anything stronger than fortified wine."

Gull's frown turned itself into a nod of approval.  Such moderation was
fitting in a widow woman.

When he returned from the counter bearing two cups of strong red wine on
a lime wood tray, he was greeted by the sight of the woman crouched on
her hands and knees, polishing the copper bath to a glorious sheen.

"I hope you don't mind," she said, continuing to buff the metal with a
wrist action so smooth and firm that, watching her, Gull felt a guilty
blush of sexual excitement.

"But it seems to me that a busy and important owner-proprietor such as
yourself must have plenty more pressing things to do than spend his time
scrubbing blue rust from a copper bath."

"My daughter normally tends the polishing, but" -- "She's reached the
age when she'd rather tend herself than the tavern."

Gull sighed.

"Exactly."

The woman's eyes darkened.  Gull could not tell what color they were,
just that they darkened.

"What you need is someone to work for you a few days a week.  Take the
strain off you and your daughter.  A young girl can hardly be blamed for
acting like a young girl, can she?  And an owner-proprietor such as
yourself should be concentrating on the higher points of his business."

Gull nodded as she spoke.  He wasn't sure that a tavern like Drover
Jack's had any higher points of business, but that didn't stop him from
agreeing with her all the same.

"And a little help at the tables at night would save both your and your
daughter's feet."

Suddenly catching the real meaning of the conversation, Gull laid the
tray down on the nearest table.  For some reason he felt as if he'd been
duped.

"I couldn't take you on, madam.  It's just been me and my daughter since
my wife died.  I couldn't afford to pay another set of hands.  The
business doesn't warrant it."

The woman dipped her head in disappointment.

"I've heard such good things about Drover Jack's.  And now that I've
come here and seen for myself this beautiful copper bath and the fine
minstrel's stoop .  .  ."

Abruptly the woman laid down the polishing cloth and stood.

"Well, I'd best be on my way."

Gull looked from the woman to the copper bath.  The metal shone more
brightly than the day Rees Tanlow had brought it on his cart from Ille
Glaive.  Even the relief work around the hand rings had been scraped
clean of all the gummy remainders of previous waxes and polishes.  Gull
glanced at the ceiling. Desmi was becominga problem--just look at last
night: Burdale Ruff had kicked Clyve Wheat in the knackers because he'd
thought Clyve was looking at Desmi the wrong way.

Gull's glance came to rest upon the woman once more.  She was plain
enough to inspire no fights, yet not so ugly as to send customers away.
And she did look so very honest and hardworking.

"I'll pay you five coppers a week."  It was a pitifully small amount, so
small that Gull felt his cheeks color as he said it.

"Done."  The woman, who he had first thought was of short or medium
height, suddenly looked tall.

"I'll get to work on those table tops whoever cleaned them last used too
much wax.  Then I'll pin on my apron, ready to serve the midday trade.
Your customers come from all over the Three Village area, don't they?"

Gull nodded.

"Yes, madam."

"Good."  The woman smiled, displaying teeth devoid of saliva.  "It
wouldn't be fitting for you to call me madam anymore. I'm Maggy.  Maggy
Sea."

t t t Ash rode north, then northwest.  When she came to the banks of the
Wolf River, she forced the horse into the black icy water and made him
swim it. The horse was a shaggy gelding with thick legs and ears like a
mule, and he had no love of moving water.  Ash hardly cared.  If she'd
had a crop, she would have whipped him.  She could not allow herself to
stop and think.  Stop and she might turn and ride back to the pass and
take a count of the men she had killed.  Think and she might slide her
feet from the stirrups, push herself out of the saddle, and let the
river's dark currents take her to hell.

As it was, horse and rider were buoyed by the thick black water, carried
a league downstream by its force.  Ash let her hand trail upon the
surface as the gelding swam beneath her, watching grease and light
ripple along her fingers like strange gloves.  Her dress floated around
her, growing ever and ever darker as it soaked up the substance of the
river.  Strangely, she wasn't cold.  Perhaps she should be .  but then
she should be feeling a lot of things, yet she was feeling nothing at
all.

When she reached the north bank, Ash dismounted and took the wet saddle
from the horse.  The gelding shook itself, thrashing its mane against
its neck and kicking its hind legs into the air.  Ash looked at the sky.
The storm had long passed, and a late day sun sent shadows stretching
for leagues.  Even the wind had stilled itself, and all was quiet except
for the sound of rotten ice cracking on distant ponds.

The terrain north of the river was hard.  Upstream, Ash saw oaks and
green meadows, apple groves and dark tilled earth.  Downstream, where
she was headed, lay a landscape of conifers and trap rock, spawning
ponds and spider moss.  On the northwest horizon, Ash saw the red and
green needle foliage of resin pines, trees that held on to their seeds
for a lifetime, waiting until forest fire or death to bear their young.
On the southwest horizon, if she looked back, she could see the dark
green finger of the Ganmiddich Tower.

Night-dark smoke, the kind that was released from burning pitch and
petrified wood, poured from the topmost chamber.

Blackhail.  Ash had known that from the moment she had first turned the
mule-eared horse north and ridden from the camp.  There were few places
from which the tower could not be seen and nowhere to hide from the
smoke.  The red fire of Bludd had been snuffed, and now a smokestack
smoldered in its place.  No flames burned black, so the Bailsmen had
chosen to send their message in smoke instead.

Ash wasn't sure what the taking of Ganmiddich would mean to Raif.

Almost it didn't concern her.  Raif had already left, that she knew, and
he was somewhere west waiting to meet her.  She did not question where
the knowledge came from.  She was a Reach.  Raif had sworn to see her
safely to the Cavern of Black Ice, and they were bound by that promise
and the touch they had shared outside Vaingate.

She remembered calling his name while .  .  .  while hands were touching
her and everything was foggy and she couldn't think, and her arms had
been so hard to move, like lead, and she'd heard someone say, If she's
waking, it'll make better sport.  Ash stiffened.  She thought she had
called RaiPs name out loud, but somehow her lips wouldn't open and her
tongue wouldn't move, and the cry had sounded inside instead.

Then she'd opened her eyes and seen the face of the man kneelingabove
her, his breath comingall ragged and short, his eyes .  .  his eyes .  .
.

Ash swallowed.  She wouldn't think about that now.  Wouldn't.

Holding the dripping saddle against her side, she led the horse
downstream. The light faded slowly, over hours, and the first stars came
out even before the sun had fully set.  The moon shone behind her, pale
and not quite full. The land surrounding the river became flatter the
farther west she traveled, and from time to time she spied the square
outlines of farm buildings amid the trees and freshly stamped hoofprints
in the snow.  Ash found herself little concerned about the possibility
of being spotted by outlying clansmen or drovers.  She didn't know if it
was weariness or a sense of her own power that made her unafraid.  Who
could harm her now? Who dared?

Ash stiffened her back as she walked.  They would be able to track her
now, magic users, Sarga Veys, anyone else her foster father sent to
fetch her. Yet next time when they came they would be wary, prepared.

Suddenly she wished very much that she had demanded more answers from
Heritas Cant.  She knew nothing about her own power, couldn't even guess
what she had done.  Killed men, said a small voice inside her.

Killed them with only a thought.

Raif saw her before she saw him.  Slowly, over the course of an hour,
she had worked her way around a dammed lake that bulged from the river
like something about to burst.  Now, as she returned to the main body of
water, she became aware that she was drawing close to him.

Gooseflesh puckered along her arms, and for the first time since she'd
left the camp at dawn she felt the cold.  Her stomach ached with
anticipation.  As she scanned the water's edge, hoping to catch sight of
him in the reflected surface light, she heard her name spoken out loud.
Turning her head in the direction of the sound, she saw a dark
silhouette emerge from a stand of resin pines fifty paces ahead other to
the north.  For an instant she was afraid.  The figure was tall,
distorted, the darkest object in sight.  She pulled back minutely,
drawing closer to the horse for reassurance.

The figure raised his hands from his side.

"Ash.  It's me.  Raif."

Fear fled as she saw his face.  Her chest tightened.  The saddle slid
from her grip, hitting the ground with a soft crunch.  What have they
done to him? All the quiet strength that she had filled herself with
during the ride evaporated, and a wave of exhaustion made her legs shake
like straw as she ran through the snow to reach him.

Raif was silent as he pressed her against his chest.  He smelled like
ice. Hard nubs of scarred flesh on his neck and hands scraped her
cheeks, and tiny flecks of desiccated blood sifted from his hair to
hers.  His body was so cold.  Ash had to stop herself from shivering.

He pulled away first, keeping both hands on her shoulders while he
studied her.  Ash saw then the leanness of his face and chest, the lack
of spare fat or tissue on his body.  He looked older, but something more
than older as well.  The raven lore at his throat glinted blue black in
the moonlight.  it was the only thing on him that looked new made.

Dark eyes searched her face.  After a long moment he said,

"Let's find some shelter."

His voice was weary but gentle.  Ash wondered what had happened at the
Inch yet dared not ask.

He went back for the horse and the saddle.  Watching him, seeing how
thin he was, how he moved like a wraith by the water's edge, Ash felt
the slow burn of anger in her chest.  She could kill the men who had
done this to him, gladly and without regret.

When he fell in by her side, she offered him the blanket that covered
her shoulders, yet he shook his head.  In silence he led her north from
the river.  The moon rose higher as they climbed the bank, forming pools
of blue light upon the snow.

"Do you know the area around here?"  she asked after a while.

Raif shook his head.

"Ganmiddich is a border clan, sworn to Dhoone.

Blackhail has little use for it.  "

Ash thought back to the black smoke pouring from the tower.  "Until
now?"

"Until now."

It was the end of the conversation.  Raif led them across a field of
eroded slate, lately grown over by tufts of urine-colored bladder grass
and dog lichen.  Snow cover was light, as the wind dried the top layers
to powder and then blew them south to the Bitter Hills.  Ice smoke
boiled off the fields, swirlingaround the horses' cannons as they
climbed to the high ground above the river.  When they reached the top
of the bluff, Ash spotted a farmhouse and half a dozen farm buildings
scattered in the valley below.  The farm's walls had been cut from the
same green river stone as the Ganmiddich roundhouse, and its roof was
blue gray slate.  Raif guided the horse toward it, crossinga series of
tarred fences erected to contain sheep.

"Won't someone be living here?"  Ash whispered.

"No.  Blackhail would have cleared it first, before they took the
roundhouse."

"Why?  What threat is a farmer to an invading force?"

"When one clan takes another, it takes it wholly."

"What about the people who lived here, the clans folk

Raif shrugged.

"Dead.  Captured.  Fled to Bannen or Croser."

"What becomes of their livestock?"

"It's lost either way.  If a farmer is killed or captured, his animals
are taken.  If he's lucky enough to escape, then most of those animals
will go in Refuge Purse to the clan who takes him in."

Ash frowned.

"I thought Croser was a sister clan to Ganmiddich?

Wouldn't they take Ganmiddich clansmen in out of a sense of honor?  "

Raifs eyes darkened at the word honor.

"It's war.  All clans must do what they must do."

The words reminded Ash that she and Raif came from different worlds.

He was a clansman, grown in the wind-stripped spaces of the clan holds
brought up to fear nine gods who lived in stone and gloried in war.  Ash
frowned.  Her god lived in thin air and spoke of peace--not that anyone
in the Mountain Cities ever heard him.  She glanced at Raif.  His gods
meant something to him.  Hers meant almost nothing at all.  She thought
for a moment, then said,

"If you need to stay and fight for your clan, I will not stop you."

"I have no clan."

Ash shivered at the tone of his voice.  She waited, but he said no more.

The farm outbuildings consisted of a series of stone sheds and paddocks
connected by walled sheep runs sunk partly underground.  The main
building was missing its door, and many of the shutters had been left to
bang loose in the wind.  As they approached the entrance, Raif stopped
to pry a broken roof tile from the frozen mud.  Ash tried not to look at
the tattered and bloody skin on his hands, the nail turned black, the
white edges of bone poking through knuckles that looked half-skinned.
Hefting the slate against his chest, he bade her wait outside while he
checked the building for armed men.

As the minutes passed Ash felt herself growing colder.  The night was
dark now, thin in substance like cold, dry nights always were.  Frozen
weeds crunched beneath her boots as she stamped her feet.

So cold tonight, so cold.  Warm us, mistressss, pretty mistressss.

Reach for us.  We're close now.  We smell you, smell of warmth and blood
and light.  .

As^ Ash

Rough hands shook her awake.  She was no longer standing by the
mule-eared horse, but in the timber-framed doorway of the farmhouse.

Raif stood before her, his lips tight as stretched wire, his arms
supporting her weight.

"How long?"

"Seconds."

Ash looked away.  She felt as sick as if she'd taken a blow to the head.
Heritas Cant's wards were gone.  Whatever she'd done at the campground
had blasted them clean away.  Nothing was standing between her and the
Blind.

"Let's go inside."  Raifs voice was quiet, his hand on her arm firm.

"There's no one here.  We'll be safe tonight."

Ash let herself be guided into the dark, strong-smelling interior of the
farmhouse.  Raif made her sit as he broke down a chair with his booted
feet then tore a mangy sheepskin rug into strips to light a fire.  The
force of his actions made her flinch.  She watched as he searched the
black mouth of the hearth, looking for something to strike for sparks.
He found an old iron pot with a rough base and built a mound of wool
tufts and fabric scraps around it, then struck the base hard with a
wedge of slate.

It took a lot of coaxingand blowing to turn the quick flashes of light
into flames.  Ash concentrated on Raifs actions, afraid that if she let
her mind wander in the darkness, the voices would take her to a place
she did not want to go.  The muscles in her arms ached as she kept them
pressed tightly against her sides.

When the fire finally took and yellow-and-white flames spilled over the
broken chair spindles, releasing smoke that smelled of pines, Raif went
outside to search for food.  Ash did not move for a long time after he'd
gone.  She feared to step away from the flames.  The farmhouse kitchen
was a broken shell: charred timbers here, cracked masonry there. Shadows
danced on walls black with soot.  Ash shivered.

She missed Angus.  .  .  and Snowshoe and Moose.

Where were they now?  Did the Dog Lord still hold them, or had Blackhail
claimed them for its own?

She closed her eyes for a moment, then set herself to working on her
dress. The bodice was ripped and dirty, the hem stiff with ice.  She
tugged on the torn bits of fabric, tying knots and unraveling threads
from the blanket to bind the bodice closed.  She didn't want to have to
look at her breasts for a very long time .  .  .  not until the bruises
had healed.  The skirt was easier to deal with; she simply stripped it
off and beat it against the wall.

Raif returned as she was feeding the fire with the last scraps of wood.
He carried with him a pan packed with powdered snow, a long-leafed
chicory plant with its roots still attached, and an animal carcass that
was warm but not bleeding.  The animal was the size of a small dog, with
sharp, opaque claws, a fox's snout, and rich black and-gold fur.  At
first Ash couldn't work out how Raif had killed it, as she knew he had
no weapon.  Then she saw the fist-size clot of blood directly above the
creature's heart.  Raifs eyes met hers.  Ash tried to hold his gaze, but
in the end she looked away.

Even without a bow he can do it, she thought.  Even with a jagged chunk
of slate.

Raif made short work of skinningand dressing the carcass.  He told her
the creature was called a fisher and its pelt was highly valued by
Dhoonesmen, "for the Dhoone Kings wore cloaks of fine-spun wool, dyed as
blue as thistles, with collars of fisher fur."  Ash liked listening to
Raif speak and was infinitely glad he didn't ask for her help in
preparing the carcass for roasting.  Somehow, with only a thin piece of
slate, he managed to open and drain the thing, remove the organ tree,
and quarter the bones.  The blood he saved for gravy.

While the meat was browning on the tin platter, he stripped leaves from
the chicory plant and rolled them in his fists until they were broken
and leaking sap.  That done, he emptied the leaves into the pot of
melting snow and stirred the contents until the liquid turned green.
After a few minutes he emptied the cooked blood and meat juices into the
pot.  The fat sizzled and spat as it hit the water, belching out steam
that smelled of roasted meat and bitter licorice.

Ash's mouth began to water.

"You're used to cooking, aren't you."

Raif shrugged.

"Camping.  Cleaning kills.  In the clan holds before a boy takes his
first year man oath, he's pretty much at the mercy of any sworn
clansman.  Clansmen hunt, bring the kills to camp, then leave the
dressingand roasting to those without oaths.  It's the way it's always
been.  Men who have sworn to die for their clan deserve respect."

Ash would have liked to ask Raif if he had spoken a year man oath, yet
something about his movements as he spoke warned her away from the
subject. Instead she said,

"Do you know what's happened to Angus?"

Raif stiffened.  A moment passed before his words came.

"He may have been captured by Blackhail; I can't know for sure.  Even if
Bludd still holds him, he should be safe.  He's more valuable alive than
dead."

Ash wanted to believe him.

"What do we do now?"

"We head west at first light."

"But we can't leave tomorrow," Ash cried.

"What about Angus?  And you.

You're in no state to travel.  Look at your hands, your face .  .  "

Raif started shaking his head before Ash had finished speaking.

"There's no time to wet-nurse wounds or look for Angus.  Cant's war
dings are gone.  The creatures in the Blind have already begun calling
you, and if Cant is to be believed, then that's not the worst of your
troubles.  He said you would die, remember?  He said that it costs you
to fight them.  They've already taken you once today.  What if they take
you tonight or the next night or the night after that?

How long will it be before I can't pull you back?  "

Ash could find no words to fight with.  He was right, yet she did- n't
want him to be.  She wanted to wait, at least a day, just one day, to
sit and think and put the horror of the campground behind her.

Unconsciously she ran a hand down the front of her dress.

"What about clothing?  Supplies?  We've got a horse, but precious little
else."

Raif gestured toward the fisher pelt hanging high above the fire, the
raw face of its flesh side facing the flames.

"It should be dry enough to use tomorrow.  It'll make a good pair of
mitts or a collar once I've scraped the fat.  Come first light I'll look
around, see what I can find.  There's bound to be something here we can
use."

"And food?"

Raif showed a cold smile.

"I should be able to see to that."

Ash made her face show no reaction.  For a while the only sound was the
snort of burning wood as it released small pockets of moisture to the
flames.  Raif speared the roasting heart with a stick, turned it so the
side with all the veins showed.

"What happened today at dawn?"

Ash looked up.

"Why do you ask?"

"I felt something, after I left the tower.  It was like the day my
father died .  .  .  only different.  The river swelled and broke its
shore ice, and I smelled metal, like when steel's taken hot from a
furnace."

"You knew it was me?"

"Yes."  Raifs eyes rose to meet hers.

"If anyone hurt you, I will kill them."

A chill took her.  Anyone else, and those words would have meant
nothing; but coming from Raif Sevrance they sounded like absolute truth.
She thought carefully before speaking.

"I think I was drugged.

1 don't remember leaving the roundhouse.  I remember feeling cold and a
bit sick, and all I wanted to do was lie down and sleep.  And then I had
all these dreams.  .  .  and they all got mixed up.  And then there were
hands on me .  .  .  and I thought it was part of the dream.  Only it
wasn't.  " Ash found some small piece of gravel on the floor to look at.

"Then I panicked.  There were all these men around me, and I just wanted
them to go away .  .  .  and I got angrier and angrier .  .  ," She
shook her head at the piece of gravel.

"What happened then?"

"Do you really need to know that?  Do you really need to know what I
saw?"

"I need to know if you reached."

Ash swallowed.  Suddenly the scent of roasting meat was enough to make
her sick.  When she spoke her voice was quiet.

"I felt Cant's war dings snap.  And at that point, that one point, I
didn't care.  I wanted those men gone.  I wished them dead. I wasn't
thinking about the Blind.  I don't know if I reached or if I didn't; it
happened so fast and my mind was on just one thing."  She paused,
takinga quick moment to glance at Raifs face.

"Then I felt something spill out with the power.  I heard a noise, high,
like the sound of a knife drawn over glass.  Something tore open ..  .
the air ... I don't know what.

There were things waiting on the other side, Raif.  Terrible things.

They were men, but not men, with eyes that burned black and red and
bodies that were all shadow.  I saw them.  I knew what they were.  " She
shivered.

"And they do not fear me."

Fat hissed as it dripped onto the flames, giving off fine dark smoke.

Raif moved from his place near the fire, and a moment later Ash felt a
warm arm wrap around her shoulders and a second encircle her waist.

She heard Raif murmur,

"Stone Gods help us," and even though the clannish gods weren't her
gods, she repeated the words to herself.

Quickly, before she lost nerve, she told him the last of it, how she'd
panicked and pulled back, how the dark fire in the creatures' eyes had
dimmed, and how they'd screamed and screamed as she'd sent them back to
whatever hell they'd come from.

As she spoke, she felt the hairs on Raifs neck lift away from his skin.
She counted the seconds until he pulled away from her.  She thought he
would turn his back, cross to the fire, and busy himself with the cooked
meat there. She did not expect him to stay and meet her eyes.  But he
did.

Incredibly, she saw he was smiling.  The sort of gentle, crazy smile
that came from shared troubles, from bad news heaped upon more bad news,
and the unasked question.  What next?  His eyes were dark, but warm,
too.  And the fear was almost hidden.  He took her hands in his,
wrapping them carefully in his fists until he had covered all her flesh.

"Are you afraid of me yet?"  she asked him.

"No.  But I'm getting close."

Their laughter was on the edge of desperation, yet no less for it.

When it was done, Raif released Ash's hands and stood.

"You're not alone in this, Ash March.  Know that.  We will make it to
the Cavern of Black Ice, and we will bringan end to this nightmare.  I
swear that on the faces of nine gods."

Ash nodded.  She watched as he made his way to the fire, took the stock
of snow melt meat juices, and chicory from the flames, and set it to
cool on the floor.  Next he moved the tin platter containing the roasted
fisher carcass and its edible organs from the heat and began to section
it as best he could with his sharp piece of slate.  For the first time
Ash noticed the silver-capped tine at his waist.  It was larger than the
one he normally wore, the horn darker, the tip sword bashed and peeling.
She had been present when Cluff Drybannock had torn Raifs tine from his
belt, yet now another hung in its place.

It meant something, yet Ash knew it wasn't the time to ask questions.

It was time to eat, then sleep.

CHAPTER FORTY-FOUR.

Somethinp Lost the Sevrance had misplaced her lore.

She'd looked everywhere for it, all her secret places like the little
dog cote, the space under the stairs in the great hall, and even in the
strange-smelling wet cell where Longhead grew mushrooms and mold.

She was certain that she'd had it yesterday when she awoke, as she
clearly remembered pulling it from her neck and dropping the little gray
stone in her fleece bag along with the rest of her collection.

She was sure about that.

What she wasn't sure about was what happened next.  She remembered
carrying the fleece bag with her most of the morning, could almost swear
that she'd had it with her while she ate her blood puddingat noon.
Trouble was, Anwyn Bird had kept her so busy all day, running around
doingall those chores that needed doing with a full half of the sworn
men away, and she'd been to so many places and done so many things, that
everything had got mixed up in her head.  Now, thinking about it, she
couldn't really be sure if she'd had blood puddingat supper, noonday, or
dawn.  Possibly she'd had it thrice.  Certainly it had been cold and
greasy and had to be chewed to death before it went down her throat.

Effie didn't mind the chores at all.  as long as they didn't involve
going outside.  It was good to feel useful.  Some things came easily to
her, such as keeping tally of the oil and wood stores, divvying up eggs
and milk quarts, and running messages word for word among Raina, Anwyn,
and Orwin Shank.  Sometimes whole hours went by where she forgot about
her lore and all the bad things it showed her.  It was a good thing to
walk into a room where you knew you had purpose, where people were
waiting upon your message or your tally, and where they listened to what
you had to say.  There was less time to worry and think.

Just yesterday morningancient, liver-spotted Gat Murdock had stopped her
in the kitchen doorway and told her that she reminded him of her mother
when she'd first married Da and come to live in the roundhouse.

"Aye.  You should've seen Meg Sevrance then," the old swordsman had
said.

"As clever at figuringas any man, yet comely enough so you clean forgot
it and thought about her dark eyes instead."

Effie mouthed the speech to herself for the hundredth time.  She did not
want to forget it.  Her mother had been good at figuring.  Just like
her.

"Effie!  You wouldn't be dallying on those steps now, would you?"

Anwyn Bird's voice rose up the staircase like the call of a rusty horn.
Effie peered down, but the grand matron of the roundhouse was not in
sight. Her graying yellow braids and barrel-shaped body were hidden by a
block of blood wood stangs.

"As you know what happens to those who stop and daydream on the stairs."

Effie thought for a moment.

"They get trampled if there's a fire."

Anwyn Bird's snort of indignance was enough to send roosting pigeons
into flight.  Erne sensed much shaking of the great yellow head.

"You, my girl, are going to be a problem come the courting years.  You
don't say but two words a day, and when you do, you come out with
something that stops all talk stone dead."

"Sorry, Anwyn."

Some distance below Effie's feet, air puffed from Anwyn's lips.

"Don't sorry me, young lady.  Sorry's a word for faithless husbands and
bad cooks."  More puffing followed.

"Run along now and find Inigar Stoop.  Tell him Orwin Shank's called a
meeting in the Great Hearth, and his council is needed."

"Yes, Anwyn."  Effie started down the steps.  She knew Anwyn wasn't mad
at her really, not in a special way.  Anwyn was mad at most people most
of the time; it was how she managed to get so much done.  By the time
Erne reached the final turn in the stairs, the roundhouse matron was
already on her way back to the kitchen, her voice cracking orders to
anyone unlucky enough to cross her path.

Erne took the stairs and headed for the small stone corridor that linked
the main building to the guide house It was late afternoon, not the time
of day she'd normally choose to visit the guide house

Inigar Stoop was always there until sundown, and although EfFie loved
the dark smoke-filled quiet of the guide house very much, she always
felt cold and itchy around the man who called it his home.  Inigar
smelled funny.  Ever since the war started, he butchered hogs with his
own hands and poured their blood on the smoke fires to make them burn
thick and long.  And his eyes were so dark they were like mirrors, and
when you saw yourself in them you looked very small.  Erne ducked to
avoid a blood wood beam leaking pitch.  Inigar had a way of looking at
you with those dark eyes that made you sure he knew all your secrets and
bad thoughts.

The great clang and hiss of the clan forge could be heard throughout the
roundhouse day and night ever since Mace Black- hail had ordered Brog
Widdie and his crew to turn every bit of metal in the roundhouse into an
arrow or a hammerhead, yet as Effie approached the green-stained door of
the guide house the noise receded to the distant clamor of a kitchen at
mealtime.  Effie didn't like the forge.  It was hot and bright, and the
roughest of the tied clansmen worked there under Brog Widdie's
Dhoone-blue eyes.  Yet she had grown accustomed to the noise.  Things
seemed too quiet when it was gone.

Like many outlying parts of the roundhouse, the guide house corridor had
ceded to damp.  There were no longer enough men to plaster and re chink
the walls, and Raina Blackhail had forbidden any woman to spend a moment
plugging leaks or repairing cracks when she could be tending to war
needs instead. Supplies were the biggest problem.  Even with the tied
farmers and free crofters yielding their livestock and grain to the
clan's keep, they were stretched for fresh eggs, butter, and milk.  So
many of the spring lambs had been slaughtered for meat that it was
impossible to find a room in the roundhouse that was not hung with
airing hides.  Raina had fought many fights with the tied farmers.

"Would you send your clansmen to fight on lard and oats?"  she had cried
when Hays Mullit threatened to drive his forty black necks back to his
croft. Raina had shamed him and others into staying, though Effie only
had to walk through the lower levels of the roundhouse to hear the sheep
farmers nursing ill feeling toward the clan.

Effie frowned.  Just this morning Raina had ordered one in every five
yearlings slain.  With no clansmen free to hunt and no migrating elk
butchered and rendered this season, meat was in short supply.  And
yearling lambs ate their weight in hay and feed once a week.

All thoughts of war slipped from her mind as her hand came up to work
the latch upon the guide house door.  She took a breath, like a diver
before entering the water.  Smoke as blue as ice trickled through the
opening, bearing the smells and shadows of the guide- stone to Erne's
nose and eyes. Instinctively she brought her hand to her chest to touch
her lore.  Only it wasn't there.

"Not wearing your lore, Effie Sevrance?"  Inigar Stoop emerged from the
shadows, his body breaking strands of smoke as he moved.  Smudges of
black paint beneath his eyes and in the hollows of his cheeks made him
look like someone wasted by disease and ready to die.  The cuffs of his
pig coat were singed in recognition of the war: He was the clan guide,
and he would not fight or raise a weapon in his own defense, yet every
time he lit a smoke fire, guided a clansman's prayer, or chipped a
warrior's portion from the guide stone he did so with hands ringed with
death.

"Step inside.  Close the door.

Approach me.  "

Effie did as she was told.  The smoke was stinging her eyes.  Suddenly
she wished very much she had not taken her lore from around her neck.

Inigar Stoop stood silent as she walked the length of the guide house At
one time Effie would have run her fingers along the guide stone as she
passed it. but that was before the war.  The stone was different now.
Colder.  Its surface was wet with pale seeping fluids that collected in
ruts and hollows and hardened like tiny teeth.  Even the great blocky
profile of the stone had changed, and its many faces and creases were
now misshapen by chisel cuts.

Many clansmen had died far from home, their bodies claimed by enemy
soil, leaving Inigar Stoop no choice but to cut surrogate remains from
the stone. Families needed something to grieve over.  Widows without
bones needed stone.

A thick litter of stone dust and soot hushed Erne's footsteps as she
came to stand in front of the guide.  Inigar was always grinding these
days, grindingand burningand speaking with the dead.

"You have not answered my question, Effie Sevrance.  Why do you not wear
your lore?"

Effle looked for a moment into the guide's black eyes, then thought
better of it and took to studying her feet.

"I have lost it."

"Did the twine break?"

"No."

"So you took it from your own neck?"

"Yes."

Inigar Stoop chose silence for his reply.  Effie felt her cheeks heat.

The guide's gaze was like a hand around her neck.  It forced her to look
up to receive the next question.

"Why?"

Effie thought of lying, but the guide's black eyes were upon her and she
saw her own face reflected there.  She found she could not lie to
herself.

"It's not always easy to wear it, not since Da died ... and Raifleft."

Inigar Stoop's shoulders stiffened at the mention of Raifs name.  "Our
lores drive us hard in times of war.  Why should you stand before me and
claim yours drives you harder than most?"

Erne shook her head.  That was not what she had meant to say.

"Does it show you things, Effie Sevrance?  Does it pour the un- ripened
juice of the future in your ear?"  Inigar's bony fingers gripped her
arm.

"Tell me the truth, daughter of the clan.  When you lie in bed at night
with the lore upon your chest, are your dreams of things that will one
day come to be?"

Effie yanked her arm free.  Her breath was coming hard and fast, and she
felt fingers of smoke clutching the insides of her lungs.

"No.  It's not like that.  It doesn't show me anything.  It never enters
my dreams.  It pushes me.  Here" -- She hit her chest.

"And when I take it in my hand I know things.  Small things, like .  .
.like .  .  ."

"Like what?"

Muscles in Erne's face fell slack.  Her own words had trapped her.  Her
lore told her no small things.  She had to think a moment before
answering.

"When Mace Blackhail came back from the badlands and he was riding his
foster father's horse, and he said that no one but him had survived the
raid, I knew it wasn't so.  I knew Drey and Raif would come back."

The guide's eyes glinted like two pieces of coal.

"What else?"

She searched for something to say.  She would not speak of what had
happened in the Oldwood the day she and Raina went to check on Raina's
traps.  Nor would she tell him of the night her lore had awakened her
and told her to run away.  Those things were bad secrets, and she had
learned her lesson about telling those.  Raising her chin, she said,

"I knew Raif would leave the clan.  I knew it the day that he took his
oath."

"That too."  The guide's face did not soften one fraction, but when he
spoke again there was less anger in his voice.

"It was right that your brother left us, child.  There is no place for a
raven in this clan."

"Will he come back?"

"Not as you know him."

Erne swallowed.  She didn't understand Inigar's words, yet they made her
insides ache.  In all the months that Raif had been gone, she had not
spoken about him to anyone.  His name was no longer said in the clan.

"I see him sometimes, when I hold my lore.  I see ice and storms and
wolves and dead men .  .  .  and I want to warn him and tell him to be
careful, but he's not here."  Tears prickled in her eyes.

"He's not here."

"Is that why you're not wearing your lore, child?  Because it shows you
things you do not want to see?"

Effie nodded.

"It pushes me all the time .  .  .  and I get frightened.

I don't want to see bad things happen to Raif and Drey.  "

"Yet it is your lore, given to you by the man who was guide before me.

No clanswoman can ever turn her back on her lore.  "

"I know.  I only took it off for a bit.  It's worst when Drey's away.

Every time it pushes.  I.  I think"-- " Hush, child.  I know you love
your brother very much.  "

Brothers, Effie amended to herself.

"You must wear your lore, Effie Sevrance.  Our clan is at war, and if
the Stone Gods choose to send messages to you, what right do you have to
turn away?  Our warriors fight with fear in their bellies: How much less
is their burden than yours?"

Effie had no answer for that.  What Inigar said was right and true.

She only had to think of Drey to know that her fears were foolish
compared with his.  He had to ride from clan to clan in ice and
darkness, never sure when the next battle would come or what it would
bring.  Clansmen he had taken his year man oath with were dead.

"Put your lore back in its place," said the guide.

"You need fear no more questions from me.  You are a daughter of this
clan, and you have the rock as your lore, and that means you are
steadfast and silent.  I trust you will speak to no others about this.
There are many in the clan who would not understand the knowledge your
lore brings, call it by a name which it does not deserve."

Effie nodded.  She understood what Inigar meant.  Mad Binny in her
crannog over the lake was called bad names.  Anwyn Bird said that at one
time Mad Binny was the most beautiful maid in the clan.  Her name had
been Birna Lorn, and Will Hawk and Orwin Shank had once fought on the
graze for her hand. Orwin had won, but once the banns had been spoken
and the wedding day set, rumors began to spread about Birna beinga witch
woman.  She always knew which cows would die from grass fever and which
ewes would cast their lambs before time.  Clanswomen began to fear her,
for all she had to do was look at a pregnant woman to tell whether or
not she would give birth to a healthy child.  A month before her wedding
to Orwin Shank, Birna met Dagro Blackhail's first wife, Norala, in the
kale yard According to Anwyn, Norala's belly was newly quickened with
child, but not even Norala knew it.

The moment Birna Lorn saw her, she said,

"That bairn you're carrying will die in your womb."  Three weeks later
when a bloody sack was cast from Norala's belly, Birna Lorn was driven
from the guide- house by an armed and angry mob. Norala blamed her for
the miscarriage of the chiefs first child.

"Effie Sevrance ..  ."  The guide's cold, irritable voice broke through
her thoughts.

"See to your lore."

She shook herself.

"I don't know where it is.  I took it off and put it in my fleece bag
with all my other stones.  Only now I can't remember what I did with it
afterwards."

"Your fleece bag is beneath my work bench.  Fetch it now and do not
leave it here again."

Too embarrassed to feel relief, Erne shuffled past Inigar Stoop and made
her way to the far corner of the guide house where the business of
chiselingand grinding was done.  She was such a fool!  Of course she had
come here last night!  It was too cold to venture outside to the little
dog cote, and she had so wanted to be somewhere quiet and alone.  And
safe.

As she plucked the fleece bag from the floor, Inigar said,

"Do you think me a hard man, child?"  She turned and shook her head, but
he did not seem to notice.  His eyes were focused deep within the smoke.

"Mace Blackhail is the chief, and he does what a chief must in times of
war, yet his eyes only see so far ahead.  He thinks in terms of his own
lifetime; what he can gain for himself, his family, and his clan.

I do not fault him for this.  It is the way of all chiefs.  It's not his
place to think of those to come.  The dark times are comingand shadows
are massing in the Want.  Soon the sky will burn red, and the City of
Ghosts will rise from the ice, and a sword will be drawn from frozen
blood.  If I told this to Mace Blackhail, it would mean nothing to him.
Clan battle men, not shadows, he would say.  Yet he would be wrong.  The
Stone Gods will not turn their backs on this fight.  "

Careful not to make a sound, Effie tied the fleece bag to her belt.

She didn't understand what Inigar's words had to do with her.

"It is I who must guide the clan through the long night ahead.  My lore
is the hawk, and I see farther than most, and that is why when your
brother came to me seeking guidance, I spoke words to unbind him from
this clan.  My duty is to Blackhail and the gods who live in stone."

Effie breathed quietly as she listened to the guide speak.  Inigar was
old and wise, but she knew words alone had not sent Raif away.  "Hawks
do not see in the darkness," she said quietly.

"Owls do."

Inigar Stoop's small, paint-smudged face turned toward her, and his gaze
sought her out through the smoke.

"You have the right of it, child, yet there is no owl lore amongst us.
I would like to think that if you had been born two years later, after
the old guide had died and his duties fell to me, I would have chosen
the owl for you."

It was the nearest thing to kindness she had ever received from Inigar
Stoop. Tears for herself and Raif collected in her eyes.

"But guides do not choose the lores of new babies.  They dream them."

"For you and Raif I would have dreamed again."

A tear slid down Effie's cheek.

"Go, child.  Be sure to wear your lore day and night."

Effie moved past the guide, careful to touch neither him nor the guide
stone Only when she reached the door did she remember Anwyn's message.

"Orwin Shank called a meeting in the Great Hearth.  He asks for your
presence there."

Inigar Stoop nodded.

"Tell him I will come once I have seen to the smoke fires."  His thin
brown fingers caressed the burned matter at his cuffs.

"And Effie, keep yourself safe."

The look he gave her almost made her speak.  It would be such a relief
to tell someone about the time Nellie Moss' son came for her in the
middle of the night.  She could not tell Drey, for his honor would leave
him no choice but to go straight to Mace Blackhail and confront him.
Effie's stomach twisted sharply at that thought.  Drey must never know.
Abruptly she dropped her hand to the fleece bag at her waist.

She had her lore back now; that would warn her if Cutty Moss came again
.  if he ever did.  In all the days that had passed since she'd
overheard Nellie Moss speaking with Mace Blackhail outside the dog
cotes, her lore hadn't once told her to flee.  Perhaps she was safe.

Perhaps she'd made more of the thing than it was worth.  Already the
details of what had been said had grown fuzzy in her mind.

"Are you all right, child?"  Inigar's voice was almost gentle.

But in the end it wasn't enough.  Effie tapped her fleece bag.  "I'm
just glad to have my lore back."  Before any more questions could be
asked, she slipped through the door and into the cool, damp corridor
beyond.  The fresher air pleased her, and with a little skip she broke
into a run.  She had a message to deliver to Orwin Shank, but first she
would do what the guide had commanded and return her lore to its proper
place.  This was a thing that couldn't be done anywhere, for she was
governed by her own secret rules in this matter.  She needed somewhere
quiet, just to hold it for a bit first, make up for time lost.

The space under the stairs in the entrance hall was a good place to sit
for a while and not be noticed.  It was good and dark, and there were
all sorts of interesting dead spiders to look at.  Once she'd tucked
herself into the deepest part, where the ceiling was lowest and the
stone floor was furry with dust missed by Anwyn's broom, she slipped her
hand into her bag.  Smooth, lifeless pebbles and chunks of rocks met her
fingers.  Frowning, she reached deeper and spread her hand wide, yet
still could not feel her lore.  Quickly she pulled the bag free from her
waist and emptied the contents onto the floor.

Erne felt her face go cold as she watched the dust settle.  Her lore
wasn't there.

FORTY-FIVE

The Iron Chamber he secret to blood sorcery, thought Penthero Iss as he
hooked the baleen lamp to a nail hammered deep into the wall, was to
remove the caul fly whole.  Any fool could take a scalpel to the host's
skin, make an incision above the fidgetingalmond-size mass of the
parasite, swiftly grip the body sac with a pair of tongs, and tug it
out.  Trouble was, with that method the caul fly nearly always failed to
cooperate.  As soon as the scalpel edge came down upon the skin, the
parasite would throw itself into paroxysms.  Its double-jointed legs
would begin to flay.  Its wings, folded over its thorax in a protective
carapace until the creature was ready to leave its host, would spread
and break.  Its horned mouthpiece would sink into muscle flesh and its
massive, articulate jaws lock in place.

It was messy, very messy.  Bits of caul fly always broke off, and no
matter how hard one tried to remove all the detritus, some tiny bit of
matter was often overlooked.  And overlooked pieces of caul fly had a
nasty habit of festeringand causing gangrene in the host.

Frowning, Iss turned and contemplated the iron chamber and the Bound One
chained to its walls.  Light seemed to shine differently here, in the
very apex of the Inverted Spire, and the air was hour spent above a
flame, and a jeweler's wedge-shaped knife just in case.

A muscle as thin as trap wire contracted in the Bound One's forearm as
he attempted to raise his hand toward his master.  One of his eyes was
as pale as milk and quite dead.  The other was cloudy, the iris stained
white in places, yet he could see.  Iss had long decided he could see.

Iss knelt upon the iron lip of the apex and pushed apart the loose folds
of the Bound One's tunic.  A small bandage, the size and shape of an
eyepatch, was fixed in place on the uppermost section of the Bound One's
back.  One had to asphyxiate a caul fly if one wanted to remove it
whole: block its air hole with a bead of fish glue, fasten a cap of
bladders king over the boil, then seal the cap edges with more glue.
Eight hours was usually enough to send the caul fly to sleep.

With his fire-darkened tweezers, Iss picked at the bladders king cap.

The Bound One's skin was yellow and loose, attached to his body in very
few places, and Iss had to be careful not to tear it as he worked.

When the cap was off and the glue scraped away, Iss pressed his thumb
and forefinger into the flesh to either side of the boil.  As he felt
the hard scaly form of the caul fly rise against his fingertips, a small
thrill heated his face.  This one was fully formed.  It had pupated in
the flesh; another few days and it would have eaten its way out.  It was
heavy, too, gorged on blood.  A perfect parasite, every organ, cilia,
and membrane created by the host.

And that was the real reason why one had to withdraw it whole.

Nothing, not one drop of digestive fluid, one double-jointed leg, or one
hollow and serrated tooth, could be lost during the extraction.

Blood sorcery could be drawn usingan incomplete specimen, but it was
never as potent as when the parasite was whole.  It was the Bound One's
creature in every way, his sorcerous child.  Duringan eight-week
incubation the caul fly had fed upon the Bound One's flesh,
concentrating his power and distilling his blood.  Iss had read that
some men who bound sorcerers to them gained access to the sorcerer's
power by using other parasites such as leeches, lice, or loa worms, but
Iss found the caul flies much to his liking.  They stayed close to the
skin and could be easily tracked and extracted, and they lived two of
their three life cycles within the host.

The caul fly was now in view, pushed to the surface by the action of
Iss' fingers, its dark, segmented eye staringat Iss through the air hole
Good.  It was close to death, but the tiny cilia on its body moved
against the current of clear fluid that leaked from the boil.

Iss flexed the tweezers, testing their bend.  As he reached through the
air hole probing for the thorax, a soft gasp parted the Bound One's
lips.

Iss was not disturbed.  The Bound One made noises sometimes.  He had no
words.  All speech, memories, and learning had been taken from him
sixteen years earlier, during the thirty-one days of his breaking.  At
the end of the thirty-one days he was left with nothing but an animal's
needs, and like an animal he grunted when he was afraid or in pain.  A
word softly spoken was all it took to calm him.

The caul fly came free with a wet pop.  Already it had begun to darken
and enlarge in preparation for attractinga mate.  The carapace covering
its wings was a thing of beauty: red toned, transparent, divided into
angular shapes by a network of crossing sutures.  Iss held it to the
light.

This one is for you, almost-daughter.  That I might see how far you
reached yesterday at dawn.

The Bound One groaned as Iss withdrew his touch.  Again the arm moved,
and for an instant Iss thought he saw a flicker of pure hatred darken
the Bound One's eye.  Iss was not a man given to shivering, yet he felt
his chest muscles contract all the same.  Surely he was mistaken?

The Bound One saw but did not perceive, existed but did not feel.

It was the way it had to be for a bound sorcerer.  They had to be broken
completely, both their body and their mind at the exact same instant.
Iss had learned the danger of breaking the body first.  Thigh bones
wrenched from the pelvis, spines forced backward around a wheel, and
needles inserted into the inner ear to mis align the tiny
hammer-and-tong bones there were not enough to destroy a mind.  Iss knew
that.  He had lost two men learning that lesson, had the enamel burned
from his teeth as a drawing leaving his mouth was forced back.

Iss snapped his head, sending the memory away.  His pale hare's eyes
focused upon the Bound One's face, searching for signs of sentience.

The Bound One's good pupil was dull and unfocused, a black hole with
nothing spilling out.

"Do you know who I am, Bound One?"  Iss asked.

"Do you know all that I have done?"

The Bound One's hand moved again, this time toward the package of beans
sealed in waxed linen that hung from Iss' belt.  Feeling a strange
mixture of affection and relief, Iss nodded his head.

"Hungry, eh?  Of course, of course.  That's the beast I've come to
know."

Turning his back on the Bound One and his iron pen, Iss took a moment to
still himself before he began the drawing.  The close, curving walls of
the iron chamber reminded him of a dry well.  Even this deep the stone
cutters had worked to maintain the gradual tapering of the spire's
walls.  Iss only had to close his eyes to imagine the spire's form: a
stake into the heart of the mountain.  A perfectly rounded stake.

Robb Claw, Lord of the Fourth Spire, builder of Mask Fortress, and
great-grandson to Glamis Claw, was rumored to have begun excavation on
the Inverted Spire five years after the Splinter was built.  The city of
Spire Vanis was new then, one-tenth the size it came to be.

The four Bastard Lords had crossed the Ranges a hundred years earlier
and wrested Mount Slain from the Sull.  Robb Claw had taken the
timber-and-stone stronghold the Quarterlords had erected and built a
city around it.  Spire Vanis was Claw's creation.  The plans were his,
the vision was his, and it was rumored that the curtain wall that
contained the city would have been raised to twice its height if Robb
Claw had lived to see an end to his work.

Iss let out a long breath.  Robb Claw feared something.  A man does not
spend thirty-five years of a fifty-year life buildinga fortress unlike
anything the world has ever seen if he does not believe he is in danger.
Theron and Rangor Pengaron, Torny Fyfe, and Glamis Claw had no such
fears.  They had simply ridden north and conquered.  And despite the
glorious tales of impaled beasts, fields steaming with blood, and
battles that lasted ninety days and ninety nights, Iss suspected they
had taken Mount Slain and the Vale of Spires with ease.  The
Quarterlords erected their first strong wall a mere seventy days after
they crossed the mountains with their war host Seventy days.

It was a tantalizing fact.  The Sull, who were known throughout the
settled world for yielding land to no one and defending their borders
with cold fury, had barely wetted their blades in defense of Mount
Slain.  Oh, the historians would tell you otherwise, and Iss could name
a dozen terrible and bloody battles that had supposedly taken place
during the Founding Wars: battles where the sky turned as dark as night
with the weight of Sull arrows, where the moon disappeared from the
midnight sky, snuffed by foul Sull magic, and where dread half beasts
walked the battlefield, their exhaled breath cold as death, their touch
enough to burn the light of sanity from a fighting man's eyes.  Iss had
read the tales along with the rest.  yet he wasn't sure he believed
them.

Two thousand years ago the Sull had yielded Mount Slain to the
Quarterlords. And a thousand years before that they had yielded the land
that became known as the clan holds to the fierce, animal-skinned
clansmen who were driven out of the Soft Lands by Irgar the Unchained.
Historians claimed that the Sull had sanctioned the Great Settling of
the clan holds because the clans were not a threat; they kept themselves
to themselves, had no interest in converting or persecuting the Sull,
and they took the hard, inhospitable land in the center of the continent
that the Sull had no love or use for.

The reasons blew like false notes through Iss' ears.  He had been reared
in Trance Vor.  He knew all about the Sull.  He had stood by and watched
as Sull warriors shot his father a dozen times in the back.

Four warriors.  Three arrows apiece.  It was over in less than an
instant.

Breath shot from Iss' throat like a pellet of white ice.  His father had
been a fool!  Slowly encroaching on borders, stealing hair-thin slices
of farmland each season, was no way to take land from the Sull.  They
had a sixth sense about these things, always knew the exact moment
foreigners crossed into the Racklands.  And they possessed deep
ancestral memories of each stream, glade, heath, and wooded grove that
formed their sacred borders.

Ediah Iss had acted in the same way a thousand Trance Vor farmers had
before him: He saw his own marshy, ill-drained soil, then he looked in
the distance and saw the soft, fertile loam of territory belonging to
the Sull.

"They don't work it," he had complained, using words well worn before
him.

"Good land laying fallow like that, while I'm out in these shit fields
breaking my balls each day."

They had warned him, of course.  The Sull always warned.  The same four
warriors who had eventually slain him rode to the Iss farm one morning
at the break of dawn.  Iss remembered being wakened by the sound of a
metal arrowhead smashingagainst the claystone grate.  He was eight at
the time, sleepingat the foot of his parents' pallet on a dog mattress
stuffed with straw.  The arrow had come through a slit in the shutters
no bigger than a child's mouth.  Ediah Iss had been meaning to fix it
since spring.

Iss stood at his mother's side as his father opened the door.  Four
mounted warriors dressed in lynx furs, wolverine pelts, and midnight
blue suede formed an arc around the farmhouse.  Seeing their black
lacquered bows stamped with quarter-moons and ravens, their silver
letting knives that hung on silver chains from their saddle pommels and
tinkled in the wind like bells, and their arrows fletched with the snow
white feathers of winter osprey, Iss learned what it was to be afraid as
a man.  He had known only child's fear till then.

The Sull did not speak--it was not their way--simply stood in warning
for a period of time and then turned east and rode away.  Iss' mother
was the first to move and speak.  Iss remembered her pushing her husband
so hard, his forehead hit the door frame.

"You fool!"  she cried.

"You late-weaned fool!  I told you they

would know about the onion field the minute you tilled it.  Run over
there before they top the ridge and pull the new bulbs out.  "

She hadn't told him, Iss knew that.  She had been the one who encouraged
him to plant the onions in Sull soil ten days earlier, then stood over
him as he spent four days turninga weed-choked meadow into a lot.

Perhaps it was anger toward his wife that made Ediah Iss leave two rows
of onions undisturbed, or perhaps he believed that those two particular
rows, being nearest to his own border and hidden from the casual eye by
the deep shade thrown from a hundred- year-old milk wood might go
unnoticed by the Sull.  Either way he left forty-eight onion bulbs in
the ground.  Iss knew the exact amount, as he had pulled each one from
the grainy black soil an hour after his father's death.

It had taken the Sull less than two days to return.  Iss could still
remember his mother screamingas the four warriors cut the used strings
from their bows, discarded them as if they were soiled rags.

He only had to close his eyes to see his father lying belly down on the
path, a full quiver of arrows, bristlingand golden like ears of wheat,
growing from his back.

Iss sucked his lips against his cracked and discolored teeth.  It was a
fool's death, foolishly invited, yet it was not without its
compensations. Iss had gained two things of value from it.  First, his
mother's family had moved quickly to be rid of him, and he was sent for
fosterage to a distant uncle in Spire Vanis who held a grangedom there;
and second, he had learned a lesson about the Sull that would stay with
him for life.

"Poor Father," Iss said, turning the caul fly in the light.

"One does not take land from the Sull in small slices.  One waits until
the time is right and then moves to take it all."

With a quick snap of his wrist, he drew air over the caul fly's abdomen,
shaking the creature awake.  The creature's rear legs stiffened, and
deep within the red-toned carapace four fully formed wings twitched to
life.  The caul fly knew it was no longer in its host and now sought to
unfold its wings and fly in search of a mate.  Iss was not displeased.
The presence of such a strong and universal instinct could only add
potency to the drawing.

Iss sat in the sorcerer's seat that had been cut two thousand years
earlier by masons who were later blinded and un tongued before they were
killed so even their ghosts could tell no secrets.  The seat was little
more than a hip-size depression in the chamber wall, backed with the
same pressure-formed granite that lined the entire structure of the
Inverted Spire and then plated with a sheath of dull iron.

Nothing of meaning had been stamped into the metal, no runes or symbols
or legends.  The mere presence of the seat in the apex chamber was
legend enough.  Iss liked to imagine that it was the final refinement
Robb Claw had commanded his masons to make.

"Cut me a sorcerer's seat that I might sit as I do the work of gods."

Jabbing his tongue against the roof of his mouth, Iss prepared himself
for the drawing.  Even after all this time he was nervous.  He trusted
the Inverted Spire and knew the power of the Bound One as well as he
knew his own, but always before taking the caul fly in his mouth, his
stomach clenched as tight as a trap.

True, there was no danger from backlash.  The Inverted Spire had been
constructed as an insulator.  The mountain's worth of rock that lagged
it, the facing tiles mined from the destroyed sorcerers' tower at Linn,
and the spiking iron-tipped structure itself combined to make the
Inverted Spire a haven from the outside world.  No outside sorcery could
penetrate it.  No backlash could break it.  No sorcery unleashed within
it could be traced to its source.  Any man who drew forth power here was
free to act like a god.

Iss brought the caul fly to his lips.  Even as his mouth opened to
accept the blood meal his stomach and lungs contracted, ready to push
the power out. Relaxing his grip on the tweezers, he laid the creature
upon his tongue.  It twitched there for just a moment until Iss bit it
in two.

The Bound One screamed and screamed, his high wavering cry bashing
against the walls of the chamber like a bird trapped in a well.

Bitter fluids filled Iss' mouth.  Stick legs scraped his teeth.

Wings cracked with the soft snap of broken wafers, and then all the
power of the caul fly, stolen over eight weeks of living, feeding, and
shedding within its host, filled Iss' being like flood water pushing his
in substance out. Iss felt a moment of pure divinity as he parted from
his flesh and bones. This was what it felt like to run with the gods.

Penthero Iss, Surlord of Spire Vanis, Lord Commander of the Rive Watch,
Keeper of Mask Fortress, and Master of the Four Gates, ascended to a
place where he could no longer hear the Bound One scream.  Power pumped
from the caul fly's body like blood from a cut vein.  Iss looked down
and saw his hair and robes blowing wildly below him.  He took a breath
with a body he no longer inhabited and tasted his own remains in the
air.

Higher and higher he rose, the roar of the drawing filling his abandoned
ears.  The midnight blue arc of the firmament dipped to meet him,
curving with the slow guile of infinity, inviting him to come and play
in the cold land beyond death.  Iss shrank from its gleaming edge.
Follow that road and there was no going back.

As he turned inward toward himself, seeking the dark path that would
lead him to the borderlands, the color of the firmament stayed within
his mind.  He'd seen that particular shade of blue once before .  .  .

stretched across the bellies of the Sull the day they'd sent twelve
arrows into Ediah Iss' spine.

A world and a half below him, Iss' body shivered upon its seat of iron
and stone.  Pushing his in substance forward to meet the swirling gray
shadows of the borderlands, Iss paid his own flesh and blood no heed.

The borderlands had many names.  The Phage called it the Gray Marches,
the priests in the Bone Temple called it No Man's Crossing, and the Sull
had a name for it that was better left unsaid.  The Listener of the Ice
Trapper tribe called it nothing at all and said only that it was a place
where a man could steal dreams.  That was what Iss felt like as he
approached its pale borders: a thief.

A line of light, pink as newborn flesh, marked the threshold to the
borderlands like a false dawn.  Smoke fingered its edges, curlingand
uncurling, reachingand drawing back.  There was no sound or

smell, yet the silence was the kind that brought no peace.  Without
noise or odor to divert his senses, Iss found himself looking with the
same single-mindedness of heretics in the Far South, who were oeeeed out
on the desert floor and left for dead.  For the sin of disr b& belief,
the dark-skinned priests sewed the eyes of heretics open, pinning back
their eyelids against their brow bones with cross stitches of black
silk, so that the heretics might see the face of God as they died.  Iss
felt as if his own eyelids were sewn open.  Blinking or averting his
gaze was impossible.  He had no choice but to see.

The borderlands stretched ahead of him, a landscape of gray mists,
iceberg peaks, and shadow-filled troughs stretching into distant
darkness.  Iss knew many things about the borderlands, knew that its
outskirts could be visited by a handful of people in every generation,
that different people came for different reasons, and that some, like
the Listener of the Ice Trappers, could see the future written here.
Even with the Bound One's power fueling his journey, Iss' abilities were
limited.  He was a trespasser, a thief.  He had no place here, not even
on the threshold.  If the future hung like ripe fruit around him, he
could not pluck it.  If he glimpsed a pathway leading inward, he had no
choice but to turn away.

Asarhia March, Foundling, mountain born, spire bred, was the one person
alive who could enter the borderlands without fear.  It was her element.
Her body was shaped for it.  Her mind could perceive paths through it.
Her hands could touch the Blindwall and come away unburned.

It was out there, the Blindwall, far on the other side where grayness
gave way to darkness and where even the most powerful sorcerer and
Listener could not tread.  All worlds bordered here, all dying souls
passed through on their way to final resting or ruin.  Iss had once
heard that people sometimes dreamed their way here in the dead of the
night.  Unlike the Listener, who made dreams his business, these people
had no knowledge or ability to help them find their way.  Their sleeping
selves drifted here like mist, pushed by dreams filled with longing for
a loved one now gone.  The newly bereaved did not hold power here, only
Asarhia March and the gods held that, but their loss brought them
kissing close to death.

Iss floated above the threshold, held in place by power stolen from
another man, and cast his gaze over all that lay below him.  He did not
know the borderlands well, yet he had been here a half dozen times
before, and his cool Surlord's eyes saw straightaway that something had
changed.

Asarhia had been here.

Leads had opened up in the smoke.  Cold currents blew with the same
intensity as before, but crosscurrents cut through them, creatinga
rippling mesh of flaws.  The gray mass of the borderlands swelled and
shifted, sending great lobes of matter risingabove the surface and
dragging other things under so quickly that they left- comet tails of
smoke.  Beneath the surface, pockets of quiet existed as dark smudges in
the grayness.  And beneath them, writhing like the hide of a vast and
muscular serpent, ran a river so dark that it swallowed light.

Iss shivered.  Averting his gaze, he looked out across the expanse of
the borderlands.  The leads Asarhia had opened stretched inward toward
the center of the grayness.  Iss searched the visible horizon, straining
to see some detail of the Blindwall beyond.  How far did you reach,
almost-daughter? There is not a sorcerer in the North who did not feel
your power yesterday at dawn.  No one can stand against you, I know that
now, not the Phage or the Sull or the First Gods themselves.  For
sixteen years I kept you from them, treasuringand protecting you, and
now you think you can run away and leave Spire Vanis behind.  Yet know
this, Asarhia March.  No matter how quickly you run and how far you
travel, when you reach you will be doing my work.

As Iss spoke the word work, a gust of wind sliced deep into the
grayness. Smoke parted.  For one instant his eyes focused upon a solid
form.  It was huge, towering, the wall of an ancient fortress,
completely smooth, and dark as night.  .  .

Iss gasped.  Back in the apex tower, his body slumped forward as the
Bound One's power wavered sharply.  Iss forced his jaws together,
sucking the caul fly dry.  He had the Blindwall in his sights.  It was
vast, breathtaking, but had he seen a tiny flaw at its base?  He had to
know.

The Bound One screamed, higher and higher, as if he might shatter glass.
Iss crushed the head of the caul fly with his teeth, releasinga broth of
blood and curds.  A rush of air and light stripped away all he could
see.  The Blindwall was gone.  The borderlands were gone.  The power
released was not enough to hold him in place, and his flesh pulled him
back.

He entered his body with a jolt.  A clumsy limb banged against the wall.
Teeth bit through tongue meat.  The nausea that always came when he
returned to his flesh hit him hard, and he spat out a wad of saliva
speckled with fly parts.  For some time he could do nothing but sit with
his head slumped over his knees.  Minutes passed before he could look
up.  With a gaze slower and more ungainly than the one he'd left behind,
Iss contemplated the Bound One.

He lay lifeless in the iron apex, his body bathed in sweat.  His eyes
were open, yet his eyeballs were rolled back and nothing but white
showed. Pressure sores from the manacles around his wrists were slick
with blood, and the metal walls of the apex were streaked with claw
marks.  His chest moved . .  .  barely.

Iss struggled to his feet.  The stench of his own body was unbearable to
him. He smelled like an old man.  The apex chamber reeked of urine and
shit. Always when he returned to his body and took command of his five
senses, it was the smells that appalled him the most.  How could people
live with them? Anger and disgust made him drive his fist hard into the
Bound One's chest. The Bound One jerked reflexively, sliding farther
down into the apex.  A series of quick breaths animated his face for a
few short seconds, and then he fell back into oblivion.

Iss watched him closely.  What had happened here?  The Bound One's power
did not usually drain so quickly--even in the borderlands where such
things counted for less.  Iss considered aiminga second blow to test
him.  Could he be faking his insensibility?  Had he withdrawn his power
on purpose?  Was it possible that he had seen the Blindwall, too?  Yet
what if he was sickening? He was old now, his body yellow and stiff.  It
was natural that his power should weaken over time.

Still.

Iss returned to his sorcerer's seat and sat and watched and waited.

Only when an hour had passed without the Bound One movingas much as his
little finger did Iss feel satisfied enough to take his leave.

For the first time ever, the Bound One did not grieve as Iss removed the
light.

CHAPTER FORTY-SIX.

A Journey Begins Raif woke in the freezing darkness before dawn.  He
knew he would not return to sleep, so he rose and took himself outside.
He urinated against the barn wall, then scooped up a handful of snow and
scoured his face.  The shock of coldness passed quickly.  Overhead the
sky was black, but far on the eastern horizon, above the tree line and
slate crags of Ganmiddich, the ice mist glowed pink with dawn.

Raif turned away.  He made himself busy, bindinga nick on the gelding's
foreleg and then tending his own stripped and bloody skin.

His hands smelled like raw beef.  They burned like hot coals as he
thrust them into the snow to clean and numb them before he bandaged them
tightly against the cold.  In winter the worst danger to broken skin was
frostbite. Gat Murdock had lost his bow finger to a dog bite no deeper
than a pockmark just because he'd not thought to bandage it one night
when it was icy cold. And last winter Arlec Byce had spent Godsfest with
pig lard slathered over his face because he'd ridden out to the Oldwood
within an hour of takinga close shave.

Hard frosts worried Raif.  Ash needed to be well protected.  She was
underweight, and a diet of ice hares and fishers wouldn't be enough to
help her fight off the cold.  A person could starve on lean meat.

Two summers ago Drey and Rory Gleet had returned from a ten-day hunting
trip to the balds doubled up with cramps and indigestion.  The hunting
had been poor, and they'd lived on nothing but flat ale and rabbit meat
for a week.  Raif remembered standing outside the outhouse with Bitty
Shank and Tull Melon, singing, Nothing runs faster than a man with
rabbit runs, at the tops of their voices while Drey and Rory relieved
themselves inside.

Raif smiled at the memory .  .  .  and somehow, as he did so, the
freezing wind brought tears to his eyes.

Drey had not waited.

Yesterday, when Raif had walked away from the shore of the Wolf River,
the final thing he did before the path veered north and hid him from
sight was to turn and look at his brother one last time.

Only Drey wasn't there.  Drey had already moved on.  Raif had caught a
glimpse of his slow-moving shadow slipping eastward through the rocks,
on his way to meet with the Hail Wolf.

Raif stood in the snow and breathed and did not think.  After a while he
turned and made his way back to the farmhouse, filling his mind with the
dozens of things that needed to be done before he and Ash could begin
the journey west.

Ash was awake, sitting tending the fire and rewarming the remains of
last night's meal.  She smiled shyly at him as he entered, and he did
not have the heart to tell her that he had wanted last night's stock
left cold so he could skim the congealed fat from the top and use it to
protect their faces from the wind.  The fisher meat had been cut into
strips and left to dry overnight, yet Raif could tell from the look of
it that it was only partially cured.  It would have to do.  The pelt was
stiff, but there was no time to soften it with urine, so he showed Ash
how to roll it on the hearth as if it were a long piece of dough and
work the stiffness out with her fists.

He left her doing that while he searched the house for clothes, knives,
and food.  It was bitterly cold.  The few rugs and blankets he found in
the storm cellar were stiff and shaggy with ice.  He picked the best two
blankets and beat them until they were dry.  In the bottom of an old
blood wood chest he found a pair of goatskin gloves.  They'd been packed
away while still wet and were mottled with blue black mold, yet Raif
pulled them on all the same. They were barely wearable and smelled of
mange, but they fitted well enough.

By the time he returned to Ash he'd found an ancient wool cloak with a
kettle burn close to the shoulder, a child's sheepskin hood, a tin cup
filled with lanolin and beeswax, and a hand knife with a corroded iron
blade.  The farmhouse had been looted with great care, possibly by both
Bludd and Hailsmen, and anything of use or value had been taken.  No
foodstuff of any sort remained.

Raif watched as Ash pulled on the cloak and hood.  She'd been busy in
his absence, wrapping the fisher meat in dock leaves, meltinga new batch
of snow, and airing her boots and stockings above the fire.

"You haven't got a cloak for yourself," she said.

"I'll make do with a blanket.  Once I put an edge to this knife, I'll
cut the fisher pelt down to a hood."

Ash frowned.

"I should have taken the supplies from the camp.  All the saddlebags
were there, scattered in the snow.  I could have had whatever I wanted."

"It doesn't matter," he said, and meant it.

Her gray eyes regarded him for a short moment and then looked away.

Raif wanted to say, If anyone touches you again, 1 will tear them apart
with my bare hands.  Instead he said,

"Pour the snow melt on the flames and kill the fire.  I'll be outside
saddling the horse."

It was full light now.  The rising wind smelled of glaciers.  The snow
underfoot was rotten in places, part melted by a mid season thaw.  Raif
laid the blankets over the gelding's back, then strapped the saddle in
place.  His hands felt big and awkward.  When he gripped the handle of
the knife to sharpen it against the rise of the step, pain made him gnaw
his cheek.

The metal was not sound.  Rot had cut deep into the untempered iron, and
the blade refused to take an edge.  Raif removed all visible rust and
sharpened the point as best he could.

Ash came out as he was putting the finishing touches to his fisher hood,
stripping fur from the two lengths of skin that would become the ties.
Raif stopped what he was doing to look at her.  The kettle-burned cloak
was a rich rust brown and its hem skimmed snow as she walked.  The wind
was quick to bring color to her cheeks and a bright film of moisture to
her eyes.  Wisps of silver gold hair blew around the edge of her hood.
The time she'd spent in Ganmiddich had improved her, and her face had a
softness to it that he had not seen before.

"Did the Dog Lord treat you well?"  he asked, helping her into the
saddle.

Her gray eyes darkened minutely.

"He couldn't wait to be rid of me."

They left the farmyard in silence.  Raif led the gelding through the
maze of sheep runs, pens, stone walls, and outbuildings, tasting the air
as he walked.  The clouds were full of snow, yet that didn't worry him
as much as the stench of glaciers.  When the air smelled of the Want
this far south, it meant only one thing.

Raif set a hard pace.  The farther west they were when the storm hit,
the better.  The Bitter Hills caught storms, held them between
Half-Bludd in the east and Bannen in the west.  Their best hope was to
reach the shelter of the western taiga as soon as possible, let the
stone pines and black spruce bear the brunt of the storm for them.

As he padded alongside the horse, Raif searched for signs of game amid
the ground birch and dogwood.  The habit was deep within him.

Last night had proven to him that he did not need an arrow to kill an
animal with a blow to its heart.  A fist of slate, heavy as iron and
blue as Dhoone, was all it had taken to bring down the fisher.  The
fisher had been snoopingaround one of the sheep pens, drawn by the
stench of slaughter that lingered there.  It had smelled Raif with its
keen nose, heard his boot heels crunching frozen mud with ears so
sensitive they could hear a red-backed vole breathing beneath two feet
of snow.  Raifs eyes caught its retreat.  He plucked a rock from the
mud, gaze still fixed upon the creature as it ran along the base of the
pen wall.  He warmed the rock in his fist.  Ash needed food badly.

It wasn't the same as releasingan arrow.  There was only the crudest
sense of calling the creature to him.  No moment of stillness joined him
and his prey, no knowledge of the creature passed through him.

Suddenly the heart was there, a glowing coal, in his sights.  Speed was
the only thing that mattered then.  Without the concentrated discipline
of bow eye and bow hand working in unison, he had nothing to bind the
creature to him.  Raif hurled the rock.  Even as it left his grip, his
sense of the creature's heart was fading.

He did not hear the impact.  Sickness washed over him as his throwing
hand fell limp against his side.  Stomach juices bubbled in his throat,
and he dropped to the mud to retch and spit and clean his mouth. Minutes
passed before he had strength enough to rise and claim his prey.  The
sickness had passed by the time he returned to the farmhouse, yet a
sense of shame remained.  It was no way to kill a beast.

"Aren't we going to cross the hills and enter the city hold I thought
Angus meant to steer clear of the clans."

Ash's voice broke Raif's thoughts.  He raised his head to look at her.

The lanolin she wore on her face had turned waxy and opaque in the
freezing wind.

"We'll make better time if we keep heading west.  We'd waste half a day
in those hills."

"But Angus said" -- "Angus isn't here.  I'm here.  And I don't claim
knowledge of the Glaivehold.  I know the clans as far west as Orri, and
I know the route we must take to enter the Storm Margin," He spoke
harshly, yet he hardly knew why.  He didn't want to explain to Ash that
the only reason Angus had chosen the route through the Glaivehold was to
save his nephew from encountering Hailsmen.  Ten days ago Raif had been
glad of that consideration.  Now he did not care.  Blackhail had hewn
his memory from the stone.  If he crossed paths with a Hailsman now, he
would have to kill him or be killed.  And strangely he found a hard sort
of comfort in that.  He knew where he and his clan stood now.  All
dreams of homecoming were dead.

"How did you escape from the tower?"

Raif wondered why she had chosen to ask her question now.  He made no
answer.

"I forced a promise from the Dog Lord," she said after a moment.

"He swore he would take no action against you until I was gone."  Her
features moved through a smile as she thought on the past.

"He's a fierce man.  Yet I think he was more afraid of me than I of
him."

"He did not take Dhoone alone."

Ash frowned.

"What do you mean?"

"The Dhoonehouse is the most defensible stone keep in the clan holds
built by the first Clan King, Thornie Dhoone, with walls sixteen feet
thick and a roof made of ironstone.  The night Vaylo Bludd took it, five
hundred Dhoone warriors stood within its walls, and countless more
manned its borders and strong walls Yet somehow the Dog Lord managed to
breach Dhoone's defenses, raise the Thistle Gate, and slaughter three
hundred men."

"It doesn't mean he had help."

"It does when every Dhoonesman who stomached a Bludd sword didn't even
bleed enough to rust his plate."

"I don't understand."

"Sorcery was used on the Dhoonesmen.  It slowed their hearts, made it so
they couldn't raise their weapons and defend themselves.  The Dog Lord
rode to Dhoone knowing the Dhoonesmen would not give him battle.

He claimed victory, but no honor.  " Raif made his voice hard.  He saw
the way Ash was sitting forward on her horse, ready to defend the Dog
Lord.  He saw and did not like it.

She looked at him as if he were speaking lies.

"If he did use sorcery, as you say, then how can you be sure it came
from outside?  He might have had help from someone within his clan."

"Clan do not use sorcery."

"What is your point?"

"The same person who helped the Dog Lord take Dhoone killed my father,
my chief, and ten other members of my clan."

A soft gasp escaped from Ash's lips.

Raif continued speaking, firming the truth in his mind.

"There were fifteen of us altogether.  We were camping in the badlands,
along the old elk trails.  Every year in the first month of winter when
the elk are moving southeast, we go there to claim Blackhail's portion.
This winter my brother and I were chosen to ride with the party.  It was
a great honor. Dagro Blackball himself led the hunt; it was the first
time he'd ridden the elk trails in five years.  The hunting wasn't good.
Tern said the elk knew a hard winter was comingand had moved south a
month early to beat it."

"Who's Tern?"  Ash asked.

"My father."  It almost didn't hurt to say it.

"He and Dagro Blackhail were close.  Mace Blackhail had been at his
foster father's heels for weeks, trying to persuade Dagro to ride north
with him, but it was my father who finally convinced him to go."  Let's
you and 1 ride north one last time, Dagro Blackhail.  Let's sit our
saddles until we're arse sore, drink malt until we're head sore, and
shoot elk until we drown in blood.  Hearing his father's voice in his
mind, Raif spoke quickly to quiet it.

"The day before we were due to return, Drey and I broke bounds to shoot
hares.  We were havinga contest to see who could shoot the farthest and
take down the most game when .

when I felt something.  "

"Sorcery?"

Raif nodded.  Suddenly it was difficult to speak.

"We rushed back, but they were dead by the time we got there.  All of
them. There was no blood on their weapons, not a drop of it.  Twelve men
dead, and not one drew a sword to defend himself."

Ash made no attempt at sympathy; he was grateful for that.  They didn't
speak any more about the past, and that seemed like another thing to be
grateful for.  There were some memories about the badlands camp he had
no wish to share.  In silence they traveled west along the river valley
and into the territory of another clan.

At noon they came upon a stone marker, sunk deep into the snow and
carved with the crossed great swords of Bannen.  Bannen was small but
rich, with many well-stocked trout lakes, a series of high meadows
suitable for grazing sheep, and a run of iron mines sunk hundreds of
feet beneath the Bitter Hills.  It was sworn to Dhoone, but it was not a
long-lived oath.  Past chiefs had declared themselves for Blackhail when
it suited them, and Hawder Bannen had fought with Ornfel Blackhail
against the Dhoone Kingat Mare's Rock.  Bannen was known for its
swordsmen.  Tern had once told Raif that Bansmen trained their sword
arms by moving through their positions while standing neck high in
running water.

Raif glanced to the north.  The Banhouse was built on low ground, with
its back against a sheer sandstone cliff, and it could not be seen from
the river.  Raif guessed it was about ten leagues north, as he could see
smoke rising above the treetops.  Beyond the smoke, on the farthest
reach of the horizon, storm heads rolled south from the Want.

Suddenly anxious to be gone, Raif touched Ash's boot.

"Are you ready to take old Mule Ears here for a run?"

"What about you?"

"I'll be taking myself for a run.  I want to reach those trees" --he
pointed to the northwest, where the headland sloped down to meet a
forest of old growth pines"--within the hour.  We'll need cover when the
storm hits."  He slapped the gelding hard on the rump.  "Go!"

Ash had little choice but to give the mule-eared horse the reins.

Snow sprayed Raif's chest as the horse took off at a fair gallop.  Raif
watched for a moment, satisfying himself that Ash could handle riding
through snow at speed, then broke into a run himself.  His body was not
prepared for the shock of swift motion, and his legs trembled as they
took his weight. Ribs broken and then partially mended made creaking
noises as he lurched from step to step.  His own weakness angered him,
and he plowed through the snow, kicking up showers of blue crystals and
sods of frozen earth.

Ash and the gelding pulled far ahead.  Winds were already working to
shift loose snow southward, and snow tails blew from ridges and high
ground.  Noise in the air increased, and the howling, ripping lowing of
the storm buffeted Raifs ears as he ran.  The Wolf River meandered due
north here, where it ran shallow, feedinga dozen salmon pools, wearing
river stone down into green sand, and forming a defensible line around
the Banholds southern reach.  In a way, Raif was glad of the storm.  Any
other day and clansmen, iron miners, and trappers would be moving back
and forth between the Banhouse and the hills.

Raifs hands and face burned as he ran.  Beneath the goatskin gloves, his
fingers swelled in a steambath of trapped sweat.  By the time he caught
up with Ash he'd bitten off the gloves and tucked them under his belt.
Every breath he took pushed against his mending ribs as if it might snap
them clean in two.

Ash had dismounted and was leaningagainst the spine of a thirty-year
spruce. She'd reached the trees a quarter ahead of him

and had had enough time to brush down the horse, shake the snow from her
cloak, and hang her hood to air over the bottom most limb of the tree.
She grinned as he approached.

"I was found on a day like this,"

she said.

"White weather suits me well enough."

He could not disagree with her.  Her eyes sparkled like sea ice.

Hunkering in the snow, he fought to catch his breath.  Ash had taken one
of the tin bowls from the roundhouse and packed it with fresh snow.  The
snow was half-melted, and he wondered where she'd nursed it for the past
fifteen minutes to warm it so quickly.

"What now?"  she asked.

Raif glanced through the towering spires of black spruce, up toward the
sky.

"We keep moving west.  We can't afford to lose half a day to a storm."

She nodded briskly.

"You need to ride for a while."

He would have liked to protest, to tell her that he was a clansman, and
a clansman never rode when a woman walked, but his ribs were creaking
and his hands were on fire, and even the thought of standing upright
made his thighs ache.  To save his pride he gave her an order.

"Pull some fisher meat from the sack.  We need to eat before we move
on."

"I'm not hungry."

"I don't care.  You can't rely on what your stomach tells you from now
on. Every time we rest, you eat.  You'll starve twice as quickly out
here in the clan holds as you would in the walled-and-shored haven of
Spire Vanis."

Ash looked at him sharply, yet she did as she was told, takinga strip of
fisher meat and chewing it with venom.

Raif almost laughed, but a patch of fresh blood on the gelding's bandage
caught his eye and he left her to tend to it.

Mule Ears suffered Raifs ministrations with the lethargy of an old horse
who had seen and done everything before.  As Raif cleaned the wound and
felt for frostbite, he found himself thinking of Moose.  He hoped the
gray gelding was on his way home to Black- hail and Orwin Shank, not
traveling north to Dhoone with the Dog Lord.  He wanted that man to have
nothing of his.

Ash wandered over to watch him as he rewrapped the gelding's leg.  The
wind tugged at her cloak, making the rust-colored wool stream behind her
like a banner.  A Clan Frees banner, he thought senselessly.

"Earlier, when we were out in the open, you said Mace Black- hail rode
to the badlands with his father.  So why wasn't he killed along with the
rest?"

It hadn't taken her very long to get to the heart of the matter.

Tying the final knot in the gelding's bandage with double the force
necessary, Raif said,

"Mace claimed he was off shootinga black bear when the raiders came.
Said he missed them by seconds, and that once he saw his foster father's
body lying in the snow, the only thing he could think of was riding home
to warn the clan."  Raif was surprised at how easy it was to tell it.

"By the time Drey and I got back to the roundhouse, he had everyone
believing that Clan Bludd had carried out the raid.  Lies.  All lies. He
didn't know anything about the bodies, where they lay, what wounds
they'd taken.  He left before the raid ever started.  Rode home on his
foster father's horse."

"But you and Drey must have made the clan see the truth."

Raif smiled bitterly, the skin on his face pulling tight.

"You haven't met the Hail Wolf.  He was born a Scarpeman.  His tongue
moves faster than his blade."

"If Bludd didn't carry out the raid, then why didn't the Dog Lord simply
deny it?"

"You've met him.  What do you think?"

Ash pushed a hand through her hair, thinking.

"Pride.  He liked the idea of taking credit for such a thing."

Raif tasted the bitterness in his mouth.

"Spoken like the Dog Lord himself."

"He told you that?"

"Yes."  Raif stood.

"What did he tell you about me?"

She didn't blink, though the silver in her eyes quickened.

"He said you slaughtered women and children along the Bluddroad.  He
called you a murderer."

Raif made no answer.  He would not speak against his brother or his
clan.

When it became clear to her that he was not going to deny the charge.

Ash gathered her cloak about her and began to make her way west through
the trees.

Raif watched her go.  New snow had begun to fall, and the wind sent the
heavy white flakes swirling in the spaces between the trees.

After a few minutes Ash's figure was lost to the storm, and Raif mounted
the geldingand wound through the spruces to catch her.

The storm followed them deep into the taiga, dislodging snow caches from
branches, bending saplings double, and roaring like a river over rocks.
Riding took more concentration than walking, as ruts and sinkholes
hidden beneath the snow were a constant danger to the horse.  Drifts
were impossible to predict in unsettled snow and forced many stops while
Ash ran ahead to test the snow depth with a whip-thin stick of spruce.
In the end, both he and Ash decided to walk, heads bent low against the
wind.

Light faded rapidly, and the taiga shimmered blue and gray as it
darkened. Raif became aware of Drey's tine bangingagainst his hip from
step to step. It seemed to weigh more than it should, and soon he could
think of nothing at all except the piece of horn and the powdered guide
stone within it.  Please gods, let Drey be all right, he thought.  Let
the wound heal cleanly, and let it not cause him pain.

It was hard to turn his mind to finding shelter for the night.  Part of
him wanted to walk and walk and never stop.  Only the thought of a warm
fire, of holding his hands above yellow flames and feeling their heat
upon his face, was enough to tempt him away from the storm.

No one lived in the taiga in winter.  Trappers, woodsmen, and loggers
spent springand summer in the woods but retreated to the shelter of
stone houses in the cold months.  They often built summer huts, but Raif
didn't hold out much hope of finding one in white weather.  He settled
upon a grove ofnewgrowth pines occupyinga narrow flood basin and set
about stripping the soft lower branches from the surrounding trees to
use as thatching for the den.  Ash saw to Mule Ears, then came to help
him fix the crude thatch roof over the frame of bent new growth he'd
erected.  The wind drove against them as they worked, tugging whole
branches from their grip.  Every time Raif closed his hands around a
shoot to strip it, pain made him catch his breath.

The storm was dying by the time they got the shelter to hold firm.

Raifs mitts were sticky with white resin, and beneath the goatskin
gloves his fingers were raw.  Ash's hood was no longer protecting her
head and lay against her back, filled with snow.  She was breathing with
quick shallow breaths so Raif ordered her to rest while he built a long
fire across the entrance to the den.  The fact that she didn't protest,
merely sat on the pine needle floor without sayinga word, worried him.
The skin around her eyes looked bruised.

He packed the fire loosely in his haste.  Built well, a long fire could
burn through the night, with timbers packed on poles so they could drop
into the flames as the poles burned down.  Yet Raif was more worried
about Ash than he was about a full night's warmth, and he kindled the
fire quickly, blowing to make it take.

Shredding the fisher meat with the bald knife, he set about turning snow
melt into a stock.  He talked to Ash as he worked, anxious that she stay
awake long enough to eat and drink.  It was winter and it was cold, so
he spoke of spring, telling her about the Hailhold after first thaw,
about the carpets of white heather that pushed up overnight and the
rings of dark wood violets that flowered amid the melting snow.  He told
her about the birds, about the blue herons that stood as tall as men,
and the horned owls that could take to the air with full-grown rabbits
in their beaks, and the little dun-colored swifts that hung upside down
from branches like bats.

He didn't know how long he spoke, only that once he started he kept
remembering other things that seemed important to tell her.  Ash
listened in silence, and after a time her breathing grew shallow and her
eyes began to flicker, then close.  Raif took the stock from the fire.
Leaning over, he touched her arm.

"Here.  Drink this before you sleep."

She took the bowl from him and held it to her chest, letting the steam
roll over her face.  After what seemed like a very long time she said,

"I don't believe what the Dog Lord said about what happened on the
Bluddroad. I don't think you killed anyone in cold blood."

Raif nodded.  He told himself he felt no better for hearing her say it,
yet it wasn't quite the truth.

They spoke no more after that and ate and drank in silence, the flames
of the long fire dancing before them and the tail end of the storm
sending gusts of winds to rattle the den.  Ash fell asleep while Raif
was nursing the last of the stock in his cracked and aching hands.  He
covered her as best he could, making sure that no part of her skin came
in contact with snow, and then settled himself down before the fire.

He could not sleep.  He was weary beyond telling, yet he could see the
night sky through the flames.  A moonless, starless night in midwinter;
not the sort of night a sane man would choose to be out in.  Then
perhaps he wasn't sane, for Raif found himself rising from his place by
the fire, pulling on his goatskin gloves and leather boots, and leaving
the warmth and dryness of the den.  It took him less than a minute to
find a wedge of greenstone to his liking: jagged and shot with lead.
Brushing it clean of snow, he entered the dark cathedral of the forest.
The storm had passed and the night animals were feedingand he was
Watcher of the Dead.

t t t The Listener woke to the hiss of the runners.  His heart beat like
a snow goose in his chest.  His old mouth was as dry as tanned hide, and
his eyes, once a dark brown color and now turned blue with snow
blindness, took a very long time before they allowed him even the
dimmest view of the surrounding world.  The sky above the sled was dark
and full of stars: The long night of winter had begun.

He'd been having the old dream again, the one where Harann- aqua guided
him to a dark place where the old Sull Kings were waiting.

Lyan Summerled and Thay Blackdragon and Lann Sword- breaker were there,
along with the Sull Queen Isane Rune.  Not his kings, the Listener
reminded himself, yet they haunted him all the same.  They were not
dead, not truly, for flesh still hung to their bones in places, and they
moved like men, not ghosts.  Isane's smile had been beautiful to behold
until the instant her spread lips parted, revealinga mouth of bloody
teeth. Lyan Summerled, he who had once been the most glorious and golden
of all kings, had laid a skinned hand upon the Listener's shoulder and
breathed a single word in his ear.

Soon.

Sadaluk shivered.

"Nolo," he said, turningaround and calling to the man who drove the
sled.

"We must stop and turn back.  This is not a good night to ask for
blessing from the god who lives beneath the sea ice."

Nolo's brown face registered not one mote of surprise; perhaps he had
felt the badness, too.  Calling to his team, he pulled on the standers
and began driving the sled in a great turning circle on the gray
shore-fast ice. Sadaluk, sittingat the front of the sled, wrapped in
bear hides and wearing a squirrel cap, watched as the dogs slowed and
changed their course.  They were fat dogs--Nolo fed them too much--yet
the Listener felt less inclined to criticize now than when he and Nolo
had set off.  Overfed dogs were a sign of a kind heart, and after the
darkness of his unasked-for dream, the Listener found much to value in
the kindness of a man who loved his dogs as if they were kin.

The sled, formed from a ladder of driftwood and horn and bound with seal
sinew, skimmed to a halt as it completed its turn.  The dogs, harnessed
together in a line, broke formation and began worrying on their traces.
The edges had been filed from their teeth, so they could do little but
suck and gnaw.

Nolo pulled off his heavy sled gloves and walked to where the Listener
sat. He was out of breath, and his chest rose and fell rapidly.

"Are you ill, Sadaluk?  You were quiet for a very long time."

The Listener shook his head.

"I dreamed," he said.

Silence followed.  Nolo looked guilty, as if his sled were to blame for
the dream.  The Listener saw no reason to argue otherwise: Perhaps if
the sled hadn't run so smoothly and silently, he might well have stayed
awake. Instead he said,

"Once, many lifetimes ago when the winter lasted many seasons and the
Gods Lights burned red, our people had to eat their skins and tents to
survive. All the dogs were slaughtered.  Mothers killed their children
to relieve

them of the hunger that ate from inside out.  Old men like me walked out
onto the sea ice and never came back.  Young couples, newly wed, sealed
themselves in their ice houses and starved in each other's arms.

"By the time the warm winds came and the sea ice broke, only twelve were
left alive.  One man, Harannaqua, who had lost his wife and his three
children, was angry at the gods for not sendinga warning.  We could have
stored more food if we had known, he cried.  We could have eaten less at
summer's end.

"The gods listened to him, for even though they hate flesh men pointing
out their failings, they knew that he was right.  From this day forth
you shall be the warning, Harannaqua of Four Losses, they replied.  We
will strip your body from you and carry your soul with us, and whenever
hard times come to the Ice Trappers we will send you down to warn them
in their dreams.  And so the gods took him and kept him and bound him to
this task."

The Listener looked sharply at Nolo.  A cloud of frosted breath lay
between them like a third man.

"Yes, Nolo of the Silent Sled, today I dreamt of Harannaqua, him and
four kings."

Nolo nodded slowly.  He thought long before he spoke.

"What must we do, Sadaluk?"

The Listener made an impatient gesture with his hand.

"Watch ourselves.  Be vigilant.  Feed our fat dogs less."  The words
made Nolo blush, but Sadaluk found little satisfaction in his young
friend's distress.  He was afraid, and the dream worried him, and he had
spoken from fear and spite.

"Run the sled."

The dogs took much whippingand cursing before they would re-form
themselves into a line.  Nolo had to put on a harness and pull like one
of them to remind the beasts what they must do.  Sadaluk drew his
bearskin close as the sled shuddered into motion.

Four Sull kings.  Not his kings, he told himself again, as if that could
make it so.  They shared blood, but that blood was old, old.

Blood could thin to water over the space of thirteen thousand years.

True, the Ice Trappers and the Sull came from the same place beyond the
Night Sea, but that was far in the past.  The great glaciers had
receded, deserts had been baked to glass, and iron mountains had risen
from seeds of rock and stone.  All this and more had come to pass since
the Sull and the Ice Trappers had once called themselves kinsmen.  Why
then should their fates still be linked?

The Listener frowned at the stars, the snow, the shimmering blue
landscape of sea ice.  Where were the Far Riders?  A raven had been sent
two moons past; they should be here by now.

This was their fate unraveling, not his.

"Lash the dogs, Nolo.  Lash them!"  The Listener tried to set aside his
dreams as he watched Nolo punish his team.  Eloko had promised to show
him the third secret use for whale blubber on his return and had set her
stone pot to warming over the lamp even as he and Nolo packed the sled.
Sadaluk had liked the first two secret uses very much, and he could
think of nothing more pleasant than being introduced to the third.  Yet
even as he tried to conjure Eloko's wide, smooth face in his mind's eye,
the face of another came to him.

Thay Blackdragon, the Night King, looked at him with eyes that were the
perfect Sull blue: dark as the sky at midnight and shot with veins of
ice. Strips of flesh hung from his cheeks, and the Listener could see
white ridges of bone beneath.  He was ridinga horse that was all shadow,
a dark beast made of muscle and black oil that quivered with every touch
of its rider's hand. Thay Blackdragon pulled the reins, and the beast
opened its mouth, revealinga bit of razored steel.  The Night King
smiled as Isane Rune had before him.

Soon, he hissed.  Our thousand years have all but passed.

For the first time in his hundred-year life, the Listener didn't know if
he was sleeping or wide awake.

CHAPTER FORTY-SEVEN.

Clothes off a Dead Man's Back hey were on the move before dawn, walking
through the hills and valleys of snow that had formed around the bases
of pines like skirts of spent wax around candles.  Light came slowly,
sparkling for brief moments on pine needles scored with hoar frost and
the whites of Ash's eyes and teeth.  A wind, soft and cold, blew south.
Somewhere beyond the horizon a ptarmigan screamed at a rival who drew
too near to its roost.

Raif carried the two fox carcasses slung over his back.  They were
gutted but not skinned and were now freezing rapidly in the cold dry
air.  He would have liked to strap them to Mule Ears' cantle, but the
old gelding had no liking for the smell of fox.

Ash led the horse by its reins.  Uneven snow cover made riding
difficult, and she had chosen to walk instead.  Raif did not like the
look of the dark patches beneath her eyes and the yellowish cast to her
skin.  Gradually he was leading her to the taiga's southwestern edge,
where settled snow would make riding easier.

He suspected that they might already be in the Scarpehold, yet any
markers that might have proclaimed that fact were buried deep beneath
the white. Bannen and Scarpe were close neighbors, though there was
little love lost between the two.  Scarpe was sworn to Blackhail, yet
its oath did not prevent it from encroaching on Blackhail's southern
reach.  Its chief was Yelma Scarpe, and in the ten years she had led the
clan she had annexed land from Bannen and Dregg and taken control of an
escarpment that Clan Orri had held for eight decades and was a prime
site for huntingand spotting wild sheep.  The Scarpe badge was a black
weasel with a mouse in its jaws.

The Scarpe boast was, Our words cut as sharply as our swords.  Yelma
Scarpe had fought no battles with Bannen, Dregg, and Orrl.  No.  She had
simply talked them out of their land.

And now one other clan was Blackhail's chief.

Raif almost smiled.  Inside his mitts, skin split as he bunched his
hands into fists.

"Look!"  Ash said, pointing to the northwest sky above the treetops.

"Smoke."

Raif followed her gaze.  Smoke, greasy and thick with burned matter,
billowed up in great clouds several leagues north of their position.

The Scarpehouse.  It had to be.  Scarpe's roundhouse was situated close
to the Bannen border, on a greenstone bluff surrounded by a moat of
poison pines.

Unease cooled Raif's face.  Who would attack Scarpe?  Bludd had pushed
no farther west than Ganmiddich, and now they were in retreat.

Blackhail would not attack one of its own war- sworn clans, most
especially when that clan was birthplace to the Hail Wolf.  Was it
Bannen or Gnash, then?  Or dispossessed Ganmiddich?  Or was it disposed
Dhoone?

None of the possibilities were good.  Any one of them meant an
escalation in the Clan Wars.  And for someone to attack a clan sworn to
Blackhail meant Blackhail itself must respond.

"Raif!  Stop!  Why are you heading north?"

Raif had to glance over his shoulder to see Ash.  She was many paces
below him, on the trail they had been walking since dawn.  He stared at
his own footprints in the snow, following their course as they cleaved
north away from the path.  He shook himself hard.  What am 1 doing?  The
torching of the Scarpehouse means nothing to me.  Angry at himself, he
headed down the slope and back onto the trail.

He set a grim pace after that.  They emerged from the taiga at noon and
traveled west along the frost fields north of the river.  To the south,
the rocky balds and escarpments that formed the tail end of the Bitter
Hills cast dark, shifting shadows upon the water.  The Iron Caves lay
somewhere beneath them, excavated by Mordrag Blackhail, the Mole Chief,
and seized by the Forsworn some hundred years later when all the iron
seams had been mined out.  According to Tern, the walls of the Iron
Caves were black and sparkling, and no man could carry a knife there for
fear of it flying from his hand.

The Forsworn claimed the caves as a holy place.  They believed the One
True God had slept there the night after he Remade the World.  It took
Aran Blackhail, Mordrag's grandson, twenty years to drive them out.

Directly ahead the pale blue peaks of the Coastal Ranges rode the
western horizon like ships made of ice.  Raif found himself staringat
them for much of the day.  It was easier to look forward than back.

From time to time they passed bits of freestanding wall, broken arches,
and blocks of stone.  Ruins.  And they had stood in the clan holds
longer than any roundhouse.  Raif had seen such things on the Hailhold,
made of the same milky blue stone that always felt cool to the touch,
even on the hottest day. Tern had said that in the great white forests
of Dhoone and Bludd whole cities stood buried beneath the snow.  Clan
Casdemilk was rumored to have taken its name from one such place.

Raif farmed the landscape as he walked, searching the grass beds and
shrub groves for bear berries frozen on the vine, rose hips field mint,
and the little wood ear mushrooms that grew on rotting logs.

They had meat, but foxes were musty on the tongue, and Raif didn't much
like the thought of eating them on their own.  Once or twice he spotted
a glossy white ptarmigan hiding in the snow, yet he left the birds
undisturbed.  Ash knew he could kill game with a rock, she knew, but it
didn't mean he wanted her to see him do it.

When they came upon a grove of old willows, Raif called a halt while he
cut himself a staff.  The knife he'd taken from the Ganmiddich farmhouse
was little use against the hard, finely grained wood, and it took many
long minutes of sawingand twisting to cut a branch free.  Ash, who had
been riding since they'd broken free of the taiga, did not dismount as
he stripped the stave of side suckers.

She slouched in the saddle, her chin almost touching her chest.  When
she noticed Raif looking at her, she straightened her spine and made an
effort to smile.  Raif could not smile back.  He was remembering what
Heritas Cant had said about her, about how the power within her would
press against her organs until they leaked.

Perhaps she read the thoughts on his face, for she said,

"I'm fine.

Just a bit tired, that's all.  "

"And the voices?"

"I fight them."  Her clear gray eyes met his, and Raif suddenly wished
the voices were real men he could fight and kill, not shadowy nothings
he could not see.

"You need to eat," he said after a while.

"Here.  Take these."  He handed her a stem of frozen bear berries and a
few of the rose hips he had collected.  All clansmen who rode to the
badlands for a season's hunting carried a pouch of dried rose hips in
their packs.  The hard pink fruits stopped the shaking sickness from
coming, even when there were no fresh greens to eat.

Ash grimaced as she bit into one of the buds.

"You'll get used to them quicker than fox meat," he promised.  The smile
she gave him warmed something deep and very cold inside his chest.

"Let's get going.  There's still an hour of daylight left."

That night they camped in the lee of a hill, digginga burrow into old
drifted snow.  Raif hunted while Ash slept, baggingan ice hare he
flushed from its den and a fat white ptarmigan who burst into flight
when Raif stumbled upon its roost.  Feeling pleased with his prizes, he
returned to the dugout with plans for a midnight roast.  The fox supper
he'd prepared by boiling the dark, purplish meat in snow melt had not
been a great success.

He sensed something was wrong when he topped the hill.  The night seemed
suddenly dark and small, as if it had shrunk to half its size.

The dugout looked the same as when he'd left it, and the fire was
burningas well as an unattended fire could, yet something had changed.
The air was colder.  A nearby grove of aspens rustled and clicked as a
gust of wind drove their trunks together like wooden sticks. Suddenly
the night's kills felt like ghost weight against Raifs back, and he let
them drop to the snow.

Ash.

Clutching the cold ivory of his raven lore, he raced the short distance
to the dugout.  The snow surrounding the entrance was clean except for
his own footprints, yet even though no man or animal had entered the
shelter he knew Ash was gone.  Her body lay on the mat of willow
switches he had spread to protect her from the cold.  Muscles in her
shoulders and upper arms were convulsing, causing her body to buck
against the dugout's floor.  Her mouth was open, and something dark and
tar like moved within it.  Oh, gods.

Raif squeezed his lore.  An instinct he wasn't prepared for made him
want to run.  He could smell the power inside her the way a dog smelled
disease. Heritas Cant was right: It was something that wasn't meant to
be.

K;7/ an army for me, RaifSevrance.

Raif shook his head, alarmed at how quickly the thought of killing her
entered his mind.  It would be a mercy, a small voice said.  The world
would thank you for it in the end.

"No."  Raif spoke the word out loud.  He had no brother, no clan, and no
memories stored in stone.  But he had Ash, and he had sworn to protect
her. And who was he to judge the value of another's life?

Thinking of Angus, imagining what he would do if he were here in the
river valley west of Scarpe, Raif stripped off his gloves and knelt by
Ash's side. Angus had thrust a wad of wool in her mouth whenever she
began to draw sorcery, so that's what he would do.  Swiftly Raif cut a
handful of wool from Ash's cloak and packed it in his fist.  He tried to
be gentle as he pushed the wad of fabric into her mouth, but his hands
shook, and the desire to be rid of the dark thing on her tongue made him
thrust the gag deep into her throat.  Her stomach sucked into a hollow
the moment the gag was in place, and he laid a hand on her rib cage and
pushed hard to counter the reflex action to vomit.  Despite the coldness
of the dugout, droplets of sweat rose like blisters on Raifs face.

Ash's legs jerked.  Cords of muscle in her neck rose as she fought the
muzzle.  Raifheld her down, hard as he could, until her muscles fell
slack under his hands.  He stayed pressing her long after, his breaths
ragged and his heart hammeringagainst his ribs.  Finally he released his
grip, but only so he could tear the fox hides into strips to bind her.
There was a taste in his mouth that might have been fear.  He kept
seeing the rippling blackness of the thing upon her tongue .  .  the way
it shifted and ran like liquid metal.

He was not gentle as he bound her.

Later, when he sat at the entrance to the dugout, turning the fire over
with the tip of his willow staff, he wondered what would have happened
if he had not returned when he had.  Ash was silent now, her arms
resting easy in their sheathing of blankets and rope.  A Reach, Cant had
named her.  Yet Raif did not know what that meant.  He had heard Cant's
words, yet they seemed like shadowy things, concealing more than they
showed.

Raif put down the staff and held his hands above the flames to warm
them.  He tried to send his mind elsewhere, to the ice hare and
ptarmigan that were lying unclaimed in the snow, to the dwindling stock
of firewood, to clothes that needed airing, yet he made no move to start
any of those tasks.  Better that he stay here and watch over Ash.

Time passed and the fire burned low, sending little red flames to eat
the insides of logs.  Raif thought he would not sleep.  The pain in his
ribs ran deeper tonight than any other night, and his hands ached and
wept.  Still, his eyes closed and his thoughts stopped comingand he
slipped into a deep, dreamless sleep.

He awoke in darkness hours later, sore all over but strangely well
rested. Before he stepped outside to relieve himself or feed the fire,
he cut the lashings that held Ash's arms to her side.  The gag was
drenched with saliva, and he had to force her teeth apart to pull out
the expanded wool.

She opened her eyes as he removed his hand from her jaw.

Raif slid the gag behind his back.

Ash lifted her right arm and rubbed the section where the ties had dug
deep.

"How long?"

"Overnight.  Just overnight."

She looked away from him.  He thought he saw her lip tremble, but a
fraction of a moment later it was still.

He helped her to sit up.  Already he was counting days.  Another two to
reach the Storm Margin.  A week to reach the base of Mount Flood.

"How are you feeling?"

"Tired.  My arms are aching."  She made a face.

"And something tastes bad in my mouth."

"I'll fetch some water."

"Raif."

He turned to look at her.

"Do you think we'll make it?  I was lucky this time ... I woke."  She
shook her head softly, her eyes darkeningas memories filled them.

"They're so hard to fight.  They're stronger now.  That day at the pass
changed them.  They came so close to breaking through they could taste
it."

Raif didn't know how to reply.  Ash needed to be told that she would
make it to the Cavern of Black Ice alive and well.  Yet Tern had not
taught him how to lie.  In the end he said,

"I will slaughter the horse for blood and meat, carry you on my back,
and walk until my feet turn yellow with ice before I give up or turn
back."

He bowed his head and walked outside to a frost so hard each breath
stung like acid in his throat.

They left the dugout while it was still dark.  If there had been a moon,
it had long set, yet the ground snow glimmered blue and gray as if light
from some distant source shone upon it.  On Raifs insistence Ash rode
the geldingat a trot.  Raif ran for short bursts to keep pace.  Often he
fell behind, as his mending ribs would allow him to take only so much
air.  When the sun rose in a brilliant blue sky, the granite peaks of
the Coastal Ranges seemed close enough to touch.  The winter sun made
Raif nervous, especially when he saw Ash tuggingat the collar of her
cloak as if she were warm and needed air.  It wasn't warm.  It was cold
enough to freeze tears.  And there were men and women in Clan Blackhail
who could tell you all about the danger of believing that sunshine meant
warmth.  As many clan ears had been lost beneath a blue sky as in the
deepest, darkest night.

Raif monitored his own body closely.  His hands ached constantly .  .  .

but at least they weren't numb.

"It's when you can't feel them there's a problem," Tern would always
say, "not when you can.

The terrain changed gradually over the course of the day.  The great
dark body of the taiga extended all the way to the Coastal Ranges, but
the trees living within it altered as they neared the divide.

They were smaller now, stunted by late spring frosts, midwinter thaws,
and the black blight of snow mold.  Hemlocks and spruce gave way to the
twisted bones ofwhitebark and limber pines.  The ground underfoot grew
harder, and giant boulders riven with frost cracks studded the valley
floor.  Scraggy beards of bladder grass and yellow moss occupied niches
in the rocks, and prostrate willow hugged the ground like something
spilled, not grown.  The snow underfoot was as hard and dry as white
sand.

The area reminded Raif of the badlands.  He felt the same sense of cold
drought.

By the time the sun reached its highest point he was no longer sure
which clan's territory he was in.  He guessed they might be traveling
through the Orrlhold, which was the most westerly of the border clans,
but he also knew that a small creek named the Red Run lay somewhere out
here, beyond whose banks Blackhail claimed all land west to the Ranges.

The Wolf River flowed to the south here, and Raif glimpsed its black
oily surface at intervals throughout the day.  Most of its tributaries
were dry or frozen, and its mass remained unchanged as it flowed toward
the sea.  The Wolf River and its valley cut straight through the Ranges,
and Raif knew it would provide the quickest, safest route to the Storm
Margin.

They stopped briefly at midday and ate the last of the roasted bird.

Raif watched Ash closely.  Her skin was markedly yellow now, and there
was something wrong with her face.  The change was subtle, yet Raif
recognized it for what it was straightaway.  The tiny crinkles around
her eyes and mouth were gone.  Fluid beneath her skin was filling out
wrinkles and depressions and making her cheeks swell.  He had seen
symptoms like these before, on Braida Tanna, elder sister to Lansa and
Hailly, whose body had been laid in a hollowed-out basswood the month
Drey took his year man oath.  It was poison, Inigar Stoop had said.  The
girl's body had poisoned itself.

Raif made Ash ride the geldingat a gallop for long periods during the
afternoon.  He ran behind her, his feet pounding over frozen earth, his
ears burning in the rushingair.  At sunset she surprised him by calling
a halt.  He was some distance behind her, catching his breath against a
massive snout of limestone, when he heard her call his name.  By the
time he reached the horse she had dismounted and was approaching a crop
of rocks that lay on a ridge north of the path.

A small movement of Ash's body turned him cold.  She continued walking
forward, yet she drew her arms to her sides and closed her mouth.

Raif took a second look at the rocks.  They were colored a delicate
shade of blue gray, coated with hoar frost and granules of snow, and
they were not rocks at all.  They were corpses.  Six of them.  Orrlsmen,
judging from the strips of white willow plaited into their braids, and
the pale, shimmering fabric of their cloaks.  From the depth and
condition of the surrounding snow, Raif guessed they had been here for
less than two weeks, yet already the cold dry air had begun to mummify
their remains.

Raif took Ash's hand.  His gaze was drawn to the dark shadows beneath
the hoar frost crust: a blue eye, perfectly preserved, a mouth open wide
enough to show the pink hump of a frozen tongue, a fist clenched around
a column of air.

"What should we do?"  Ash's voice was a whisper.  As she spoke, Raif
noticed a cap of beaten silver discarded a short distance from the
bodies.

"Nothing."

"But shouldn't they be blessed, buried, something?"  He could tell she
was upset, yet he still shook his head.

"My clan brought this death.

It's not for me to deal with the corpses they left behind.  "

"How do you know it was Blackball who did this?"

"That piece of silver over there belongs to Blackhail and no other.
They killed these men, and when they were done, one of their number
flicked the cap off his tine and drew a circle in the frost."

"To honor the dead men's memories?"

"No.  You do not honor the memory of a man you've just killed.  The
circle was made to draw the eyes of the Stone Gods, so they may know
there are souls to be claimed."

Ash pulled free of Raif's grip.

"Why kill these men here, where no one lives?"

"Because we are on Blackhail land, and a state of war exists in the clan
holds and something has happened to make the Hail Wolf angry or nervous,
or both."

Raif dragged his hands over his face.  Orri was sworn to Black- hail.

The two clans had shared borders for two thousand years, and for as far
back as he could remember all disputes between them had been settled at
the hearth.  Now this.  What was Mace Blackhail doing?  What had
happened to make him order such a killing?  Orrl's chief, Spynie Orri,
was no fool.  He was the oldest living chief in the clan holds outliving
four wives, two sons, and a daughter.  Dagro Blackball had liked him
well enough to invite him to hear vows at both his weddings, and when
Spynie's first great- granddaughter had been born five years back,
Spynie had sent Dagro ten head of black neck sheep in celebration.  Raif
could not imagine Spynie Orri attacking Blackhail.

No man lived as long as he did by taking chances.

Clan Scarpe.  The memory of smoke risingabove the Scarpe tree line
cooled Raifs face as quickly as if it had been stroked with ice.  If
something had happened to bring the two clans into dispute, and Clan
Orri had crossed swords with Clan Scarpe, then Mace Black- hail would
make sure that it was Orri that paid the highest price.  He might call
himself the Hail Wolf, but he was a Scarpeman through and through.

Raif closed his eyes.  He felt tired enough to lie on the frozen ground
and sleep with the dead.

He knew there was no way of knowing for certain if the torching of the
Scarpehouse was connected to the mummified bodies on the ridge Scarpe
collected enemies like flat roofs collected rain.  Yet even if the two
events were unrelated, there was still a hard truth to be learned here.
The Clan Wars were spiraling out of control.  Mace Blackhail had ordered
the killing of Orrlsmen.  The Scarpe roundhouse had been torched.
Ganmiddich had been taken first by Bludd, then by Blackhail.  Dhoone
survivors were still unhoused and scattered, yet it was only a matter of
time before they massed for a strike against Bludd.  When would it end?
When every guide stone was smashed to rubble and every clansman dead?

Raif looked northeast toward Blackhail.  After a few minutes the lines
around his mouth hardened, and he went to strip clothes from the
corpses.

He found no game to kill that night.  The thought of Ash sittingalone
while he hunted kept him close to the camp.  The night was dark, and
there was no moon showing, and the sky seemed close enough to touch.

Wind moving down from the mountains froze the saliva on his teeth and
made his eyes stream with stinging tears.  His breath glaciated upon his
fisher hood within minutes.

He returned to the camp dragging numb feet in the snow.  They had not
traveled far from the Orrlsmen, just enough to put the sight of death
behind them.  Camp was a dry storm channel thatched with willow switches
and laid with willow leaves and moss.  The clothes Raif had stripped
from the Orrlsmen had been beaten free of ice and were now laid over the
gelding's back so they would be warm and dry by morning.  Ash had
offered to help, but he had set her the task of building the fire and
preparing the dried fox supper instead. Skin had peeled off with the
dead men's clothes, and although it bore little resemblance to living
flesh, Raif had not wanted her to see it.

Ash was awake when he entered the shelter, sitting with her knees tucked
close to her chest.  Smoke choked the air--too much to escape easily
from the smoke hole--and Raif could tell by the length and fierceness of
the flames that Ash had been feeding the fire.

He stripped off his gloves and came to kneel beside her.  She was
shakingas violently as if she'd been pulled from freezing water.

"Here," he said, tucking the blankets around her shoulders.

"You need to cover yourself properly."

She smiled weakly.

"No kill tonight?"

"No."  His gaze took in the pile of willow branches he'd collected for
firewood; there was no longer enough to last the night.  Ash had burned
more than half their stock.

"Did the voices come again?"

She lowered her head as she nodded.

"They never leave me now.

Sometimes they're not strong, and I can push them back.  Other times
it's as if they're standing right beside me .  .  .  and I can smell
them .  .  and they're cold and their eyes are black and dead.  It's so
easy, they say.  So easy.  All you have to do is reach.  "

"Do you know what they are?"

"Men.  At least they once were men .  .  .  it's as if the shadows on
the outside have found a way in."  Ash swallowed hard.

"They hate us, Raif.  They've been shut away for so long, and all they
can do is imagine what it's like to be free.  It's cold there, and no
light ever touches them .  .  .  and they're in chains, and the chains
are made of blood.  They call me mistress and say they love me, but
their words are all lies.  There's thousands of them, thousand upon
thousands, and each and every one of them is waiting for me to reach."

Raif leaned over and fed more willow to the fire.  He understood her
need for warmth now.

As yellow flames dripped onto the new wood and the frozen clay walls of
the shelter shivered in the changing light.  Ash said,

"Why do I exist, Raif?  If what I can do is so terrible, why was I
born?"

Her eyes were bright in the firelight.  A patch on her bottom lip was
red and tattered where she had chewed on it.  Raif wanted to take her in
his arms and crush her until she was warm and safe and unafraid.

He wanted to say, It doesn't matter what you are capable of.  If you
breached the Blindwall this night and let loose an army from the Blind,
I would stay by your side and protect you.  You are clan to me now.
Instead he said,

"All of us are born with the ability to bring death and suffering.  Some
of us have to fight harder than others to cause no harm."

It was not the answer Ash wanted, yet he could see her thinkingas she
pushed smoke away her face.

"You fight it too, don't you?"

"Yes."

She edged closer to him, so that their shoulders and arms were touching,
yet kept her gaze on the fire as she said,

"Why do you stay with me, Raif?  You don't want anything from me.
There's no reward for taking me to the cavern.  We could both die in the
cold and the snow, and by the time someone came upon our bodies we'd be
like those Orrlsmen on the ridge, blue and white and frozen."

Raif sat still and did not speak.  How could he answer?  Staying with
Ash was all he had, yet he could not let her know that.  She might pity
him .  .  and that was something he had no need for.  After a time he
leaned forward and stoked the fire with his staff.

"I think we'd better sleep."

Ash looked at him without blinking, yet he pretended not to notice as he
shouldered down beneath his blanket, closed his eyes, and waited for
sleep to take him.

The screaming of the wind woke him before dawn.  The fire was long dead,
and the temperature in the shelter had dropped below freezing.

Ice smoke hung in the air above Raif's body, like a small piece of his
soul. He lay still for a while and listened to the wind, as Tern had
taught him. The high-pitched whistling told of air forced through
mountain passes and needle-thin fissures in rocks.  The undertone of
white noise, a sound as soft as a mother s/zssinga baby to sleep, spoke
of ice.  The wind was full of ice.

Although he didn't much feel like it, Raif rose.  Pain shot through his
hands as he contracted muscles locked by cold.  His left eye was frozen
shut, and when he rubbed his beard, dead skin and ice crystals flaked
into his hand. He needed to heat water and render the last drops of fat
from the fox, yet the idea of going outside and collecting more fuel for
the fire rested like an undigested meal in his belly.  He rubbed his
left eye until it ached and scarlet colors bloomed against the inside of
his eyelid, and then pried the eye open.  Some portion of ice held fast,
and as he forced back the lid a handful of eyelashes were plucked clean.

Raif damned the cold.

Gathering his blanket around him like a cloak, he crossed to where Ash
lay sleepingagainst the back wall of the shelter. Breaths so shallow
they hardly raised her chest exited her mouth with little scraping
noises.  Rail spoke her name, loudly, afraid she might not wake.

Her eyes blinked open.

Raif concealed his relief.

"It's morning.  We must be ready to leave within the quarter.  Wrap up
well. There's ice on the wind today."

He left her alone then, as he always did, aware that women needed time
for themselves after waking.  Breaking up the roof thatch, he pulled
himself free of the shelter and entered the ice storm beyond.

The land was white and shifting, driven by winds that could be seen and
touched.  Great webs of ice hung from bent and crippled pines, and hoar
frost grew on everything that lived like a plague.  The snow underfoot
was so hard and dry it snapped like panes of glass beneath Raifs feet.

Head down, arms crossed over his chest, he made his way toward the
prostrate willow where he had tethered the horse.

The gelding was in a bad way.  It had not fed during the night.  Veins
around its mouth and eyes were chilblained and broken, and despite the
many blankets and articles of clothing spread over its back, it was
shivering violently. As soon as it heard Raif, it whickered softly and
came toward him on uncertain legs.  Raif stroked the old horse's nose,
oddly touched by its desire to be near him.

Ash came out to join them sometime later, huddled in every scrap of skin
and wool she could find.  The harsh, shadowless light showed up the
yellow tones in her skin and made her lips look the same color as her
face.  She smiled weakly.

"I see now why they call this land the Storm Margin."

Raif hardly knew how he managed to smile back.  He didn't have the heart
to tell her that the Storm Margin didn't begin true until they'd crossed
the mountains and entered the strip of land that ran the length of the
coast.

Ash motioned to the pile of clothes tucked beneath the gelding's

blanket.

"You need to put on some of those things, the ones you took from the .
.." She let her words trail away.

Dead men, he finished the sentence for her in his mind.  Ash shivered as
if he had spoken the words out loud.  Raiffelt like shivering too, but
he turned and began unloading the horse instead.

They fitted well, the dead men's clothes, sitting over his back like
garments tailored for him alone.  The Orri cloak he had taken was the
same white blue color of snow, and Raif found some small measure of
satisfaction in being rendered invisible in the storm.  Orrlsmen were
famous white-weather hunters, able to feast on fresh meat in the dead of
winter when all other clans were grinding their teeth on cured elk.
Their badge was the ice hare, and Tern said that no one moved as swiftly
and silently through snow as an Orrlsman. Raif touched the cap of his
tine out of respect for their skills.  Orri was a hard clan, with a hard
clan hold and it had been loyal to Blackhail for a thousand years.

He pushed the thought away.  What Blackhail did, what any clan did, was
not his business now.  Forcing his mind into the present, forcing his
senses to deal with the storm, he saddled the geldingand prepared for
the journey west.

The dead men's clothes warmed his back.

CHAPTER FORTY-EIGHT.

A Night at Drover Jack's hat new girl of yours is a witch," said Clyve
Wheat. " No.  An angel,"

corrected Burdale Ruff.

"The ability to know what a man wants before he knows it himself comes
from the heavens, not the twelve sheep less hells."  Burdale Ruff
spoiled the eloquence of his words somewhat by belching with great
satisfaction at the end of them.  With a smile made sloppy by drink, the
great hairy ewe man apologized, then belched again.

Gull Moler could appreciate the compliment inherent in a goodly belch as
much as the next man, but the current subject of discussion was of too
great an interest to him to risk being diverted by one of Burdale Ruff's
infamous after-supper performances.  Before blond-eye browed Clyve Wheat
and little rat-faced Silas Craw could spoil the conversation by
snickeringat Burdale's antics, Gull said hotly,

"I'd hardly call Maggy a girl.  She's long past the days of pink ribbons
and shoes that pinch.  She's a widow, you know.  A widow."

Clyve Wheat, who was not as drunk as Burdale Ruff yet no cleverer for
it, nudged Silas Craw with such force that the little ewe man nearly
fell from the beer cask he had taken to sitting upon in light of the
shortage of chairs.

"A widow, he says!  A widow!  Well, all I can say to that is she must
have wed before she was weaned from the teat.  For I tell you now that
woman is no older than my sister Bell."

Silas Craw, who had righted himself with the quick, ferrety action of a
man well used to being pushed, grunted in agreement.

"Bell!"  he said with feeling.  Everyone waited, but he said no more.

Gull Moler frowned as he looked from man to man.  They were blind
stinking drunk, the lot of them.  What did they know about women and
women's ages? With a sniff he judged fitting to his position as
owner-proprietor, Gull squeezed his well-fed body between Burdale Ruffs
and Clyve Wheat's chairs and began rounding up the empty tankards,
pitchers, and serving bowls sitting on the table.

Burdale Ruff caught his arm as he withdrew.

"Taken a fancy to our Maggy, have ye.  Gull?"

Having been owner and sole proprietor of Drover Jack's for fourteen
years, Gull Moler was well accustomed to drunks and drunken talk.

Experience told him the best way to deal with a man who was over potted
and over opinionated was to purse your lips in deep thought and then
proclaim loudly,

"Aye!  You might well be right."  Nothing took the fight from a man like
agreement.  Yet in this instance Gull could not bring himself to agree.
Not about Maggy.  It just wasn't right.

He cleared his throat.

"Maggy's a decent woman, Burdale Ruff.  Keeps herself to herself.  I
won't have you upsetting her with drunken comments and low talk."  As he
spoke, Gull tried to keep his voice low, but as always happened in
taverns when conflict between men erupted, wind of it passed from patron
to patron like the scent of a good pork pie.  By the time he'd finished
his last sentence, he was speaking in a silent room.  Gull was suddenly
aware he was hot.  The three dozen patrons of Drover Jack's, many of
them still wet and steaming from exposure to the storm that raged
outside, waited to see what Burdale Ruff would do.

Burdale Ruff was not the largest man in the Three Villages-- that honor
went to dim-witted Brod Haunch, who broke rocks for a living--but by far
he was the most feared.  He was an unpredictable drunk: the worst kind.
He could switch from jest to threat in less time than it took to draw a
pint.  Gull could feel Burdale's big, sausage-shaped fingers pressing
into his arm.  The ewe man small eyes shrank to pinpoints, and suddenly
he did not look drunk.

Without releasing his grip on Gull's arm, he kicked out the table to
give himself space to stand.

Gull spared a thought for the table legs; they would need to be sanded
then polished.  Burdale Ruffs wet, peaty-smelling breath brushed Gull's
cheeks. The knuckles on Burdale's free hands cracked one by one as he
curled a fist. Gull feared broken chairs and broken tables.  Blood on
his fine oak floor. Bent pewter.  Spilled beer.

Patrons who might leave without paying full due.  It was only as Burdale
Ruffs right arm--muscled like a bull's throat from the machinelike
action of shearing sheep--made the small retraction necessary for a big
punch that it occurred to Gull Moler to fear for himself.

He closed his eyes.  Prayed to the spirits of tavern keepers past to
save his chairs, his tankards, his hide.

With eyes closed he did not see what happened next.  Footsteps tapped
across the wood floor, their rhythm coming to an abrupt end with a
woman's cry of pain.  A chair toppled with a mighty crack.  A clamor of
noise followed as metal tankards bounced off tables and hard objects
dropped to the floor. Clyve Wheat hissed loudly, "Damn it!"

Gull risked opening his eyes.  Maggy Sea stood to the side of him,
bending over to rub her ankle, an empty tray pressed to her chest.

"Forgive me, gentle sirs," she said in her most golden-toned voice.

"I twisted my ankle on Farmer's Lane this morning.  I never thought it
would betray me tonight."

Gull followed her gaze to where Clyve Wheat and Silas Craw sat at
Burdale Ruffs table, soaked to their skins and drippingale.  Their hair
was plastered to their heads, their ewe man mustaches dangled over their
lips like limp bits of rope, and puddles were forming where their elbows
touched table wood. Gull blinked in astonishment.

Maggy Sea had flung a whole tray's worth of beer at them.

Miraculously, it would occur to him only later, without spilling one
drop on Burdale Ruff.

Gull's attention snapped back to Burdale as a queer puff of sound exited
the ewe man lips.  Burdale was not looking at Gull.  Burdale was looking
at his two drinking companions.  His fist was

still clenched, but there was air between his fingers.  For one frozen
moment all was still.  None of the thirty-six patrons in the tavern
moved or spoke. Burdale Ruff stood, breathed, deliberated.

Then laughed.  It was like watchinga volcano erupt.  Burdale's large
mouth flew open, his nostrils flared, his head came back, and a sound
like rocks exploding from a summit came forth from his lips.  Most
importantly to Gull, he released his grip on Gull's arm and slapped his
fist on his own large belly as he rocked back and forth in merriment.
Within seconds everyone in the tavern was laughing.  Tears came to one
man's eyes.  Another laughed until he choked, and another still fell
under the table, where he laughed until his wife put her boot to his
throat.

Gull Moler never laughed at customers; it wasn't good for business.

Instead he frowned at the puddles of ale on the table and floor, while
attempting to work out his losses.  For some reason, though, the sums
that usually came so easily to him got muddled in his head, and all he
could think of was Burdale Ruff's fist.

Maggy Sea wasn't laughing, either.  She had put down her tray and was
now, very discreetly, mopping up the mess.  In the ten days she had
worked at Drover Jack's, Gull had never known her to spill as much as a
thimble's worth of ale.  Now this.  Gull looked at her more sharply.

Had she done it on purpose to divert Burdale Ruff's attention?

"Aye!  Maggy," said Burdale Ruff.

"Let me give ye a hand with that.

You need to rest that ankle.  I was on Farmer's Lane myself two days
back, and it's as potholed as my father's arse.  It's a wonder you
didn't break a leg.  "

Gull Moler watched in astonishment as Burdale Ruff bent down on all
fours and began collecting the pewter tankards that had rolled to the
floor.  The small speech he had made marked the end of the
entertainment, and patrons turned back to their own tables with the
swiftness of rats bailing ship.  Gull, suddenly realizing he had been
standingand staring for far too long, shook himself and headed to the
back to fetch towels.

Ten days Maggy Sea had been here.  Ten days without a single fight.

Business had never been better or run smoother.  The beer taps were
clean enough to pump mother's milk.  The oak floor shone like a serving
platter, and the wick oil in the lanterns had been forced through a wire
cloth so fine that it burned almost entirely free of smoke.  All Maggy's
doing.  She had improved the quality of food served, rising before dawn
each day to cook fresh beans, pea and bacon soup, and lamb shanks
crusted with mint- she even baked her own bread!  She had cleaned and
varnished the Drover Jack's sign, unclogged the storm drains, located an
old and mysterious leak in the roof and mended it with cordage as a
sailor would a ship, and even taken to distilling the barrel dregs and
making a rough but surprisingly palatable wheat liquor from them that
she had christened Moler's Brew.  All in all the woman was a wonder.

Why then did Gull feel an itch of unease as he took the warm towels from
the kettle and turned to face the tavern once more?

She was so quiet; that was the thing.  The words she had spoken just now
to Clyve Wheat and Silas Craw were the most she'd said all night.

And then there was the queer business of her appearance.  Fancy Clyve
Wheat calling her a girl!  Why, she was at least as old as Clyve Wheat's
mother and very probably older than Gull himself.  Or was she?

It was so very hard to tell.

Her plain face inspired no male admirers, but her skill at hearth and
beer keg was becoming something of a local myth.  It was already drawing
patrons from the Ewe's Feet.  Good ones, mind.  Men with trades.  The
kind who brought their wives and elder daughters with them and always
paid in coin there and then.

Gull Moler only had to look around his tavern to see the way things were
changing for the better.  Maggy was a treasure.  Just tonight she'd
stopped a fight that had threatened not only his tables and chairs, but
his own good health as well.  And looking down upon the puddles of
spilled ale.  Gull saw that it was yellow-oat: the least expensive brew
that Drover Jack's offered. Unease forgotten, Gull congratulated his own
good luck.  Maggy Sea even spilled ale with good sense!

As he handed over warm towels to Clyve Wheat and Silas Craw, he noticed
that Maggy was speaking to a patron who had just walked through the
door.  The fact that it was clearly Maggy who

was doing the talking, not the newcomer, took Gull by surprise.  A small
twinge of possessiveness bent muscles in his chest as he watched Maggy's
lip graze the newcomer's ear.

A hand came down upon Gull's shoulder with considerable force.

"Gull!

Friends, eh?  I canna say what came over me, great fool that I am.  I
wouldna hit ye, ye know that.  And if I had, I surely would've missed. "
Burdale Ruff stepped into Gull's line of vision, grinning like a
charmingand very naughty child.  He pressed coins into Gull's hand.

"For beer lost, my friend.  Better that than friendship, eh?"

Gull pulled himself together.  Burdale Ruff was a troublemaker, yet
where he drank all the other ewe men in the Three Villages drank, too.

Gull made a show of refusing the coins but ultimately accepted them:
When a man offered you a gift it was an insult not to accept it.  Gull
knew this. He also knew that Burdale Ruff would have hit him and would
not have missed. Yet he was owner- proprietor of Drover Jack's and as
such could afford to bear no grudges.  He made an effort.

"Aye, Bear.

You're a good man to think of my loss.  Step over to the counter wi' me
and let's share a dram of malt.  " The malt would cost him more than
Burdale Ruff's coins, but that was the way of things in tavern life.

Only when he had filled two wooden thumb-cups with liquor did he
remember Maggy and the man she had been speaking with.  He glanced
toward the door. The man was sitting with a crew.  Now that his face was
better situated to catch light.  Gull recognized him as one of the
patrons newly come from the Ewe's Feet.  Thurlo Pike.  Tradesman.  A
roofer, if Gull remembered rightly, one with fat pockets and a mouth to
match.  Gull struck cups with Burdale Ruff.  Thurlo Pike was speaking
with another of the Ewe's Feet crew, laughing loudly at a jest of his
own making.

"That Thurlo Pike's in for a good season," Burdale Ruff said, following
Gull's gaze.

Gull finished his malt before strikingan expression of mild interest.

"How's that, Bear?"

"Roofer, ain't he?  What with the winds and late thaws we've been
havingaround here, he'll be lining his pockets with master's gold.  Near
everyone's roof is rotted or missing tiles.  Take me own roof--leaks
like a woman on the rag.

"Cording to Silas, Thurlo's the only roofer in the Three Villages who
has a ladder tall enough to reach anything higher than an outhouse.  And
he's known for his tools.

When his mother died and left him four gold pieces, he buried the poor
woman in an apple crate and spent the money saved on a good set of hand
chisels and a lathe.  Never looked back since.

"Cept to watch for his mother's vengeful spirit, o' course."

Smiling in appreciation of the jest, Gull sat and waited for Burdale to
finish his measure of malt.  Idle tavern talk was exchanged, and much
noddingand agreement passed between the two.  Then, when Gull judged the
mutual show of goodwill sufficient, he poured Burdale a second dram of
malt and bade him sit and savor it while he rose and tended to business.

Burdale surprised Gull by catching his arm for the second time that
night.

"You're a good man, Gull Moler.  And you run a good tavern.  If I ever
take a strike at you again, may the door of the dark house come tumbling
down and the wralls ride out and take me."

Gull felt ice slide down his spine.  Burdale's words were old ones, said
by people of the Three Villages for generations.  Gull did not know
where they came from or what they meant, but to hear them sworn in oath
in his tavern made him afraid.  Words had power, everyone knew that, and
once something was spoken it could not be unsaid.

It cost Gull much to hold his smile as he disengaged his arm from
Burdale's grip.  The malt rested as uneasy as sour vinegar upon his
stomach, and even the knowledge that Burdale Ruff and his crew were more
closely to bound to Drover Jack's than ever before did little to repair
his spirits.

When he came upon Maggy Sea by the soup kettle, where she was skimming
the fat, he spoke more harshly than was his wont.  "Maggy.

Run upstairs and fetch me my wool coat.  It's passing cold in here
tonight.  "

Maggy Sea regarded him with eyes that might have been green or gray.

With fingers that were never dirty despite the hard nature of her work,
she rubbed the faintest sheen of sweat from her brow.

Gull felt his cheeks color.  Yet even though her actions demonstrated
the warmth of the kitchen area, she simply nodded and said, "Aye.  Tis a
bite cold near the door."

Where Thurlo Pike is sitting, added Gull to himself with a second guilty
flush.  He looked up, half expecting Maggy Sea's knowing gaze to be
resting on the Ewe's Feet roofer, but she had already turned for the
stairs.  Gull felt a tiny bit of relief.  He did not like deception and
knew quite well he was not good at it, yet his position as
owner-proprietor often called for small lies.  A man could not manage
thirty-six drunken patrons on truth alone.  Still.  This was different.
Gull knew that, yet it did not stop him from hastening toward Thurlo
Pike the moment Maggy Sea's small neatly shod feet disappeared from
view.

"Gentlemen!  May I take the liberty of welcoming you to Drover Jack's on
this bleak and stormy night."  As Gull spoke, the small crew of Ewe's
Feet regulars ceased speakingamong themselves and turned to look at him.
Gull smiled warmly and then continued.  "I'm Gull Moler,
owner-proprietor of this humble establishment, and if there's anything I
can do to increase your comfort or your bellies' girth, speak up and let
me know."

Thurlo Pike leaned back in his chair.

"Aye!  You can tell us where Drover Jack is!"  A hard burst of laughter
united the Ewe's Feet crew.

Thurlo Pike, who was dressed in expensive fabric cheaply dyed and wore a
beaver collar to warm his red and pimpled neck, smirked in satisfaction
at his own wit.

Gull was well used to such teasingabout the name of his establishment,
yet for some reason he found it difficult to retain his normal good
humor.

"There never was a Drover Jack, gentlemen.  " Tis but a name my late
departed wife picked on account of its favorable sound.  " Back in the
days when me and Peg still hoped of havinga son and dreamed of naming
the two the same.

Thurlo Pike sucked air until his cheeks hollowed.

"Let me get this settled.  Your name's not Jack, and no offense, friend,
but you look too well fed to be a drover.  So what you're really saying
is that there's no truth to the sign above your door."  One of the Ewe's
Feet crew snickered.  Thurlo polished his fingernails on his beaver
collar as he delivered his final sting.

"How then can we be sure that when we ask for best dark stout we're
getting it?  And not last night's slops instead."

Gull had to force his teeth together to stop himself from crying,
"Outside!" Jests about his tavern's name he could stand.  Comments about
his girth were something that pained him less with each passing year.
But when someone brought into question his integrity as owner-proprietor
of Drover Jack's, it was like a dagger in his heart.

He was not by nature a violent man, but for an instant he entertained
the wild image of smashing Thurlo Pike in the teeth.  Drover Jack's was
an honest tavern, where a man could purchase an honest beer and an
honest supper and take warmth from the hearth for free.  And its
owner-proprietor had never topped a barrel in his life.  Now this roofer
from the Ewe's Feet was sitting before him, as cocky as a trapper with a
mink in his snare, suggesting just that.

Gull cleared his throat.

"I'd never take it upon myself to thatch a roof, Thurlo Pike, and unless
you fancy stoking my fire and cleaning my taps, then I suggest you leave
the business oftavernkeeping to me."

A murmur of approval rose from the Ewe's Feet crew.  The crewman who had
snickered moments earlier--a small but muscular apprentice potter named
Slip--said,

"Aye, Thurlo.  The man has the right of it."

Thurlo Pike said nothing.  Gull watched as he finished his ale with slow
insolence, wiped the foam from his lips, then stood.

"I think I'll be heading back to the Ewe's Feet.  At least there a man's
free to make a jest without worry that the help may take offense."  With
that, he flicked over his pewter tankard, sending it rollingacross the
table toward Gull, and stalked out the door.

Gull stood and suffered the blast of wind and snow that accompanied the
man's exit.  What was wrong with him tonight?  In less time than it took
to bake a loaf of bread he'd nearly talked himself into two separate
fights.  It was all very upsetting.  Very upsetting indeed.  As a reflex
action, Gull righted the upturned tankard and wiped away the spilled
droplets with his sleeve.

"Don't mind him," said the apprentice potter, wagging his head

toward the door.

"He's not much loved wherever he goes.  Dorri May over at the Ewe's Feet
won't be thanking you for sending him back.

Thought she'd got rid of him for the night, she did.  "

Gull made a noise.

"Besides, you wouldn't want him getting too friendly with your new girl.
What with her being so highly spoke of and all.  He'd only bring trouble
to you both."

"Oh."

"Aye.  Thurlo's got his eye on her all right.  Boastingaway, he was.

Telling her how he's workingall the local roofs, making enough money to
buy himself a horse and cart.  He mentioned one job up near the old
growth forest, you know, on the far side of Buck Stream.  Said there's a
house full of women up there.  Last week's storms pulled part of their
chimney down, and Thurlo's planning on making them pay through the nose,
what with them being women and all.  "

Gull found his wits.

"And Maggy was interested in this?"

The apprentice potter shrugged.  Particles of clay dust sifted from his
sleeves onto the table.

"With women who can tell?  I think she only asked the family's name out
of politeness."

It was tavern talk then--a man braggingand a woman listening--the kind
of thing that Gull Moler saw and heard every day of his life.  He should
have felt better for knowing it, but the memory of Maggy Sea's dry
flinty teeth near Thurlo Pike's ear disturbed him in a way he had no
words for.  Gull suddenly wished the night were over.  He was tired, and
his legs felt shaky beneath him.  He put a hand on the table to steady
himself.  Even now he found himself unable to set aside his
owner-proprietor obligation of providing congenial conversation.  A man,
a patron, sat before him, having just said something that required a
reply.  Gull searched for a way to turn the conversation away from Maggy
Sea.

"And who might this family who lives in the woods be?"

The apprentice potter ran a gray and powdery hand across the table,
wipingaway his own dust.

"I don't think Thurlo knew.  To be honest, I think it upset him that
Maggy asked a question he had no answer for--you know how some men are.
Should have seen his chest get all bloated up as he tried to tell her
something else of interest instead.  To listen to him tell it, the
womenfolk who work the farm are all of passing beauty, and with the
husband away for the season on a whaler, the wife and eldest daughter
are desperate for a man."

Gull's expression let the apprentice potter know what he thought of
that. Reaching beyond the man, he collected more tankards in readiness
to withdraw.

"Well.  Houseful of women or not, Thurlo Pike will be hard put to
practice his trade in this weather.  Burdale Ruff reckons the storms
won't clear for a week."

"Aye.  Well, that won't bother Thurlo.  He told the women he was full
pressed for the next five days.  It's one of his tricks ..  .  makes
himself seem busier and more in demand than he actually is.  You know
how these things go: For an extra silver piece I'll fit you in between
jobs."

Gull frowned.  And this from the same man who had dared question the
honesty of Drover Jack's!  Movingaway from the table, he raised his
voice to address all the remaining Ewe's Feet crew.

"Well, I'll be off now to tend the stove.  Can't risk it burning out on
a night like this.  Nay, gentlemen.  Keep your seats.  I'll send Maggy
with a round."

Gull glanced at the empty cups in his hands, his expert eyes discerning
the exact quality of ales drunk from the scum of froth around each rim.
He made a quick calculation.

"On the house."

That ensured him a fond farewell.  It was such a relief to have patrons
feeling nothing but goodwill toward him that Gull almost didn't care
about the cost.  Besides, only one of them had been drinking his best
stout.

"Gull."

Cull turned and came face-to-face with Maggy Sea.  She was so close, he
could smell her.  She smelled of ice and stone and other hard things.

"Your coat."

"Oh.  Yes.  Thank you, Maggy."  For some reason Gull found himself
rumbling. Maggy Sea was just so .  intense.  That was the word.  Her
eyes seemed to focus more deeply than most, and she possessed no
capacity for gaiety or humor.  She smiled when conversation called for
it, yet Gull had never heard her laugh.

Her deeply set eyes never left him for a moment as she handed over the
coat. The material was as cool as if it had not been handled, merely
picked straight up from the floor.

"Should I see to the fire?"

she asked, her teeth making little bitingactions as she spoke.  / Gull
collected himself,

"No, Maggy.  See to the Ewe's Feet crew over there.  I've promised them
a round on the house."

Maggy Sea nodded.

"Gull, I'd like half a day to myself next week.  I need to go to market
and purchase some good winter boots.  I should be back in time for the
evening trade."  Teeth, dry as fingernails, flashed in the firelight.

"I'll expect my wages to be duly docked."

So put, Gull Moler had no choice but to consent.

chest get all bloated up as he tried to tell her something else of
interest instead.  To listen to him tell it, the womenfolk who work the
farm are all of passing beauty, and with the husband away for the season
on a whaler, the wife and eldest daughter are desperate for a man.

Gull's expression let the apprentice potter know what he thought of
that. Reaching beyond the man, he collected more tankards in readiness
to withdraw.

"Well.  Houseful of women or not, Thurlo Pike will be hard put to
practice his trade in this weather.  Burdale Ruff reckons the storms
won't clear for a week."

"Aye.  Well, that won't bother Thurlo.  He told the women he was full
pressed for the next five days.  It's one of his tricks.  .  .  makes
himself seem busier and more in demand than he actually is.  You know
how these things go: For an extra silver piece I'll fit you in between
jobs."

Gull frowned.  And this from the same man who had dared question the
honesty of Drover Jack's!  Movingaway from the table, he raised his
voice to address all the remaining Ewe's Feet crew.

"Well, I'll be off now to tend the stove.  Can't risk it burning out on
a night like this.  Nay, gentlemen.  Keep your seats.  I'll send Maggy
with a round."

Gull glanced at the empty cups in his hands, his expert eyes discerning
the exact quality of ales drunk from the scum of froth around each rim.
He made a quick calculation.

"On the house."

That ensured him a fond farewell.  It was such a relief to have patrons
feeling nothing but goodwill toward him that Gull almost didn't care
about the cost.  Besides, only one of them had been drinking his best
stout.

"Gull."

Gull turned and came face-to-face with Maggy Sea.  She was so close, he
could smell her.  She smelled of ice and stone and other hard things.

"Your coat."

"Oh.  Yes.  Thank you, Maggy."  For some reason Gull found himself
fumbling. Maggy Sea was just so .  intense.  That was the word.  Her
eyes seemed to focus more deeply than most, and she

possessed no capacity for gaiety or humor.  She smiled when conversation
called for it, yet Gull had never heard her laugh.

Her deeply set eyes never left him for a moment as she handed over the
coat. The material was as cool as if it had not been handled, merely
picked straight up from the floor.

"Should I see to the fire?"

she asked, her teeth making little bitingactions as she spoke.

Gull collected himself.

"No, Maggy.  See to the Ewe's Feet crew over there.  I've promised them
a round on the house."

Maggy Sea nodded.

"Gull, I'd like half a day to myself next week.  I need to go to market
and purchase some good winter boots.  I should be back in time for the
evening trade."  Teeth, dry as fingernails, flashed in the firelight.

"I'll expect my wages to be duly docked."

So put, Gull Moler had no choice but to consent.

CHAPTER FORTY-NINE.

Ice Wolves

T;

he mule-eared horse collapsed on the fifth day.  Without a sharp knife
or a stout length of rope, it was not going to be easy to destroy it.

Freezing winds blasted Raifs face as he stroked the animal's neck.

The high mountain valley they had come to was choked with compacted
ridges of ice.  It was not a glacier, for the field was not deep or old
enough to be named so, but the creak and rumble of grinding ice filled
the air.  Directly below, the Wolf River ran slow and narrow beneath a
partially frozen crust. The sheets of ice floating upon its surface were
as black as night, smoothed to glass by the continuous movements of
river currents and wind.  Overhead, the sky was white with suspended
snow.

Raifmet eyes with Ash.  She sat with her body pressed against the
gelding's naked belly, sharing what little warmth she had with the dying
horse.  The journey through the mountains had visibly weakened her, and
she could not hold Raifs gaze for long without dropping her head and
looking down.  Raif searched his mind for some new way to help her, to
keep her warm and protected and out of reach of the voices that hounded
her.  Yet there was nothing to do but deliver her swiftly to the Cavern
of Black Ice.

Abruptly he bit on the tip of his mitt to remove it and then pulled the
elk hide belt from his waist.  With a twist of his wrist he tied a hard
knot beneath the velvety flesh of the animal's chin, binding its jaw
closed.  The old horse jerked its head in protest, but the frozen snow
beneath its flank was leechingaway its will to fight, and it did not
strain for long.  Raif filled his fist with snow and began packing it
around the gelding's nose.  Gradually, over the course of many minutes,
he blocked the creature's nostrils, running his scarred hands over the
snow until meltwater glistened on the surface.  Within seconds it
hard-froze to ice.

The effort of drawingair through the ice pack proved too great for the
failing horse, and it died within the quarter.  Raif watched its huge
dark eye turn dull and gelid, then rose to fetch his knife from his
pack.

As his hand closed around the lime wood hilt, he heard Ash's boots
crunching snow at his back.

"No, Raif.  Don't butcher him.  Not with that dull knife.  Not like
that."

Raif turned to face her.

"Look away.  I have not made a kill in three days.  We have no food save
for a few berries and a scrap of smoked meat."

"Please."  The light in Ash's eyes wavered as she spoke, and for a
moment he was reminded sharply of the dying horse.

Relaxing muscles in his hand, he let the knife drop.  He had not
intended to butcher the horse--his blade was not keen enough for
that--but he had wanted to bleed the animal while it was still warm and
collect its blood in a skin. Horse blood was rich in goodness and fat.

"Let's just leave him here.  He was a good horse."  Ash made a small
motion with her hand.

"It wouldn't be right to open him."

No, he thought.  We'll leave the wolves to do that.  Aloud he said, "We
should be moving on.  It'll be dark soon.  I want to camp by the river
tonight."

She looked at him for a moment, trying to decide if there was anger in
his voice, then nodded slowly.

"I'll fetch the blankets from the horse."

Raif spared no time wondering if she considered his actions cruel.  It
was too cold for thought.  Any clansman would butcher a fallen animal in
the same conditions.  There was tragedy in eating one's own horse, but
no shame.

Pulling his mitts over the hard chilblained flesh of his hands, he
watched as Ash moved around the gelding.  The voices might take her at
any time.  Twice in the night he'd had to shake her until bones in her
neck cracked.  It was becoming harder to wake her, and he lived in fear
of the day when no amount of shaking would bring her back.

Stoopingas he walked into the wind, he went to reclaim his belt from the
horse.  Ash was sitting in the snow.  She had begun the work of
unleashing the blankets but had stopped short of pulling them free.

When he approached her she smiled like a sleepy child.  Gently he helped
her to stand.  In a soft voice he bade her stamp her feet until he was
done with the horse.  His face betrayed no worry to her, yet he
recognized the first symptoms of cold sickness.  The smile she had given
him was one of contentment.  Left on her own, she would have curled up
by the horse's corpse and slept.

Keepingan ear to the sound other stamping feet, he rethreaded his belt
and hung his antler tine in place.

Cold sickness could kill a man as surely as a fall through broken ice
yet keep a smile on his face as it did so.  Sleep, it said.  Rest for a
bit, just here in this soft bank of snow, and I promise all your hurts
will pass.  With the sickness upon him a man could swear to the Stone
Gods that he was warm, believe it so completely that he loosened his
collar and tugged down his hood.  And all the while his heart was
slowing like a failing clock and his feet were turning yellow with ice.

"Cold sickness is like a whore with a knife," Gat Murdock was fond of
saying.

"Drugs you with sweet words and sweet feelings and then stabs you with
her knife."

Raif stayed at Ash's side during the descent from the high meadow.  He
asked her questions about her life in Mask Fortress, the city itself,
Penthero Iss. She was too tired to speak for long on any subject, yet he
pressed her for details, forced her to remember, think.  He considered
laying one of the horse blankets over her back for extra warmth, but he
wasn't sure she could bear the weight.  Many times she slowed and asked
to rest, yet he shook his head and told her,

"Just a little more."

Whenever they came upon a wide expanse of snow, Raif tested its depth
with his willow staff.  One fall and they would both be done.

The ascent to the pass had been easy up to a point.  The Wolf River
retained walk able gravel banks for a fair portion of the way, until a
hundred-foot wall of granite rose from its waters, sheer as the tallest
cliff.  They had been forced to climb for half a day to reach the top of
the wind-carved bluff and take the pass.  The west side of the pass was
a breaking ground of split rock, frozen waterfalls, gravel beds, and
drifted snow.  Most surfaces were stippled with hoar frost All edges had
been scoured by the wind.

Raif fought hard to keep his mind in the now.  Ash was weaker than he;
the sickness that poisoned her blood and robbed the color from her skin
made her more susceptible to the altitude and the cold.  But that did
not mean he was immune.  Several times he caught himself driftingaway
from the present on the wave of a collapsing thought.  So far he had
managed to pull himself back, but the fear of lethargy was present and
real.  He could not afford to let his mind drift.

Ash was what mattered.  Keeping Ash safe.

A path of sorts, a game track used by horned sheep in high summer, wound
down through the cliff to the river and the Storm Margin below.

Through chinks in the clouds, Raif spotted the dark body of a blood wood
forest far to the south.  The mighty red-barked trees were the tallest
living things in the Territories, and they grew only in the wet, foggy
slopes of the southern margin.  Every summer men and women from the clan
holds made the journey west and then south to purchase timber from the
Cold Axes who lived in their high timber halls amid the trees.  Croser
was the only clan that had riverboats capable of hauling the raw timber
upstream.  All other clans paid freightage to the Master ofllle Glaive.

When Raif turned his gaze north, he saw nothing but white snow clouds.
Mount Flood and the Hollow River were out there, yet he could not be
sure where either of them lay.  Clan knowledge ended here.

"I miss Angus," Ash said.

"I wish he were here with us."

Raif dragged his hand over his face.  Her words robbed a portion of his
strength.

"We've come so far without him.  We'll manage the rest of the way."

"He will be all right, won't he?"

Raif forced himself to reassure her.  How could she know that the
mention of Angus' name cut him--she who had no kin?

The last hour of the descent was undertaken duringa long bloody sunset
that turned the surrounding mist pink and made west-facing snow banks
look like killing fields.  The Wolf River ran dark and silent,
unaffected by the failing light.  The wind died and the air cooled, and
the first wolf cries rose above the grinding of the ice.

Raif wondered how long it would take the pack to find the horse.

He and Ash did not speak much after the words about Angus.  They were a
good two hundred feet below the high meadow, and the risk of cold and
altitude sickness was now less, despite the drop in the temperature.
Besides, the final descent was tricky, pitted with bog holes and wet
ice, and concentrating on avoiding falls seemed mental exercise enough.

Raif watched Ash every second.  Her cloak was weighted with frost, and
the fur around her hood was stiff and white.  Every so often she swayed
with the wind, and Raif would reach over and steady her, disguising the
gesture as a casual touch or a gentle reminder to stay on the path.
Toward the end of the descent her legs began to buckle and she started
missing steps, and it seemed natural to put his arm around her shoulder
and take her weight as his own.

By the time they reached the river, ice smoke steaming off the surface
made it difficult to see more than a few feet ahead.  The air was colder
than the black, oily water, and the river would steam through the night.
Raif could not find the will to search for a proper campsite and settled
upon the first bluff that afforded shelter from the wind.  Ash slipped
in and out of consciousness as he hacked at the resin-preserved remains
of a frost-killed willow.  The only thing that kept him from stopping
what he was doingand tending her was the cold certainty that she needed
heat from the fire more than any words of comfort from him.

It took forever for the fire to catch.  Raif couldn't stop his hands
from shaking as he cupped and blew on the pine needle kindling.  When
the fire finally took and bright little fingers of light shivered around
the wood, he set snow to melt over the hottest part of the flames, then
turned his attention to Ash.  She had fallen fast asleep, bundled up in
the roughest horse blanket, her hooded head restingagainst the smooth
belly of a basalt boulder.  He meant to wake her; she needed to drink,
to eat, to take off her boots and beat the ice from her stockings and
the inside of her collar and hood.  Yet somehow he didn't.  She was
resting easy, and for the first time that day the muscles in her face
were fully relaxed. Quietly he set about securing the camp for the
night.  The fire would warm her soon enough.

After a portion of the night had passed, he wrapped himself in the
second blanket and slept.

When he awoke Ash the next morning, she did not know who he was.  Her
eyes were as dull as gray clay.  Skin around her mouth was shedding, and
the yellowing of her flesh had spread to her tongue and gums.

Raiffelt the fear rise within him.  He shook her.

"Ash!"

Her eyes flickered at the sound other name.  Raif fought the desire to
shake her harder.  Instead he pulled her up by her shoulders and spoke
in a firm voice.

"You must ready yourself to leave now.  We have to make our way north,
to Mount Flood."

Lips shrunk by dehydration mouthed the word,

"Flood."

Raifs breath drained out of him.  She was standing, that would have to
be enough.  Holding on to her with one hand, he reached back until his
fingers found the warmth of the tin bowl that contained the snow melt

"Drink this."

She took the bowl from him and drank it dry.  Water spilled down her
chin, but she didn't seem to notice and made no effort to wipe it away
when she was done.

"Stay here while I roll the blankets and store my pack."  Raif guided
her back to the basalt boulder where she'd slept.  He could feel the
heat of her body through a double layer of wool.

"If you need to relieve yourself, do it here in the warmth .  .."  Heat
of a different kind burned his face.

"I won't look."

He did not know if she understood him.  Her eyes were focused somewhere
else.

When all was done and the fire was kicked cold, its remains buried
beneath the snow, he came for her again.  She was sitting with her chin
slumped against her chest.  Her hands were dropped against her thighs,
mitted fingers curled tight.  He took her arm.  "Ash.  We've got to go
now.  Remember?"

It was like leadinga ghost from the grave.

The day began like the last one had ended: with ice mist peeling off the
river and the hidden sun turning everything red.  The wind was sharp but
not unbearable, breaking up grease ice on the river's surface and
shifting drifts back and forth between the trees and raised ground.  The
air stank of snow. Raif kept an eye to the thick featureless clouds as
he traveled: This was no time for a storm.

Ash walked, in a manner.  She shivered uncontrollably, her body too weak
to counter the reflex action, yet somehow she retained the will to keep
moving. Raif wrapped an arm around her waist and took as much other
weight as he could, but it was her own determination that placed one
foot in front of the other and made her walk.

Raif wondered how much she was aware of.  He spoke to her, but she made
no reply.  He looked into her eyes, but the shadows he saw living there
soon made him look away.

Within an hour of breaking camp, they parted company with the river that
had led them this far.  The great channel of black water headed west
toward the sea, where choked ice in its channel formed a delta each
spring.  Raif was sorry to leave its banks, but his route took him
northward, and there was no time to spare on sentiment for the river
that was known throughout the clan holds as the Sum of All Streams.

Mist lifted over the course of the morning to reveal a landscape of
black basalt spires, sheared cliffs, valleys peeked with frost boils and
hummocks, flood ways blocked with ice rubble, and dead and calcified
pines sunk half into the ground like beached whales.  No blood woods
grew this far north, or if they did they were no longer recognizable as
the sure and towering trees that were more highly valued than livestock
in the clan holds The trees that did grow were beaten to their knees by
the wind, their trunks smooth as polished stone, their limbs webbed with
mistletoe, whose pale fruits shone like opals and were poisonous to man.

Hard granite mountains rode the east and northern horizons, and Raifs
gaze traveled from peak to peak, looking for the glacier- pressed form
of Mount Flood.  The wind stung tears from his eyes, and inside his
gloves his hands hurt like all the hells.  According to Angus and
Heritas Cant, the Hollow River lay at the base of Mount Flood, fed each
spring by a flow of snow and glacier melt so great that it broke
mountains.  Raif wasn't sure what state the river would be in now.

Rivers fed by a single source often froze or ran dry by midwinter, but
nothing was certain this far north.  Sudden changes in the weather, hot
springs, or swift currents could keep a river flowing through to spring.

Raif stripped off his gloves and massaged his hands.  The cold made his
eyes slow to change focus from the distant mountains to the nearness of
his fingers.  Weariness tugged him down.  If he could just rest for a
little while .  .  .  sleep .  .  .

He snapped back with a start, suddenly aware that Ash's weight was no
longer upon him.  She had slid to the ground and was now kneeling in the
snow.  Raif cursed his own weakness.  How could he have been stupid
enough to close his eyes for even a moment?  Anger made him rough with
himself, and he thrust his gloves over fingers that were shadowed yellow
and gray with early frostbite.

"Ash."  His throat was raw as he spoke her name.  Crouching, he touched
flesh as cold and rigid as tent hide pegged out in a storm.  A chill
took him, and he placed a hand upon the back other neck and drew her
head against his.  Her eyes were closed, and her throat muscles were
pumping, and he smelled the sorcery upon her like liquor.

The coolness of her skin was slowly replaced with something else.

Raif heard the murmur of voices.  Reach, mistressss, they whispered.  So
dark here, so cold.  Reach.

He could not help but pull back.  Clan had no word for the sound of
those voices.  They were the hissings of insane things.  What sort of
men where they, these creatures who lived in the Blind?  Heritas Cant
had spoken about shadows and other vague things, but it seemed to Raif
that he'd left too much unsaid.  Shadows could not hold a sword and kill
a man, yet why did he think these things could?

Raif let the thought go.  He could not think about that now.  Forcing
numb hands to grapple with his pack, he searched for something to use as
a gag. Wind howled, rushing under Ash's cloak and whipping it hard
against her back. Suddenly rocks and trees grew shadows, gliding across
the snow like living things.  Ash's lips parted, and the power massed
upon her tongue turned day into night.

No.  Raif moved so quickly he crashed into her, sending them both
falling back into the snow.  He had a whole blanket in his hand, and he
pushed what he could of it into her mouth, shoving the pool of blackness
back.  When he could no longer fit any more wool into her mouth, he
spread his weight full out upon her, pinning her arms and legs.

Raif did not know how long they lay there, their bodies forming a cross
in the snow.  He knew only that his breath slowed and his body cooled,
and when the first snowflakes fell upon his eyelids they roused him to a
world where day and night had merged into the grayness of a false dawn.
Ash's hood had slipped during the fall, and pale strands of hair blew
around her face.  Raif spoke her name, knowing that she would not
respond yet unable to stop himself.  He rolled off her, brushing ice
crystals from his shoulders and elbows.

Working cold cramps from his muscles, he fixed his pack to his back,
jammed his willow staff under his belt, and settled his dead man's cloak
in place. A lone wolf howled beyond the horizon.

When he was ready, Raif knelt in the snow and lifted Ash to his chest.
. then continued the journey north.

t t t Magdalena Crouch waited in shadows the color of slate.  Thurlo
Pike had told her to meet him inside the Ewe's Feet, not outside in the
storm-darkened street, but for reasons of her own she chose not to enter
the tavern at this time.  Besides, no one ever told the Crouching Maiden
what to do.

She knew him from his footsteps.  The man spent money on clothes, not
shoes, and the uneven tread of mismatched soles, poorly mended, gave him
away before he turned into the street.  The maiden was ready for him
with a soft word sure to please: "Thurlo."

All men liked the sound of their own names, but some especially so.

Thurlo Pike was one of the latter, and turned his head so quickly that
for a moment the pale skin around his neck was bared, ready to take a
knife.  The maiden smacked her lips so softly it sounded like a kiss.
She waited a moment, for she knew nothing interested a man more than
mystery, then stepped into the light.

"Over here."  A slim finger, closely sheathed in leather so highly
polished it looked wet, beckoned him forth.

Thurlo Pike, roofer, joiner, and rogue, recognized Maggy Sea, then
frowned.

"Get inside, Maggy.  It's cold enough to freeze arse hair."

Magdalena took a step forward, but only because she wanted to.  "I can't
go in there, Thurlo.  Gull would send me packing if I did.  You saw what
he's like."

Though in fact all Thurlo Pike had seen of Gull Moler was a man mildly
affronted when the good name of his tavern was brought into question, he
was quick to nod his head.  Men always made monsters of their enemies;
Magdalena knew that.  It was one of her tricks.  Thurlo snorted air.

"All right.  All right.  But you'd better make this quick.

If you had balls swinging beneath that skirt of yours, not fresh air,
you wouldn't be so quick to do business outside on a day like this.  "

The maiden smiled, but it did not reach her eyes.  As the roofer
approached she moved farther back into the dark space between buildings.
The walls of the Ewe's Feet were dry-laid flint, and it was a testament
to the man who'd built them that even without aid of mortar or sand he'd
managed to construct such flat, ice-resistant plains.  Magdalena Crouch
appreciated good workmanship, no

matter what the trade.  She continued edging back until Thurlo Pike's
beaver pelt mitts caught and held her arm.

"What you playingat?  I'm not going no further than this."

Magdalena Crouch had killed many times, but only once out of anger.

It was something she wished never to do again.  With a quick, almost
powerless movement, she moved her arm toward the roofer's chest, causing
his wrist to twist to such a degree that he was forced to let her go.
After he released her, she continued flaying her arms in panic, as if
unaware of what she had done.

"Very well," she said.

"Tell me your secrets here."

As she spoke, she glanced into the street.  All was quiet.  The hour of
gray light that occurred before a storm was in some ways better than
true darkness itself.  Smugglers, thieves, prostitutes, unfaithful
husbands, and procurers all came out at night.  No one ventured out in a
storm.

"Have you got the means?"

The maiden tapped a bulge in her loom-woven coat.

"Tell me what you've found out."

Thurlo Pike's eyes ranged from the bulge, to the storm clouds, to
Magdalena's face.  He was dressed in a brown wool coat edged with beaver
fur and fastened with pewter buckles.  Sweat and dirt had caused the for
around the collar to clump and shed, and it looked as if a mangy cat had
the roofer by the throat.

"There's four of them all right.  The mother.  A daughter about
sixteen--all plump and ready for splitting.

"Nother girl, young.  No tits.  Then the baby."

A single droplet of saliva wetted the dark desert of the maiden's mouth.

"Did you catch their names?"

"Real close, they were.  The mother bundled the children into a back
room the moment she saw me coming.

"Course you know what children are.  Specially young-uns.  The baby
starts crying for its mother, and the oldest daughter tries to hush it.
Then the middle daughter starts up.  Well, all the while I'm talking to
the mother about stone struts and what backing she'd prefer on the flue,
I'm listening to this wi' my second ear.  Then I hear the middle
daughter cry out as plain as day.  Calls her sister Cassy.  You're
hurting me, Gassy.  Let me go!"

Thurlo Pike wagged his head.

seen the mother's face.  Couldn't wait to be rid of me.  In her haste
she agreed to two layers of baked brick on the stack.  Two layers!

That'll cost her a master's penny.  " The roofer showed his teeth.  "
And who's to say what's beneath that first layer of brick.  "

The maiden whispered the word,

"Aye."  She disliked petty crimes and the people who committed them.
She was not the kind of woman who sought to justify her own actions. She
was an assassin, and she knew her place in hell was assured.  Yet she
also knew that there was more honesty to be found in killinga man
swiftly than in duping him and continuing to smile in his face.  The
world was full of Thurlo Pikes; Magdalena Crouch depended on it.  Their
greed made them easy to use.

She maintained eye contact with the roofer as she said,

"Where exactly does this farmhouse lie?"

Thurlo Pike rubbed his thumb against his mitted fingers.  "Means, Maggy.
Means."

She took out the dogs king bag containing salt she had ground to a
powder with her own hands.  Pullingapart the drawstring, she showed the
contents to the light.  Thurlo's hand came out to grab it, but the
maiden snatched it away.

"Where's the farm?"

Thurlo's hazel eyes darkened.

"How do I know it will do as you say?"

"How do I know you have told me the truth?"

Thurlo Pike had no answer to that.  With a dissatisfied shrug, he gave
the details of the farmhouse location.  Magdalena watched his eyes as he
spoke.

When he was done, she weighed the dogs king bag in her hand.  "Follow
me.  A deal is a deal."  Without waiting for his response she headed
down the alleyway to the back of the building.

"Hey!  Where d'you think you're off to?  Give me that now."  Thurlo
snatched at her arm but found himself grabbingair instead.

The maiden continued walking, increasing her pace from step to step.

This was the point where any other female assassin would use the promise
of sex.  A downcast glance, a lick of the lips, perhaps even a handful
of soft flesh pressed into a waiting hand.  Let's do it out of sight.
I'd be beaten if my father saw us.  Magdalena raked her tongue over
teeth that were perfectly dry.  Seduction was not her stock in trade.
She said,

"I have to show you how the drug works.  I need water for that."

This statement intrigued him; she could tell from the subtle change in
his breath.

"Wait here, then.  I'll get a pitcher from the Feet."

Magdalena shook her head.  She was free of the building now, in what had
once been the Ewe's Feet courtyard but was now no more than a paved
square with broken-down walls, littered with beer kegs, iron hoops,
chairs with missing legs, women's underthings, crates, and several dead
crows.  It stank of semen and sour ale.  Magdalena headed for a break in
the walls.

"Where you going?  There's no damn water out there."

"Yes there is.   In the pond, behind the basswoods."   "That piss hole
It'll be frozen hard as brass balls until spring."   "No it's not.   I
passed there along the way."   The maiden hiked over the rubble of stone
blocks that had once been the courtyard wall, forcing Thurlo to keep up
with her if he wanted his voice heard.

"Why'd you be passing there?"  Suspicion was clear in his voice.

"Children," she said.

"I heard one of them cryingas I crossed the road in front of the Feet.
I ran to the back, quick as I could.  They'd been playing on the pond
when the ice cracked.  One of them got a soaking,"

"Brats!"  Thurlo said with feeling.

The maiden was facingaway from him, striking out toward the stand of
stout-trunked basswoods that surrounded the pond, so he was unaware of
the shift in the color other eyes.  There were no children, and if he
had thought to look at the snow as he trod it, he would have seen that
no footprints led to or from the courtyard and the pond.

Magdalena had been at the pond an hour earlier, but she had come and
gone from a different route.  The ice pick and hammer she had used to
break the ice were two items she had no wish to be seen with.

It had not been a pleasant job, making the first crack in the ice.

She'd had to lie with her lower body on the bank and upper body

over the ice as she'd hammered down the pick until it hit water.  The
pond was small, and its water was frozen to the depth of half a foot.

Magdalena had blackened her knuckles in the process.  After the initial
crack had been made, she'd bellied her way back to the bank and worked
on the shore ice there.  By the time she'd finished, the armpits of her
good widow's dress had become a pulp of wool and sweat.  After throwing
the pick and hammer into the body of open water she had created, she'd
brushed the ice from her coat and hood and left the way she'd come.

Preparation was everything to the Crouching Maiden.

"You'd best not be playing games with me, Maggy Sea."

Magdalena looked back.  Thurlo Pike was crab-walking down the slope, his
arms held stubbornly at his sides.  He did not look happy.  To make him
feel better she feigned a stumble.

"Come on.  We're nearly there."

For good measure she tapped the dogs king bag.

He was out of breath and red-faced by the time he cleared the trees.

The maiden positioned herself on the bank of the pond, directly in front
of the break.  Water exposed to the air an hour earlier was already
quickening with ice.

The roofer wiped his nose on his sleeve

"Right.  Show me how it's done then, and let's get the piss out of here
before the storm hits and blows that skirt of yours up around your
neck."

From a pouch sewn inside her coat, Magdalena produced a soft leather
cup.  It did not hold water well, having being waxed in haste and tarred
only around the stitching, but that mattered little to the maiden.  She
bent over the water and scooped it full of the icy gray slush.  As she
stood she slipped two other items from her coat.  The first was the dogs
king bag.  With a gloved finger she agitated the cup water.

"See, you have to get the water moving before you add the powder.  And
it must be very cold.  Like this."  Magdalena did not look up as she
spoke, but every hair on her body was aware of the roofer drawing closer
to the bank.

"Now, you must add only enough powder to salt a roast.  Too much and the
women will sleep like dead dogs for days."

"Will it harm 'em?"

Magdalena almost smiled.

"No.  But there are degrees of sleep.

You want the entire family insensible, yes?  " Again, she did not need
to look at Thurlo Pike to feel the air he displaced with his nod.

"Then you have to be careful with the dosage, for what's enough to lay a
full-grown woman on her back might prove too much for a baby or a child.
You wouldn't want the two young girls to sleep too long past the waking
of their mother and elder sister."

Thurlo Pike grunted.  He was so close now Magdalena could smell the
excitement on his breath.

"I want 'em all asleep until I'm finished and gone."

"One cup of this in the well before they wake and draw water for the day
will be enough for that."  Magdalena added a pinch of salt to the cup.

"You should have at least three hours to do what you will.  A man could
uncover much hidden gold and precious stones in that time."

Thurlo shifted his weight.  When he spoke his voice was low and tight.

"Aye."

Magdalena's distaste for him deepened.  Profit was not his motive here.
He did not seek to drug the family in the woods to rob them, though he
wouldn't be above pokingaround teakettles and forcing locks when he was
done.  He had seen a household of women and girls and now had rape on
his mind.  She had read the desire in him three nights ago in Drover
Jack's, when he spoke with bright eyes and a mouth wetted by saliva and
ale.  All she had done was offer him the means: drugs to render the
family senseless in exchange for information.  Now the deal was nearly
done, and Magdalena Crouch was eager to be parted from this man.

She raised the cup.

"Taste it, so that you may know the strength of the drug."

Thurlo Pike thought himself no one's fool.

"You taste it first."

The maiden was more than happy to do so.  The taste of salt was not
unpleasant to her, but she still made a face.

"Here," she said, thrusting it toward him.

"I didn't promise it would taste like mother's milk."

Thurlo Pike took the last step he would ever take.  As he raised the cup
to his lips and sniffed, the Crouching Maiden warmed her knife.

It was over in less than a instant: a blade thrust through the rib cage,
lungs, and heart, in that order.  Magdalena preferred to do her killing
from behind.  The back bled so much less than the soft flesh of the
abdomen and chest.  The cup rolled into the water with a plop as a gust
of wind shook the basswoods and ruffled the roofer's collar.

Magdalena held the body upright until she felt the soft slump of
unsouled flesh, then yanked her knife free and let him go the way of the
cup.  The hole she had made in the ice fit him perfectly, and he slipped
through to the cold black waters below.  Within an hour the surface
would be completely refrozen, and an hour after that the storm would
dust it with snow.  Thurlo Pike wouldn't be found until spring.

Magdalena sincerely doubted he'd be missed.

Turning her back on the pond, she cleaned her knife, not with water or
snow, but with a soft rag moistened with tung oil.  She was particular
about such things, and although her knife was plainly wrought and of
little value, she had no wish to replace it.  Its steel carried the sum
of lives she had taken.

With a small movement she removed the blade from sight before her own
reflection had chance to settle there and catch her eye, then started up
the slope.  If she was lucky she would arrive at Drover Jack's one step
ahead of the storm.

t t t The wolves were drawn by the smell of sickness.  Raif heard them
call to each other, long notes that wailed in the darkness like the
calls of children lost, then dropped away with the wind.  Once, when he
had looked back, he had seen one--high upon the basalt ridge, its eyes
burning like blue fire.  An ice wolf.

They smelled Ash: the wrongness in her body, the blood that had rolled
from her nose to her mouth and had now dried to a black crust on her
lips.  She stank of weakness to them, like a lame elk, or an aging
moose, or a homed sheep riddled with lasp worms.  The smell meant easy
prey.  Raif tried not to think about it, tried to force every last bit
of his strength into carrying Ash across the barren, snow-dressed valley
he had entered.  But the howling of the wolves took something from him.
The creatures hunted, and as Raif stepped from a trench onto a shelf of
hard rock and saw a second pair of ice blue eyes watching from the
shadows, he knew they were sizing their prey.

There was nothing for Raif to do but continue walking.

"Wolves will not attack a full-grown man," Tern had said more times than
Raif had fingers to count.

"They know men from the scent they leave on carcasses and traps, and
wolves learn quickly to pair this scent with death."  Raif held on to
these words as he trekked through the falling snow.  Sometimes his lips
moved as his mind repeated them.

Ash lay motionless against his chest, her breathing so shallow that it
hardly seemed as if she were alive at all.  Raif watched her face.

Air continued to whiten as it left her mouth: That was what kept him
moving. He could not tell how many hours he had walked or what sights he
had seen since Ash fell unconscious.  He knew only that he couldn't
stop.  The cold was something he no longer gave mind to.  Within his
gloves his hands were numb, their circulation slowed by the weight of
Ash's body upon his arms and chest.  Another time it would have
mattered; he would have paused to wrap them in a second layer or tuck
them in the warm pockets of flesh beneath his arms.  Now he thought only
of walking until he could walk no more.

He had broken First Oath and failed his brother.  He would not break the
second and fail Ash.

Exhaustion was something he could not give in to.  He kept his spine
rigid as he walked, his mind farming the pain it caused, using it to
keep him awake. He could not feel his feet and could not recall the last
time he had been aware of the slow-working coldness of snow around his
boots.  His lips were dry to the point that to stretch them in a smile
would draw blood.  Good thing he had nothing to smile about.

Good thing too that he had passed no tree or rock formation tall enough
to supply south-facing shelter.  He did not know what he would do when
faced with the decision between continuing on and

halting for the long night of darkness to come.  Halting would help him,
but it would not help Ash.

Raif thrust the thought from him.  Glancing up, he saw snow clouds the
color of furnace metal.  Good.  There's still an hour of daylight left.

His mind was quick to allow the lie.

On he walked, forcing his body into the wind.  He stumbled often,
stepping into snowdrifts whose true depths were hidden by shadows or
uneven ground or placing his weight on a prostrate tree only to find its
dead bark turn beneath his feet.  Ice was a constant danger.  Clan had
no knowledge of this valley, and the thick snow cover made reading the
land for frozen streams, muskegs, and ponds near impossible.  Sometimes
Raif would spot a line of willows closely followinga depression in the
valley floor.  Stream, he said to himself with little satisfaction.
Knowing that was as good as knowing nothing at all.  Mostly he kept to
head ground: basalt plateaus, rocks, and moraines.  The many small
climbs were hard on his legs.

He had reached the midway point in the valley when he first heard the
sound of wolf paws breaking snow.  It was silvery dark now, with
midnight blue shadows crouching behind pines and on the east side of
rocks.  Snow continued to fall, but a drop in the wind slowed its
descent.  Already newly settled flakes were hardening to ice.  The wolf
cracked this frozen crust as it padded downwind of Raif.  Raif stiffened
for an instant, then continued walking.  The desire to increase his pace
ran like heat through his body, and it cost him dear to control it.  The
massacre on the Bluddroad had taught him all he needed to know about
predators and their prey.  Like men, wolves preferred their victims on
the run.

He could not resist glancing back.  Three pairs of ice blue eyes glowed
from the darkness behind him.  Two other shadows moved far to his flank:
long-legged, loping, their great shaggy necks thicker than their heads.
Aware the eyes of their prey were upon them, the pack hesitated, drawing
their forelegs beneath their bodies and lowering their heads.  They
wanted him to run.

Raif cracked his lips in a grim smile.  He was so far past running, he
doubted if he could manage to break into a trot if the devil himself
were at his heels.

Slowly he brought his head forward and continued on.  A crop of rocks,
blunt as cornerstones and half-sunk into the snow, broke the line of the
valley floor ahead.  The tallest was perhaps as high as Raifs chest.  It
would do.

The pack began to close distance.

Raif thought of nothing but reaching the rocks.  He was too exhausted to
feel fear.  His arms were numb to the elbows, and his thigh muscles
ached with the kind of pain that only sleep could cure.  As he neared
the rocks, he prepared himself to face the pack.  Slowly, over the
course of many steps, he turned a half circle in the snow so that his
back was against the rocks and his eyes met gazes with the pack.  The
wolves were close now, and Raif could see the black guard hairs that
ringed their eyes and their muzzles and the snow white fleece of their
throats.  The hackles on the first wolf rose as Raif looked at it, and
its ears dropped flat against its skull.  The second wolf bared yellow
teeth.  Another growled, a long, vibrating rumble that skimmed the snow.
All slowed .  .  waiting to see what the pack leader would do.

Keeping his gaze fixed upon Pack Leader, Raif dropped slowly to his
knees. The wolves were nervous, excited by the smell of blood and
weakness, but fearful of the creature who would turn and look them in
the eyes.  Raif suspected fear would hold them only so long.  Pack
Leader's belly was narrow beneath its coat of silver fur, its cheeks
sunk to the depth of its eyes. Watching it, Raif knew with cold
certainty that his father was wrong.  This one would attack a man.

The wind drove a flurry of snow into Raifs face as he lowered Ash's body
to the ground.  Her weight had been a part of him for so long it was as
if he were peelingaway his skin.  She sank motionless into the foot-deep
snow, her chest sinking to the lowest point.  Raif risked glancing down
to check that the bare skin of her nose and cheeks was not in contact
with snow or ice. The pain in his freed arms made his eyes tear as he
reached out to draw the hood around her face.

Pack Leader snarled, its blue eyes shrinking to slits.  Lowering its
neck, it pounced forward and snapped its jaws at the air.

Raif flinched.  The wolves saw it, and the air thickened with their
calls.

Rising, Raif reached back and pulled the willow staff from his belt.

His hands felt huge and numb, and the wood hardly registered in his
grip.  It nearly rolled from his glove as he stepped over Ash's body and
put himself between her and the pack.

The wolves were claiming space.  Teeth bared, they charged forward,
making swift imaginary strikes.  The two wolves bringing up the rear
were now only a short distance behind the lead three, and Raif saw dark
patches of matted hair, a white ridge of scar tissue on a foreleg, and a
torn and bloody snout.

Pack Leader ran at Raif.  It was all snout and teeth and maw.  Strings
of saliva shivered between its fangs as its eyes winked out to darkness.
Raif cursed the aching stiffness in his arms that made them move so
slowly.  He barely had time to draw the staff across his chest and no
moment to brace for a blow.  The heat of wolf breath pumped against his
throat as Pack Leader charged at his belly.  Raif wheeled back, trusting
in the strength of his legs more than his arms.  The wolfs teeth hit
wood and the shock of impact caused both predator and prey to jump back.

The two guard wolves moved forward as Pack Leader shook its great head
and edged back into the pack.

Raif barely had time to curse the dead flesh of his arms.  A second
animal came for him, launching its long gray snout at the un boned flesh
at Raifs waist.  Again Raif had no choice but to step back.  His
nostrils filled with the rangy aroma of wolf musk.  Gagging, he forced
his arms to raise the staff.  The clack of teeth meeting wood split the
night.

Angry at his own weakness, Raif forced the cold meat of his hands to
buttress the staff.  The second wolf retreated, and this time Raif made
a show of chasingafter it, sending every wolf except Pack Leader
scampering back.

Kill an army for me, Raif Sevrance.  Raifs jaw tightened.  What was one
wolf compared to that?

He made his stand twenty paces from the rocks.  Stripping off his
gloves, he bared hands mottled blue and yellow to the night.  Swiftly

he closed his fingers in a new arrangement around the butt of the staff.
All around him wolves' eyes burned with sliver blue light that looked
borrowed from the moon.  Raifhad mind for only one pair.  Pack Leader
stood at the head of the formation, its snout bunched, its lips pulled
back revealing the hard purple substance of its gums.

Raif dropped his gaze from its eyes to the muscled bow of its chest.

.  and within an instant sighted its heart.  Big as a man's, but beating
twice as quickly, it rested against the wolfs ribs: a fist of gristle
and meat.  Blood heat and blood stench mingled in RaiPs mouth, and he
had no way of knowing if they were his own or the wolfs.  Pack Leader's
heart was his, and it was all dancingafter that.

Snarling, the wolf hunkered for an attack.  Raif raised the butt of the
staff high above his head.  As the animal pounced he waited .  .

waited:.  .  until the darkness at the center of its open maw was all
that he could see.  And then thrust the staff down its throat.  Bone
crunched. Breath hissed like steam.  Blood shot from the cavity in a
fine mist that wetted the upside of Raif s face.  Down the staff went,
down the gullet to the heart.

The wolf hung there, its paws no longer touching earth, spitted upon a
branch of willow like a suckling pig ready for the hearth.  Raif watched
as the blue ice in its eyes melted and the curled bullwhip of its tail
fell flat. Watcher of the Dead.  Abruptly he threw the staff from him.

The wolfs body slumped into the snow, raisinga cloud of white ice.

Blood seeping from its mouth and the break in its chest fed the frost a
meal of scarlet.  The other dogs padded forward nervously, haunches low
to the ground, nostrils twitchingas they pulled knowledge from thin air.
Raif ran at them, roaring.

It was enough to scatter the pack.  One by one they turned and ran,
leaving their leader to the cold embrace of death.  None looked back.

Shivering, Raif turned.  His strength was gone.  He could not lift his
feet free of the snow and had to force his way through it to return to
Ash.  Wolf blood drying on his face tightened like a mask as he
approached her.

She was still, perfectly still.  Her hood was twisted back behind her
neck.  Dark liquid rolled from her nose, ears, and mouth.  Streams of
it.  And her head now rested in a pool of red ice.

Madness came swiftly to Raif.  Thought shedded from him like old skin.

Sense and understanding drained away as quickly as water down a slope,
and all that was left was Ash, the darkness, and the faces of nine gods.

She could not die.

He would not let her.

With hands long past feeling, he plucked Drey's tine from his belt.

The elk horn was as smooth as teeth, cold as the night itself.  The
silver cap popped softly as he flicked it free with his thumb.  A thin
stream of powder blew free with the wind, the color of ashes and stone.
Turning the tine on its side, Raif walked a circle in the snow.

Ganolith, Hammada, lone, Loss, Vthred, Oban, Larannyde, Malweg,
Behathmus, Raif so named the Stone Gods.  Powdered guide stone trailed
behind him like a plume of dark smoke, scatteringa line of charcoal upon
the ice.  The night deepened and hollowed like a pit, and Raif felt
himself falling, falling, falling .  .  .

Circle completed, he stepped inside it.  And howled like the wolf he had
just slain.

CHAPTER FIFTY.

Far Riders and Old Men al Naysayer and Ark Veinsplitter were riding in
silence through a valley of smooth snow when they heard the call of the
gods. The two warriors had known each other for so long that they had
little need for talk.  Ark could tell what the Naysayer was thinking
from the slightest shrinking of his pale ice eyes.  A moment before the
cry, Ark had considered calling a halt, but Mal's eyes had warned him
off.

They were over late as it was.

A dead raven had called them north.  Meeda Longwalker, heartbom daughter
of the Sull and mother of He Who Leads, had excavated the frozen carcass
from the snow.  By her reckoning it had been there eleven days .  .
which made Mal Naysayer and Ark Veinsplitter eleven days out of time.
Normally such considerations were nothing to Far Riders--they were Sull,
and all men waited upon them--but a summons from the Listener was
different.  It carried the compulsion of blood and gods shared.  Ice
Trappers were Old Blood, like the Sull.

Ark Veinsplitter barely had time to thrust his hands into the ashes of
the Heart Fire before the summons had come.  Blood from his horse was
still wet upon his letting knife, as He Who Leads had pointed his
opal-tipped arrow north.

"The Listener calls us north to speak of war and darkness.  Staunch the
wounds of your horses and ride forth.  You speak in my voice and act in
my image, and the sons and daughters of the Sull will fast from dawn to
moonrise to mark

the sacrifices you must make.  May you find a bright moon to guide you.
"

Mal Naysayer and Ark Veinsplitter had drunk their horses' blood and
left. Neither had kin to see them off, yet even so when they halted that
first night on high ground above the Heart Fires, they found freshly
fletched arrows in their cases of wolverine and bone, and new-roasted
caribou tongues in the packs that rode their horses' rumps.  Hungry as
they were, they honored the fast and did not eat until the blind eye of
the moon rose high above the trees.

They were Sull.  The blood of their horses was enough.

Winter was too deeply set to head north and ride through the Want.

The Want was a wasteland of frozen ground.  Its pocked and broken earth
bore the scars of ancient magic and ancient battles.  And even the
Sull's ancestral tellings of its terrain were sparsely worded in parts.
The Want was Sull land.  They had won and claimed it at the cost of a
whole generation of warrior sons and daughters, yet still it remained an
unknowable place. Things older than the Sull had lived there in the Time
Before.

Instead the Far Riders had headed west through the clan holds weavinga
path through the territories of twelve separate clans, seen by few save
old crags men drovers, and clanswomen tending their traps.  The Far
Riders skirted the margins, traveling in the mists created by open
waters, in the troughs left by dry streams, in the shadows raised by
tree lines, and over ice, frozen marshes, and wetlands that no clan
horse could dance.  The clan holds had once been Sullholds, and the
memories of the land still burned with cold fire in their blood.

The pass they had taken west through the Ranges was known to none save
the Sull.  The path slipped beneath the rock in places, and both Ark and
Mal had to un mount The tunnel walls had been chiseled smooth by Sull
hands, and ravens and the moon in all its phases were drawn there in
silver and midnight blue so dark it looked almost black.  The Far Riders
gave thanks to the stone cutters who had formed the tunnel and paid a
toll of hair and blood.

That was in the final hour of daylight last night.  This morning they
had awakened from their cold camp on the west face of the mountain and
made good pace to the Storm Margin below.  The thick snows that were
born in the Wrecking Sea and held within the margin by mountains that
would allow none but the highest clouds to pass did little to slow them
down. The blue and the gray were bred for white weather and their dams
had birthed them upon ice.  Even with a day of hard travel behind them,
the two stallions and the packhorse showed no sign of tiring, and their
heads were erect and alert.

Both stallions responded to the cold howl that seemed to crack the very
substance of time.  Ark's gray shook its head and fought the bit.

Mal's blue lowered its ears so they touched the back of its skull and
snorted a great cloud of air.  Ark spoke a word to calm his stallion.

All about, snow swirled in whirlwind forms, risingand flickering like
white flames.  The wind murmured softly through the lynx fur at Ark's
ears and throat, and for the first time since journey's start the Far
Rider felt fear.

He turned to face Mal.  The Naysayer was a large man, made huge by the
bulk of his furs.  His face was hardened by white- weather travel and
white-weather fights.  He could use more weapons than any other living
man, and his eyes were the color of ice.  He had needed no word to calm
his horse.

You speak in my voice and act in my image .  .  .  Ark Veinsplitter
counted those words through his head like prayer beads as he decided
what to say to his hass.  The howl of a creature who was not a wolf had
broken their journey, and every scar on his body where blood had been
let ached with the knowledge of God.

The Naysayer waited, his pale eyes blinking only when snowflakes touched
them.  He could be patient, this man whose anger when stirred was enough
to stampede caribou herds and send entire villages inside to lock their
doors.

Ark breathed deeply, then spoke.

"What think you, Mal Naysayer?

Should we continue our journey as if we have not heard the cry that
halted us, and ride north sure in the knowledge that what we do is right
in the eyes of moon and God?  "

Mal Naysayer made a move that caused his lynx furs to ripple, a move
that anyone else but Ark Veinsplitter might easily have mistaken for a
shrug.  He said just one word: "Nay."

It was enough to turn the two men west, and change the course of fate.

t t t Spynie Orri, the ancient chief of Clan Orri, faced the Dog Lord
over the chiefs table at Dhoone.  A storm pushed clouds and snow against
the Dhoonehouse's blue sandstone walls, but inside the chief's chamber
all was still.  The dogs were chained to their rat hooks by the hearth,
but harsh words from Vaylo Bludd moments earlier had forestalled the
normal hostilities they showed to uninvited guests.

The Dog Lord poured malt in silence, giving the amber-colored liquid the
respect it was due.  Two wood cups, plainly turned with neither handles
nor embellishment, were filled to the exact same mark.

Pushing the first in the Orri chiefs direction, Vaylo said, "What brings
a Blackhail-sworn chief to Dhoone this night?"

Spynie Orri made no response, save to retrieve his cup and drink.  He
was an old man, the oldest chief in the clan holds and his body was all
knots and bone.  A few white hairs clung to his scalp, but apart from
that he was bald in the way newborns were bald: eye browless pink, and
shiny.  His eyes were dark and shrunken, but they were still as sharp as
picks.  Placing his wooden cup on the table, he nodded toward it.

"Good malt.  I've tasted Bludd liquor before now, and no offense to your
malters and distillers, but this stuff must belong to the Dhoone."

"So you think ill of our Bludd's own brew?"

"Ill's not the word.  Let's just say I wouldn't feed it to my sheep."

Vaylo Bludd snorted with laughter, slapping his hand on the table and
stamping his booted feet.  At the hearth, his dogs tugged nervously on
their leashes.  They had not heard their master laugh in months, and the
sound disturbed them deeply.  Vaylo reached for Spynie's cup.

"Well, coming from an Orrlsman, I'll consider both

myself and my clan reprimanded.  Here.  Let's drink to brewers with
nimble fingers and distillers with surgeon's hands.  "

Spynie Orri was more than happy to drink to that.

When the second cup had been drunk and an agreeable silence had settled
between the two chiefs, Vaylo decided to try his hand again.

He had been too arrogant the first time; he saw that now.  This man
before him might be a chief from a lesser clan, but he had lorded that
clan for fifty years, and for that alone he demanded respect.

"I

hear there's trouble between you and Scarpe.  "

The Orri chief nodded absently, the gooseflesh on his neck continuing to
wobble after the movement stopped.

"Aye.  And trouble with Blackball as well."

The Dog Lord knew this, but he also knew it was better to let a man tell
his own story in his own words.  So he nodded and said nothing and let
the Orri chief speak.

"It's Mace Blackhail.  The Hail Wolf, they call him now.  Any other man
or woman in that clan would have been a better choice to lead it.  His
foster father was a good man.  I say that because I knew and respected
him, and named a grandson in his honor.  But Mace Blackhail shares
neither blood nor mettle with the man who fostered him from Scarpe.

Mace is a Scarpeman.  Yelma Scarpe is his mother's cousin.  He can't
help but favor her claims.  When she came to him asking for his help
against us, he should have done what Dagro always did.  Told the
sharp-toothed bitch he never so much as pissed between his war-sworn
clans.  " Spynie Orri wagged his ancient head.

"Of course, Dagro would have used words sweeter than those.  But then
sweet words didn't save him in the end."

He looked at the Dog Lord sharply, and Vaylo got the distinct feeling
that the old chief had long since guessed that Clan Bludd wasn't
responsible for Dagro Blackhail's death.  Vaylo was too much of an old
dog himself to allow his face to betray him, but his dogs picked up on
the change in his scent and growled accordingly at Spynie Orri.

The Orri chief tipped his head in their direction.

"Nice dogs.  When you're done with them send them to me.  I've got some
sheep I'd like to scare hairless.  Not to mention a few of my wife's
kin."

Before Vaylo had chance to react, Spynie leaned across the table and
said,

"Mace Blackhail has as good as declared war on our clan.  Twelve
Scarpemen were slain on our border, and it suited Yelma Scarpe to point
her finger our way.  She's always wanted that borderland.  My hunters
take down a hundred head of elk there each season.  It's good ranging
land, and Yelma Scarpe went running to Mace Blackhail to get it.  You
know how Scarpes are: She didn't want to fight.  There's more muscles in
their tongues than their guts.  We'll pardon you for the killing of our
men if you relinquish the land they died on."  Spynie Orrl's breath
exploded from his mouth.

"And Mace Blackhail thought this fair!  Take the land, he said, quick as
if it were his Stone God-given right to grant it.  I'll send a score of
ham mermen to keep the peace."

Vaylo frowned.  No Bludd, Dhoone, or Blackball chief had any business
intervening in conflicts between their war-sworn clans.

Spynie Orri continued, his head shaking softly as he spoke.

"I had no choice but to defend my borders against Scarpe- and Hailsmen.
Orri against Blackhail, I never thought to see it in my lifetime. Before
they rode north, I warned my ax men to slay only those men showing the
colors and badges of Scarpe.  But even then I knew I was givingan order
that could not be obeyed.  You cannot order men to cherry-pick their
foe."  He sighed heavily.

"Two Hailsmen were slain along with a score of Scarpemen.  All men of
mine who venture outside the Orrlhold now risk death.  I've lost two
border patrols, and a party I sent east to treat with the Crab chief."
There was a pause.

"And I'm waiting on the return of my firstborn grandson and the five men
who traveled west with him for the hunt."

The Dog Lord stood and turned his face toward his dogs.  He knew all
about grandchildren and their loss.  When he spoke he kept his voice
hard.

"Yet you torched the Scarpehouse."

"Aye.  And I'd torch it again if I could.  We are Orri, we hunt our
enemies and our game alike."

The Orri boast.  Vaylo had never thought much of it until now.  Bending
joints that creaked like old wood, Vaylo reached down to handle the dogs
he had left.  The wolf dog forced its large

streamlined head into his hand, demanding to be scratched and tussled
first. The burns on its ear and scalp were dry now, but the healed flesh
was hard and raised, and fur would never grow there again.  Not for the
first time, Vaylo found himself thinking back to that last night in
Ganmiddich.  If the dogs had not been shackled and housed, they would
have provided fair warning of the Blackhail attack.  As it was, Vaylo
had barely had time to assemble his men and raise an attack on Blackhail
lines.  Strom Carvo was dead, his skull smashed by a Blackhail hammer.
Molo Bean was dead, his arms hacked off at the elbows, his face burned
black by the flames that had rained from the sky.  Others were gone.
Good men, who all took pieces of the Dog Lord's heart to the Stone Halls
beyond.  Two of his dogs were burned beyond recognition.  One made it as
far as Withy before Vaylo broke its neck.

The sight of his two grandchildren, running toward him across the
courtyard at Dhoone, nearly made his hurts go away.  Cluff Dry- bannock
had taken them north two days ahead of the raid, and they and Nan were
safe.  Drybone didn't say it but both he and the Dog Lord knew that if
half the Bludd force hadn't been sent north from Ganmiddich to escort
the children home, Blackhail would have won nothing but death that day.

"You know the Hail Wolf refused to relinquish control of the Ganmiddich
roundhouse until the Crab forswore his oath to Dhoone, and gave word to
Blackhail instead?"  Spynie Orrl's dark eyes glinted like pieces of
coal. Could he read thoughts?  Vaylo wondered.

"I have heard that.

"Tis a bad business.  Canmiddich has been sworn to Dhoone for as long"
-- "As Orrl's been sworn to Blackhail," Spynie finished for him.  The
old clan chief met and held the Dog Lord's gaze.  Silence in the room
deepened and stretched, and Vaylo felt it press against each of his
seventeen teeth.

Why had he come here, this chief from an enemy clan?  Why had he risked
the lives of eleven of his best men by riding east through territory
that encompassed three separate warring clans?  And then there was the
greatest risk of all: presenting himself at the Dhoone border and
demandingan audience with the Dog Lord himself.  It took jaw to do that.
Vaylo almost smiled to think of it.  Spynie Orri was as tough as a
mountain goat.

"I haven't come here to offer my clan to Bludd," the Orri chief said,
once again snatching the thoughts straight from Vaylo's head.  "Only a
fool would do that.  I've got Blackhail-sworn clans on two sides, and
playing piggy-in-the-middle suits me about as much as a truss made of
ice.  No.  I'll keep my oath to Blackhail as best I can.  A thousand
years of loyalty should not be easily set aside."

The look in Spynie's eyes left no doubt as to what he thought of oath
breakers.  Suddenly angry, the Dog Lord said,

"Say what you came here for, Orri chief.  I will not be preached at.
The Stone Gods bred war into us, and I would not be a clansman if I did
not see an advantage and take it.  Battle is in my blood."

Spynie Orri was not ruffled in the slightest.  Before he spoke he winked
at the wolf dog.

"Aye, I don't deny it.  But I did stop to wonder what you saw when you
reached the top of the Ganmiddich Tower and turned your gaze north.
There have always been wars in the clan holds but can you honestly say
you have ever known or heard of one like this?  Bludd against Dhoone,
Blackhail against Bludd, war-sworn clans fightingamongst themselves. And
now that the Hail Wolf has forced a Dhoone-sworn clan to turn, Blackhail
will have to cross axes with Dhoone."  The ancient pink-skinned clan
chief clicked his tongue against the roof of his mouth.

"There are outside forces at work here, Bludd chief.  I know it.  You
know it.  And the question that now remains is, Are you content to let
it be?"

Vaylo Bliidd breathed deeply.  Knowing he needed a moment to think, he
fished in his belt pouch and pulled out a chunk of chewing curd, tough
and black as Nan could make it.  As he pushed it into his mouth, he was
aware of Spynie's eyes upon him.  Vaylo hated scrutiny.

"Why come to me with these words?  Why not search out the Dhoone chief
in exile, or the Hail Wolf himself?"

"You know why, Bludd chief.  We are the oldest chiefs in the clan holds
you and I.  Together we have close to ninety years of chiefdom between
us, and that cannot be lightly said.  We come from the two opposite ends
of the clan holds and today we meet here, in its heart.

"I know you're an ambitious man, and no one can fault you for that, but
I wonder if you sleep well at night.  You're cut from different timber
than the Hail Wolf.  Oh, I know you both fancy yourselves Lord of the
Clans, but you've led Bludd for thirty-five years and he's led Blackhail
for less than one.  His ambition is blind.  He has not learned what it
is to be a chief in the true sense of the word, to put his clan, not
himself, first.  You have. No one stays chief for as long as you have
without learning that sword strength alone is not enough."  Spynie Orri
paused for a long moment, and when he spoke again he sounded tired and
very old.

"The cities are planning to take the clan holds They're behind this war,
stirring the pot, keeping it on the boil until such a time that so many
of our clansmen are dead they can just hike straight over the Bitter
Hills and shatter our guide stones to dust.  We're waging the war
^orthem.  And unless we shake ourselves out of this senseless slaying,
we'll destroy ourselves for them, too."

Vaylo Bludd took breath to speak, but Spynie waved him to silence.  The
Orri chief wasn't done yet.

"And there's one last thing for you to think on, Bludd chief, you whose
clan boasts, We are Clan Bludd, chosen by the Stone Gods to guard their
borders. Death is our companion.  A hard life long lived is our reward.
The Sull are preparing for war."

The words hung in the air like dragon smoke, heavy and black and scented
with the fragrance of old myths.  When the Dog Lord breathed he took
them in. Deep inside his lungs they worked on him, stirring memories so
old he wondered if they belonged to his father, or the man who had
fathered him. Fear touched him like the swift nick of a knife.  No, he
told himself, quick to turn fear into anger.  Gullit Bludd passed no
memories to me.  He barely spoke five words to me in all the years 1
grew to manhood at his hearth.

"How do you know this to be so?"

"I'm an old man.  I do little these days but listen and watch."

It was no answer, but seeing the hardness in Spynie Orrl's eyes,

Vaylo knew it was the best he was going to get.

"Do they mean to make war on the cities or the clan holds

The Orri chief raised the ridges of pink skin where his eyebrows had
once grown.

"They're Sull.  Who's to say who or what they will fight?"

Again, fear pricked at Vaylo's neck.

"Are you playing games with me, old man?"

"Perhaps if you had wintered at your own roundhouse and not blue
Dhoone's, you might have seen the signs yourself."

Vaylo spat his wad of curd onto the floor.

"Damn you, Orri chief.

Speak plainly.  If you know more, say it!  "

"I know only that while the clans are busy butchering themselves, the
Sull are cleansingand fastingand growing their proud locks for war.

Five nights back one of my crags men saw two Far Riders passing west.

The week before that an Ille Glaive trader came and purchased all my
stocks of opal and jet.  Opal and jet.  Moon and night sky.  The Sull
use both in their bows.  " Spynie Orri let out a thin breath as he
waited for the Dog Lord to meet his eyes.  " Tell me, Bludd chief, have
you ever wondered what your clan boast means?  "

The question disturbed Vaylo deeply.  He said nothing rather than speak
a lie.

Spynie Orri watched the Dog Lord's face for a long moment, his eyes
pulling, pulling, at Vaylo's thoughts.  Abruptly he stood.

"It's time I started my journey back.  Send for my escort.  I trust you
didn't order their slaying.  It would be quite an inconvenience to me to
have to war against Bludd as well as Blackhail and Scarpe."

Vaylo did not take the bait.  Unease was too deep upon him.  "They have
been treated as guests.  Their weapons were ransomed but not removed
from their sight."

"Aye.  I thank you for that courtesy."  Spynie Orri reached the door.

Standing, the Dog Lord towered over him, a bear beside a goat.

"You must not let your hatred of the Hail Wolf poison you against
Blackhail. There are good people in that clan.  Raina Black- hail,
Corbie Meese, Ballic the Red, Drey Sevrance" -- The word Sevrance was
too much for Vaylo Bludd, and he shook his head until his braids whipped
against his face.

"Say no more, Orri chief.  You come close to crossing bounds."

Surprisingly, Spynie Orri nodded.

"Aye.  Perhaps I do, but you cannot blame a man for the actions of his
brother."

Vaylo growled.  The noise was so low and terrible, the dogs shrank back
in the hearth.

Spynie Orri shrugged.

"Think on what I have said, Bludd chief.  When an old man travels
through the darkness of four nights and three warring clans to see you,
you'd be a fool not to take note of what he said."  With that the old
man left.

It would be a full five days before Vaylo received word of his death.

t t t The Naysayer spotted the clansman first.  He was crouching in the
shelter of granite rocks, his back bent over a bundle of bloody rags.

Ark named him an Orrlsman, as he was wearing the snow-colored cloak of a
hunter from that clan.  Well before they reached him, the two Far Riders
unmounted and entered the ground he had claimed on foot.

Neither Mal nor Ark drew weapons.  They were Far Riders, and both knew
that while there was much to fear here, the clansman was unarmed and in
no state to fight.  Ark watched as the clansman became aware of them, as
his head rose and his eyes long focused and his expression shifted
between anger and fear.

Ark Veinsplitter, Son of the Sull and chosen Far Rider, was well used to
being the object of fear.  He had ridden these lands for twenty years,
fought battles with men and beasts, borne messages across frozen seas,
iron mountains, and desert floors baked as hard as glass: Fear was his
due.  What he didn't expect was his own fear, fluid as liquid mercury,
rising in the back of his throat.  The clansman's eyes pinned him with a
look he would remember for always.  And a question he would ask himself
for the rest of his life murmured in his ears like the wind: Have I done
the will of the gods?

The clansman stood to meet them, his cloak spreading in the

wind, his bare hands yellow and frozen.  Ark's whole being was so
completely focused upon him, he nearly missed the carcass embedded in
the snow.  A full-grown wolf, big as a black bear, with two feet of
willow jammed down its throat.

"Heart-killed," said the Naysayer, the words dropping like stones from
his mouth.

Ark closed his eyes and sent a prayer to the Sender of Storms.  When he
opened them he knew the world he lived in had changed.  A clansman had
heart-killed a wolf.

"Help her."  The clansman spoke Common with a clannish lilt.  As he
spoke he jerked his right hand in the direction of the bloody rags.

No greeting.  No questions.  No fear.

At Ark's side, Mal Naysayer reached for one of his wolverine-skin packs.
With a tiny jolt of realization, Ark understood that the clansman was
not alone and that the bloody bundle of rags he stood over was a person
.  a girl.  And Mal meant to tend her, because that was the nature of
Mal Naysayer.  He would not turn his back on a cry for help.

Ark almost cried for him to stop.  Too late he saw the pale circle of
powder in the snow, too late he realized that blood should be let and a
price paid now, not later, for entry into territory that had been marked
by clannish gods.  Transfixed, Ark Veinsplitter watched Mal Naysayer
break the circle and drop to his knees by the girl.  Already he had a
sable blanket bunched in his hands, ready to place under her.

There was nothing for Ark to do but raise the tents and build a fire.

CHAPTER FIFTY-ONE.

Snow Ghosts the stayed awake until her eyes were sore, but there was
still no sign of Drey.  Anwyn Bird had sworn he would return from
Ganmiddich today, but it was long past midnight now and the roundhouse
was dark and creaking, and Bitty Shank was drawing the iron bar across
the great door and securing the pull stone in place.

"Hey, little one.  You should go to bed.  The storm's slowed Drey down,
that's all.  He'll be here in the morning, I promise."  Bitty Shank tied
greased rope as thick as his wrist around the brass claws that were sunk
deep into the stonework on either side of the door.

"I

spoke to him myself only ten days ago.  Said as soon as the Crab chief
reclaims that tall green roundhouse of his, he'll be back to scrub your
face and pull your hair.  "

Despite herself, Effie smiled.  Bitty Shank was funny.  Like all the
Shanks, he had a shiny red face and pale hair.  And he loved Drey.  All
the Shanks loved Drey.

Done with sealing the great roundhouse door, Bitty turned to look at
Effie, who was sittingat the foot of the stairs.  Bitty was the second
youngest of the Shank boys, a year man of two winters who'd lost one ear
to a Bluddsman's sword and the tip of two fingers to the 'bite.  His
blond hair was already thinning, though he swore that since he'd lost
his ear it had started growing back of its own accord.

Effie didn't see it herself, but she never offered opinions unasked.

"So.  Would m'lady care for an escort to her chamber?"  Bitty flourished
his arm in the air and then bowed with exaggerated grace.

"Though I do say it myself, I have a sword forged for guarding maidens
and the kind of walk that scatters rats."

Erne giggled.  Part of her felt bad doing so, but Bitty was so very
funny, and she was wound up so tightly inside with worry and fear that
it sort of broke out on its own.  Like wind.  That thought made Effie
giggle even more. All the while Bitty stood by the door, smilingand then
laughing right back. It felt good to laugh.  It banished the blindness
for a while.

"Come on, little one.  I best get you off to bed 'fore you wake Anwyn
and get us both spoon-bled and kettle-whipped."

Effie didn't think such a thingas spoon-bleeding existed, and she knew
for a fact that no amount of laughing in the entrance hall would rouse
Anwyn, because the barrel-shaped matron slept in the game room at the
rear of the building, guarding her butchered meat.  Still, she stopped
laughingand rose to her feet.  Bitty Shank was a year man wounded in
battle, and he deserved her respect.

He put out his good hand for her to take, but Effie ignored it and took
his frostbitten one instead.  Effie Sevrance was not squeamish.

The two stubs, with their shiny pink flesh and smooth, nail less tips,
were things of wonder to her.  Bitty, first embarrassed and then pleased
with her interest, demonstrated his range of movements as he led her
downstairs.

"See," he said, pausinga third of the way down to waggle his fingers in
the light of a burning lunt.

"I can still hold a half sword and draw a full bow."

Effie nodded gravely: She was clan; she knew that no matter how casual
his voice sounded, nothing mattered more.

Bitty was one of a dozen year men and sworn clansmen who made it their
business to watch over Drey Sevrance's little sister while Drey was away
from home.  Effie knew what they were up to and guessed that Drey asked
everyone he rode with to keep an eye on her when he was gone.

Oh, they thought they were beingas clever as grown men could be, always
arranging to bump into her late at night when it was long past her
bedtime, or checking in on her when they thought she was asleep, or
sometimes even sleeping

right outside her door and claiming drunkenness had made them pass out
then and there.

The proud part of Erne knew she should resent it; she was nearly
grown-up now, a full eight years of age, and certainly didn't need any
old clansman watching over her.  But ever since she'd lost her lore,
only the sight of men such as Bitty, Corbie Meese, Rory Cleet, and
Bullhammer could make her feel safe inside.

She was blind without her lore.  Blind.

No one had seen it or knew where it was.  Anwyn Bird had ordered some of
the older children to search the roundhouse from wet cell to dovecote;
Raina Blackhail had addressed the clan and commanded the person who had
taken it to drop it outside her door, no questions asked.  Even Inigar
Stoop had fallen down on his hands and knees and raked through the ash,
rock dust, and gravel that had accumulated on the guide house floor.
Losing one's lore was bad luck of the worst kind.  Erne knew it.  Inigar
knew it, and that's why when the guide found nothing the first time he
searched, he went back and searched again.

Trouble was, she hadn't known how much she relied upon the little
ear-shaped chunk of granite until it was gone.  Always when she was
worried or afraid, she reached up and touched her lore.  It didn't
always show her things--not proper things, not things that she could
make sense of--but it always made her feel something.  In the past, when
Drey was late home from scouting or raids, all she had to do was take
her lore in her fist and think of him.  As long as it didn't push, it
meant he was safe.  Bad things only happened with her knowledge .  .  .
like Da, like Raina, like Cutty Moss.  Now bad things could happen and
she would know nothing at all.

Three loud thuds broke Erne's thoughts.

"Open up!  Open up!  Clansmen wounded!"  The call of returning war
parties.

Effie looked at Bitty, and before she knew it the blond-haired year man
had grabbed her by the waist and swung her over his back.  For the first
time in her life Effie saw the ceilingabove the staircase close up.
Green-and-black mildew grew there, in the fuzzy bits between stones.

"Drey and the Ganmiddich eleven are back!"

Bitty cried as he raced up the stairs, Effie bouncing like an animal
hide on his shoulders.

"They're back!  They're back!"

Effie wasn't sure what she felt about heights, but at that moment she
supposed she wouldn't have minded if the entire Shank family had stood
shoulder upon shoulder and balanced her right on top.  Drey was back.
Drey.

The hue and cry at the door roused the roundhouse, and all those clans
folk who had waited with Effie most of the night but given up and gone
to bed before her suddenly came rushing into the hall.  Effie hardly
spared a thought for the river of clansmen descending from the Great
Hearth, their leather-and-metal armor jouncing loose against their
chests, or the miraculous appearance of Anwyn Bird, who was suddenly
there at the top of the stairs, a tray of fried bread in her hands and a
barrel of hearth-warmed ale at her feet.

Effie's mind was on the door.  Bitty had set her down on two feet and
then appointed her the most important task of unraveling the cords of
rope that bound the bar securely in its iron cradle.  Effie's heart
swelled with pride as she worked.  She was helpinga year man open the
door.  Even when Orwin Shank, Bitty's father, came to help with the pull
stone Bitty made space for Effie's hand upon it, and together the three
of them dragged the quarter-ton weight of sandstone on its greased
tracks across the floor.

Then the bar was raised and the door swung open, revealing its waxed and
metal-studded exterior face to the hall, and there, standing in the
doorway like dark gods, bodies steaming, iron armor blue with frost,
mud-stained faces set into grim lines, were the first of the Ganmiddich
eleven.  They \vere the men who had held the Ganmiddich roundhouse while
Mace Blackball had ridden to treat with the Crab chief at Croser.  Now
the Crab was war-sworn to Blackhail and newly returned to his roundhouse
and Drey and the eleven were back.

Like everyone in the clan, Effie had heard the story of how Raif had
been taken at the tower, only to escape that same night by wounding Drey
so deeply with Drey's own sword that the bleeding persisted for two
days.  Effie didn't waste a single moment believing it.  She didn't need
her lore to tell her that Raif would never raise a hand against Drey.
Ever.

Corbie Meese was the first through the door.  Effie called to him,
"Where's Drey?"  but her voice was small and Corbie's eyes were on his
wife, Sarolyn, who was heavy with child and paler than either Anwyn or
Raina liked, and the great dent-headed ham merman pushed past Effie
without once glancing down. Mull Shank came next, and Effie meant to ask
her question to him, but Orwin Shank stepped right in front other,
sweeping his eldest son in a hug so brutal, it almost looked as if they
were fighting.

Effie stepped outside into the cold.  She spied Cleg Trotter, son of
crofter Paille Trotter, and headed toward him, clearing her throat.

Bodies smelling of horses, leather, and frost drove against her,
sweeping her sideways and then back.  She lost sight of Cleg Trotter,
and when she saw him again his father's arm was around his shoulder, and
the two great bear-size men were talking head-to- head.  There was no
room for an eight-year-old girl to come between them.

All around, clansmen and -women were pouring onto the court.  A light
snow was falling, and apart from the wedge of orange light spilling from
the doorway, it was as dark as a winter night could be.  Sounds of
laughter and private whisperings filled Effie's ears, promises of
lovemaking, special potions for easing chilblains, and favorite foods
steaming on the hearth.  To either side other, bodies came together
violently, mud and ice from boots and cloak tails dropping in heavy
clods to the earth.  Horses shook their heads and snorted streams of
white mist into the air.  Clansmen came from the stables to tend them,
and soon it was impossible to tell the Ganmiddich eleven from any of the
dozens of clansmen who had invaded the court.

"Drey?"  Effie asked time and time again.

"Drey?"  No one heard, or if they did hear, they soon forgot when a
loved one of their own came into sight.

Effie walked farther away from the roundhouse.  Ahead she spied a lone
clansmen tendinga horse.  He was tall enough for Drey .  it was so very
difficult to tell in the dark.  Shivering, she made her way toward him.
By the time she got close enough to see his face, she knew it wasn't
Drey.  He was dressed in the gray leathers and moose felt ofBannen, and
his braids were tied close to his head.

Shivering, Erne changed course.  He wasn't even a Hails- man.  He
wouldn't even know who Drey was.

Cold stole slowly over Erne's body, rising up from her feet like
tidewater. Crossing her hands over her rib cage, she looked out over the
graze.  Her heart moved in her chest.  There.  On the slope, a shadow
within the shadows, a man-size shape standing watch.  Drey.

She ran.  Icy air roared against her cheeks as she scrambled over ground
frozen to the hardness of stone.  Her breath came in shallow bursts, her
chest too tight to breathe deeply.  The figure waited.  It waited.  It
had to be Drey.

When she reached the bottom of the slope, the figure shuddered.

Suddenly she saw he was dressed in white.  She stopped.  "Drey?"  Even
to her own ears her voice sounded weak and uncertain.  In response, the
wind carried the smell of resin to her nostrils, and with a cold shock
she realized her mistake.  The figure wasn't a man at all.  It was a
snow ghost, a pine sapling completely encased within fallen snow.

Should have known, she told herself harshly.  Any fool knows the
difference between a snow ghost and a grown man.

The snow ghost swayed and creaked with the wind, its middle branches
beckoning obscenely.  Effie felt tiny pinches of fear tighten the skin
around her face.  Quickly she turned away .  .  .  and saw how far she
had come.

The roundhouse was a monstrous black dome against a charcoal sky.  The
square of orange light that marked the door was no bigger than a speck
in Erne's sights.  As she stood and watched, it slimmed to a hairline,
then disappeared completely.  Shut.  Erne's heartbeat increased.
Purposely she kept her gaze on the roundhouse, her eyes searching for
the stable block and more light. Only the stable doors faced toward the
roundhouse, not away from it, and all she saw was a pale corona of light
glowingaround the stable door.

Effie started toward it.  She tried not to look at the dark curves of
the roundhouse or the land that spread out in all directions around y<
it.  But it was hard.  There were no walls to block the view.

Shadows tr surrounded her, not small shadows, not people shadows, but
shadv ows of slopes and hills and great black bodies of trees.  And it
was lc cold, so cold.

11 "Ah!"  Effie sucked in breath as something whipped across her cheek.
She jumped out of its way, her eyes searching the darkness IT for
monsters.  In her mind she conjured up gray worms as big as a] men, with
teeth like glass spikes and limbs made of the same wet w substance as
eyes.  What she saw was a thin birch branch extending s( from the snow,
a flag of red felt flying from its tip.  It was one of w Longhead's
graze posts; once the snow reached a certain depth it u was his only way
of knowing where the graze ended and the court tr began.

Shaken, Effie quickened her pace.  tv She barely heard the first
footsteps. The thin film of light that h marked the stable was growing
dimmer, and all of Effie's attention K: was upon it.

They couldn't close the stable doors, too.  Not yet.  c^ Panic swirled
like thick fog in her head.  Could she make it before s( they locked the
doors if she ran?  What if she fell in the snow?  What r( if there were
things lying beneath the snow, tree root things that n curled around her
ankles and trapped her?  Her heart was beating so u fast that it was
many seconds before she realized that the soft t( crunching noise she
kept hearing in between her footsteps wasn't d the sound of her own
rushing blood.  s' Slowly the realization dawned on her.  Someone was
walking be- a hind her.  All the exposed skin on Effie's face cooled. It
wasn't Drey.  ^ He wouldn't do anything to scare her.  No.  It was a
monster, or a " cowl man or Mace Blackhail come to ... Crunch, crunch,
crunch.  The footsteps quickened. Effie looked s] ahead at the
roundhouse, but now the stable light had gone out and y she had nowhere
to head for.  With a little cry, she broke into a run.  s' Crunch,
crunch, crunch.  The footsteps were right at her back.  11 Effie
imagined a monster dressed in cowl man robes, with tree w roots for
fingers and Mace Blackhail's yellow eyes.

Faster, she ran.  t] Faster.  11 Snow was everywhere: in her hair, in
her dress, in her boots.  The monster's breath was hot on her scalp, his
footsteps close enough to be her own.  Effie was dizzy with fear, no
longer payingany attention to where she ran.  She heard the footsteps
change rhythm, and then a hand jerked viciously at her hair.  White pain
exploded in Effie's scalp.  Night turned to day and then back again as
she felt herself being dragged down into the snow.  Suddenly she didn't
know which way was up or down.  Her head hurt so.

"... teach you, little bitch.  Run crying to the roundhouse .  .  ."

It took Effie a moment to realize that the monster was talking.  .  in a
normal clansman's voice.  She twisted around and came face-to-face with
Cutty Moss.  No monster, just a clansman with one blue and one hazel
eye.

"Bitch."

Effie tried pullingaway from him, but he had wound a thick coil of her
hair once around his wrist and held the length tightly in his hand.
Feeling her resistance, he jerked her back.  The pain made white dots of
daytime dance before her eyes.

"Not got your little witch's stone this time, eh?"  Cutty Moss tapped
his throat.  Effie's vision was fuzzy, but she saw enough to realize
that the twine suspended there was the exact same reverse- twist cord
she had spun to hold her lore.  Cutty laughed softly, his mouth
splitting into two red strips.

"Didn't see that one coming, did yer?"

Effie didn't move.  Cutty's lips were wet with spittle, his eyes two
greasy stones that glittered on his face.  The ties that held his braids
had come undone, and his hair blew unchecked around his face in filthy
kinks.  Calmly he took out a knife.

"Reckon a cowl man going to get you.  Right here in the snow."  He
jabbed the snow with its tip.

Quick as a flash the blade was at Effie's throat.  Effie saw the trail
of blue light it carved in the air, felt air puff against her skin, then
something warm bit muscle in her neck.  No pain, just a pinprick, then
warm ness She jerked back, snapping her head away from the knife.  Cutty
swore. Pulling on her hair, he yanked her back down into the snow. Effie
smelled the sour sweetness of his breath and the urine and man-stench on
his clothes. Warm liquid trickled down her throat.  Frightened more by
the liquid and what it meant than y by Cutty Moss, she bucked and
struggled against the clansman, n kicking up clouds of snow.

^ "Sevrance witch."  Cutty Moss kept sticking her with his knife, 1( and
Effie felt the tip enter her cheek, her arm, her chest.

Hot blood n was everywhere, slidingacross her teeth and the whites of
her eyes.

Still she struggled.  She didn't want to think about what would hap- n
pen if she stopped.

a Cutty Moss shifted the grip on his knife so that he was holding it w
only with a finger and thumb, and then he slapped her face with s( what
was left of his hand.

"Bitch!"

At that moment Effie's feet found hard ground beneath the " snow.  Hands
slamming down on the packed white surface, she u vaulted into the air.
For one breathtaking moment she thought her hair was coming with her.
Cutty had been so focused on slapping h her that he had slackened his
hold on her locks.  EfFie felt her hair h unraveling from his wrist like
wool from a reel.  Then he yanked her K back.  This time Effie snapped
against him, throwing the entire c weight of her body in the opposite
direction.  The pain was like a s( thousand white-hot razors slicing her
scalp.  Her skin ripped, makn inga wet sucking sound like chicken skin
pulled from a bird.  She n lost vision, but not balance.  She lost all
sense of direction, but no u sense of purpose.

fa Blood running in a river down her scalp, she ran.  And ran.  And a
ran.

s' Cutty was only seconds behind her, but she was lighter in the a snow
than he and she was burning with animal fear.  She heard him I curse and
grab at her, but now she had an instinct for keeping to " deep snow
where she could run and he would sink.  It did not occur to her to
scream; screaming was not something Effie Sevrance did.  s!  She needed
all her breath to run and think.  y Twice she felt Cutty's hands
clutchingat her hair and dress, but s( both times she was merciless with
hair and fabric and helped him II tear both from her by pulling
violently away.  Her scalp was on fire, w raw flesh stinging in air cold
enough to freeze breath.  The hurts on ^ other parts of her body hardly
mattered; the blood seeping from the 1( cuts warmed her skin.

When she rounded the far corner of the stable block, she saw a figure
step out of the shadows.  Even before her eyes could focus properly, a
deeper part of her brain responded to the figure's shape the sunken
chest, the bony shoulders, the man-set jaw: Nellie Moss.  The luntwoman
ran toward her, calling words in some foul mother's tongue to her son.
Effie understood few words, but she felt the luntwoman's sense of rage
against a son who had failed to carry out his appointed task swiftly and
with little fuss.

Effie ran wide of Nellie Moss and her clutching tar-blackened fingers,
careful to keep to deep snow.  As she glanced ahead into the landscape
of shadows and open spaces, a shiver of recognition passed along her
spine.  She knew the profiles of those stone pines and the mound of
packed earth behind them.  She knew them, and suddenly the darkness made
sense.  Kicking her heels through the snow, she altered her course.  She
had a place to run to now.

Nellie Moss was lighter on her feet than her son, and Effie heard her
gaining.  A hand clutched at her collar, but Effie's hair and dress were
slick with blood, and it was easy to pull away from an unclosed grip.
Too tired to feel relief, she continued running.  Her legs were
weakening beneath her, and it was becoming difficult to think.  She was
so tired .  .  .  her eyelids were as heavy as stones.  .  .  she knew
she had to run .  .  but it was so very hard to think .  .

The howl and clamor of the shanks hounds cut through the haze of Effie's
thoughts like a light through a storm.  Shaking herself, she saw the
little dog cote straight ahead.  The shanks hounds knew she was coming.
They knew. And they were guiding her home.

Tears prickled Effie's eyes.  She heard the deep bass rumble of
Darknose, the excited howls of Cally and Teeth, the angry snarl of Cat,
the low roar of Old Scratch, and the bloodcurdling growl of Lady Bee
Lady Bee, who thought Effie was one other pups.

Behind her, Effie heard Nellie Moss and her son hesitate.  Their
footstep rhythm wavered.  Angry words were exchanged.  Nellie Moss
called her son foul names.  Effie tried not to hear them, but the wind
carried them straight to her ears.  They stung like the coldest air in
the middle of the night. Darknose began howling frantically, and
suddenly she couldn't hear mother and son y anymore.  Footsteps
quickened, and two sets of hands began grab" bing at her dress and hair.

V The shanks hounds shrieked and wailed like madmen trapped in " a
burning house.  The plank door of the little dog cote rattled and n
strained as the weight of six dogs came against it.  Tears and blood
rolled in pink streams down Effie's face as hands pulled her down n into
the snow.  She tasted ice as Nellie Moss began hauling her a back.  The
door was so close that she could see the grain of the m heartwood and
the orange rust on the latch.  If only she could get si her arm to work
properly ... if only it didn't hurt so. There was a hole at the top of
her shoulder, a dark red pit where Cutty Moss had tl stuck her with his
knife.

tl She threw the useless arm toward the door.  Pain made her teeth come
down upon her tongue.  Nellie Moss' hands were around her ^ waist,
pulling, pulling.  Effie's hand slid down the planks.

Her h fingers caught on the latch.  Cutty Moss gripped her thighs.

Effie k stiffened her fingers around the latch, and as the clansman
hauled c her body through the snow, the metal bar jumped its cradle.  s<
And the night of dogs began.

n Dark beasts exploded from the cote, sleek nightmare forms, all n snout
and teeth and neck.  Their growls shook the air like thunder, tt raising
hair on Effie's back and neck.  She heard terrible, terrible t( screams
and the word No stretched over seconds until it ceased haved ing meaning
and became the sound of pure terror instead.  A neck si snapped with the
wet crunch of a rotten log, fingers scratched at a: snow, something tore
with a twisting-wrenching kind of sound, and T then Effie knew no more.

lc Later, when it was over.  Corbie Meese and others found her lying in
the center of a killing ground of blood, bones, viscera, and s] human
hair, protected by a circle of dogs.  The dogs had licked her yi clean
of blood and were keeping her broken body warm by pressing s( their
bellies against it. Orwin Shank had to be roused from the fi Great
Hearth, for the dogs would release her to no one but him, v, and it
wasn't until many hours later that the first whisper of the tr word
witch was heard.

CHAPTER FIFTY-TWO.

The Sull Drink this, Orrlsman.  It will thicken your blood.  " Raif
heard the words, but he had just woken from a deep sleep and it took him
a moment to understand them.  The dark-haired warrior was cuppinga brass
bowl decorated with midnight blue enamel in his hands.  Raif could not
see what the contents were, only that they were hot enough to cause
steam to rise above the rim. Pink steam.  He shifted his position
beneath the wolfskin blanket, then tested moving his right hand.  Pain
made him bare his teeth.  The hand that emerged from the blanket was
thickly swaddled in some kind of birds king and greased with shale oil
scented with a sharp, smoky fragrance he could not name.  Underneath,
his fingers felt swollen and stiff, and he was suddenly glad he could
not see them.  Frostbite was seldom pretty to look at.

It took him a while to shift his sore and aching body into a sitting
position and even longer to align both hands in a position suitable for
holding the enamel bowl.  The Sull warrior waited in silence, his hard
ice-tanned face giving nothing away Raif kept his own face still when he
took the cup, though its weight and heat caused him pain.  In silence he
drank the red liquid, realizing as he did so that horse blood was the
main ingredient.  Its taste was not unpleasant, but it was strangely
spiced, and some of the blood had congealed in long strings that clung
to his tongue and teeth.  When he had finished, he placed the bowl into
the Sull warrior's waiting hands and gave his thanks.

The warrior bowed his head.  He had stripped off his outer u clothes and
was now dressed in fluid furs and soft midnight blue ' suedes inlaid
with horn sliced so thinly it rippled like dragon's 11 scales.  On first
glance Raif had thought his hair braided, but now " he saw that although
it was held in thick strands by a series of opal and white metal rings,
the hair itself was not woven in any way.  n Both men's features were
somehow different from clannish a features: their eye color more vivid,
their lips and brows more finely M shaped, and their cheekbones harder,
with more obvious bone s( mass beneath.

The tent they had erected was made of hides and caribou felt, 11 and it
was lined with a dark fishskin like substance that cut the wind " dead.
The floor was laid with an exquisitely woven carpet, showing the moon in
all its phases against a field of night blue silk.

A fire pit h formed the center of the tent, and although Raif had
memories of n seeing timber burned over the course of the past two
nights, chunks K of dark stone were now alight, burning with smokeless
amethyst c flames.  Ash lay on the opposite side of the tent, her body
entirely s* covered with white fox blankets, her face turned toward the
wall.  r< Her hair had been washed, and it now shone the exact same
color n of the white metal the Sull warriors hung in their hair and at
their d throats.

L( Raif made a small movement toward her.

"How is she?"

" The Sull warrior brought a hand to his chin, and as he did so the s'
sleeve of his lynx coat fell back, revealing dozens of bloodlettinga
scars on his forearm and wrist.  So they bleed themselves as well as I
their horses.  Raif wasn't sure if he was fascinated or disturbed.

" " The one who sleeps grows stronger, Orrlsman.  Today she woke and
drank broth and asked words about you.  " s!  Raif saw no reason to
correct the Sull warrior's assumption he y was an Orrlsman.

"When will she be able to get up?"  s( "You mean, when will she be able
to travel?"

r.

II Raif nodded.  The Sull warrior spoke Common with only the w faintest
hint of an accent to betray the fact that it was not his firstn spoken
language. The first night when they had ridden out of the lc darkness,
seeming to Raif's eyes to have stepped straight from a

legend of blood and war, they had spoken to each other in foreign
tongue. Raif had never encountered Sull before in his life, yet he knew
them for what they were the moment his eyes fell upon them.

Sull.  The warriors who rode the vast forests of the Boreal Sway, lived
in cities built from ice wood and cold hard milk stone and carried
arrowheads so fine and sharp they could penetrate a man's brain through
the orb of his eye. Their blades were a swordsman's dream, layered and
folded and pale as ghosts, wrought from metals that fell from the stars.
Clansmen whispered that their hard shimmering edges could take a man's
soul as well as his life.

"It would depend upon where she must travel and why."  The Sull warrior
did not blink as he spoke.  His letting scars glowed like broken veins
in the amethyst light.

Raif had not yet decided how much to tell the Sull.

"We travel north on a matter of urgency."

The Sull warrior nodded slowly, as if he had heard and understood a lot
more than the small thing Raif had said.  His sable- colored eyes
glanced to the tent slit.

"The Naysayer will have answers better than mine.  He has tended the
girl day and night.  Her life is now a weight upon his own."

A speck of fear rested in Raifs chest.

"What do you mean?"

"The Naysayer has spilt his own blood to save her."

"Why?"

"That is not my question to answer, Orrlsman."  The warrior's voice
tightened with something that might have been anger.  He stood, the horn
scales on his coat snapping like teeth.  Although he was neither large
nor tall like his companion, his presence filled the space of two men.

"Why did he let his blood?"  Raif persisted, unable to shake off his
unease.

The Sull warrior turned and looked at Raif as if he were some bit of
dirt he had scraped from under his boot.

"When we make sacrifice or pay toll, we settle in the highest currency
we have.  And nothing in this world of cold moons and sharp arrows comes
dearer than Sull blood."  Thrustingaside the tent slit, he stepped into
the darkness beyond.

Raif breathed deeply.  Beneath the bandages his hands felt like u raw
meat.  Pain had made him twist and sweat in his blankets for two ^
nights.  It was almost as if his flesh had been burned, not frozen.  In
his 11 dreams he envisaged tearing off the bandages and thrusting the n
scorched flesh in snow.  The worst time had been sunset on the sec and
night, when the Sull warrior called the Naysayer had stripped off n the
first set of bandages and cleaned the black flesh.  Bits of tissue had a
come away in his cloth.  Raif had looked down and not recognized M the
wet sticks of flesh as his fingers.  When he'd asked the Sull warrior s'
if he would lose any of them, the man had said simply,

"Nay."

He'd used the same word later, in the middle of the night, when t1 Ash
had cried out in her sleep.  Raif had watched as the great bear of u a
man had laid his hand on her head and said,

"Nay, silver-haired one.  No demons will reach you here."  ^ The care
the warrior had taken of Ash was beyond Raif's knowln edge as a
clansman.

The Naysayer had taken dried black root and K barberry leaves and made a
hot tea from them, which he woke Ash c every few hours to drink.  When
asked, he'd said that the tea would s( take the yellow poison from her
blood.  There had been tinctures r< made from the leafy twigs of
mistletoe and the golden resin of a tree n unknown to Raif.  Her body
had been cleaned and massaged with u fragrant oils, the chilblains on
her face washed with witch hazel, ^ and the cuts and frost sores dressed
with purified fox grease and nau tive moss.

s* Raif slept through much of what the Naysayer had done.  Exa haustion
made it impossible for him to stay awake for long periods 1 of time.  By
the time the two Sull warriors stepped into the circle he " had drawn in
the snow, it took everything he had to meet them standing.  Raif smiled
grimly at the memory.  He was paying the cost s!  of that clannish pride
now.

y It took him an unacceptable amount of time to struggle to his s( feet.
He could not use his bandaged hands to lever his weight, so his "legs
were forced to do all the work.  The more his muscles labored, w the
more determined he became to stand and walk.  The Sull wartr riors had
helped him and Ash, and he was grateful for that, but the lc thought of
being dependent upon them for one moment longer

than necessary stiffened his jaw.  They were Sull.  He was clan.  For
three thousand years they had shared borders, nothing else.

By the time he reached Ash, she was beginning to stir.  He called her
name softly, and it was enough to cause her eyes to open.

"Rail."

He sent thanks to the Stone Cods.  .  .  and the Sull gods, whose names
he did not know.

"Morning, sleepy."

She yawned a great big yawn, then smiled up at him apologetically.

"Sorry.  That's not very ladylike, is it?"

He didn't care.  Whatever the Naysayer had done, it had worked.  The
skin on her face was now pink and translucent, and no sign of jaundice
or swelling remained.  He risked kneeling so he could be nearer to her.

"How do you feel?"

"Sore.  Tired."  Her gaze had followed his hands as he knelt.  "What
happened?"

He shrugged.

"I killed a wolf barehanded."

She smiled nervously, unsure whether or not he was joking.

Switching the subject, he said,

"I need to ask the two Sull" -- "Sull?"

He nodded.

"The two men who found us in the valley and took us in are Sull."

Absently Ash touched the moss patch on her cheek.

"I didn't realize ... I just felt wwm hands touching me .  .  .  voices
asking me to drink."  Her gray eyes suddenly took on the amethyst light
from the fire.

"How long have I..."

"We're two days north of the pass.  On the morning of the second day you
lost consciousness and I carried you until it grew dark."

"Carried me."  Ash repeated the words in a small voice.

"What happened then?"

Raif looked down.  He hardly knew the answer to that himself and wasn't
sure he really wanted to know.  For the first time in days he felt for
his lore. It was tucked deep beneath his wool shirt, the twine that held
it half-rotted with sweat.  Abruptly he tucked it away.

As quickly as he could he told his story.

When he had finished.  Ash said,

"So you drew a guide circle and the two Sull warriors came?"

"The sound of the wolves may have drawn them."

"You don't believe that, do you?"

                                      tt

"I don't know what I believe anymore."  His voice was harder V than he
meant it to be.

ic Ash looked at him for a long moment before saying,

"How long n will it take us to reach Mount Flood?"

He was grateful to her for changing the subject.  He refused to n think
about what possible reasons the Stone Gods might have for a protecting
him.

"That's what I meant to ask you.  I may need to tell h the Sull warriors
where we're headed.  There's a mountain peak to s< the north of here, a
great blue thing choked with glaciers, and I'm pretty sure it's Mount
Flood.  But what I don't know is where the tl Hollow River lies in
relation to the base. We could lose a week just tl searching for running
water."

Ash thought for a while before answering.  Raif could hear the h rough
catch of her breath, and he reminded himself that she was h still very
weak. Finally she said,

"You trusted these men with both k our lives.  At any point over the
past two days they could have caused c us harm, but they didn't.  I
think they came because you summoned si them, and both you and they know
it, and somehow that binds n them to you."  Raif opened his mouth to
protest, but she headed n him off with a question.

"Do you think the Stone Gods brought tl them here merely to bandage our
wounds and send us on our way, to like surgeons on a battlefield?"

d Raif frowned.  By speaking so, she was brushing too close to issues si
no clansman would ever dare to question- Stone Gods were not like a the
One God who watched over the city holds They did not concern 1
themselves with the day-to-day lives of their followers.  And they an1;
swered no small prayers. Suddenly aware of the pain in his hands, he
said,

"I will tell them only of our destination.  Nothing more."

s; Ash nodded.

y Raif shifted his body toward the fire and set his mind on finding s'
warm food and liquid for her to take.

fi The lip of the fire pit was ringed with stone carvings that were v
meant to be held in the hand.  All were the color of the night sky or t
the moon. Objects carved from obsidian, opal, white mica, blue ii black
iron, and rock crystal shot with silver had all collected so

much heat from the fire that they were warm to the touch.  The carvings
were very old, and much of the detail had been lost, but their round
edges and heavy weight made them pleasing to hold.

Raifhad watched as the smaller of the two Sull warriors had placed one
carving in a copper bowl packed with snow, then set it aside until the
carving s heat had rendered liquid.  He had not drunk the snow melt Raif
recalled.  Instead he had used it to moisten a cloth that both he and
his companion had cleansed their hands with.

Raif returned the carvings to their place and reached down to take a
small copper kettle from the fire's edge.

"The man who cared for me," Ash said, "he reminded me of one of the
Bluddsmen."

"Cluff Drybannock."  Raif could not keep the hardness from his voice.

"He's a Trench-born bastard."

"So he's part Sull?"

Raif winced as his fingers dealt with the weight of the kettle.  "Yes.

Trenchlanders haven't called themselves Sull for centuries, but no
matter how many children they sire with clan and city men, the Sull
still protect them as their own.  "

"Why?"

"I'm not sure.  Trenchlanders trade with the clans and the Mountain
Cities. Sull don't; they trade only with Trenchlanders."

"So the Sull need the Trenchlanders for trade, and the Trench- landers
need the Sull for protection?"

Raif shrugged.

"Something like that."  As he spoke a giant pair of hands parted the
tent flap and the warrior named the Naysayer stepped into the tent in a
flurry of wind and snow.  The second warrior stepped after him, carrying
an iced-up chunk of meat in his fist.

While the Naysayer brushed ice from his hair and furs, the second
warrior dropped the meat at Raif's feet.

"I cut the heart from the beast, Clansman.  It is yours to eat."

Raif didn't have to look at it to know that it was Pack Leader's heart.
He shook his head.

"Clan do not eat wolf."

The two warriors exchanged glances.

"So you do not heart-kill for meat?"

Realizing the object of discussion was no longer the wolf, but the man
who had killed it, Raif said,

"I did what I had to, to protect Ash and myself.  If you want the
carcass, take it.  I have nothing else to offer you in payment."

The Sull warrior made no reply.  After a moment he said, I he Naysayer
believes you wear the cloak of a false clan.  He says you are a
Bailsman.  Is this true?  "

So they have found the silver cap from Drey's tine.  Aloud Raif said,

"I have no clan."

"Do you have no name also?"

"I am Raif Sevrance."  Watcher of the Dead.

The Sull warrior nodded slowly.

"I am Ark Veinsplitter, Son of the Sull and chosen Far Rider.  My hass
is Mal Naysayer, Son and Far Rider also."

The two warriors stood still, await inga response.  Raif hesitated,
unsure what to do.  It was Ash who broke the silence.

"I am Ash March, Foundling, born in the shadow ofVaingate.  I thank you,
Ark Veinsplitter and Mal Naysayer, for the gifts of care and shelter you
have given.  As Raif said, we have no gifts to repay you, but know this:
I shall carry the knowledge of Sull kindness with me always."

The expressions of the two Sull warriors did not alter as Ash spoke, but
something within their eyes changed.  The Naysayer was the first to come
forward and bow to her, the lynx fur at his throat still shedding snow.
Ark Veinsplitter watched his companion, the firelight casting fingers of
shadow on his face, then came and bowed no less deeply.

"You have spoken well, Ash March, Foundling.  May the moon always light
your way in darkness and your arrows always find the heart."

Food was cooked and eaten after that.  Ark Veinsplitter pulled a
partially butchered goat carcass in from the snow, while the Naysayer
fed dead wood to the fire to make it hot enough for cooking.  After he
had gutted the carcass and presented Ash with the raw liver to
strengthen her blood, Ark rubbed the meat with dark spices and sourwood
and set it to roast.  Within minutes the tent was filled with the fatty,
briny aroma of roasted goat.

"No wolf?"  Raif said when it was obvious that no other meat was to be
added to the fire.

Ark Veinsplitter cracked his first smile,

"Sull do not eat wolf, either.  If we want tough meat we eat our saddles
instead."  He reached down and picked up Pack Leader's heart.  The heat
in the tent had thawed it, and now Raif could clearly see where the
willow staff had split it in two.

"Of course, the Naysayer has been known to chew on their bones.  What
say you, hass?"

"Wolf bones!  Nay!  You speak with false memories, Veinsplitter.

Perhaps you have spilt too much blood today.  "

Laughing softly, Ark Veinsplitter slipped from the tent.  After a moment
Raif pulled on his cloak and followed him out.

The wind was shocking after the stillness of the tent.  Snow had stopped
falling, but dry powder blew close to the ground like shifting sand.
Beneath his bandages, Raif felt his hands burning as if they had been
doused in pure alcohol and set alight.  He watched as the Sull warrior
threw the wolf heart onto the ground and pushed it deep beneath the snow
with the sole of his boot.

"That mountain ahead, the dark wall on the horizon, is it Mount Flood?"

If the Sull warrior was surprised he was not alone, he did not show it.

"It is one name for it."  He did not turn around as he spoke.

"And do you know from which face the Hollow River flows?"

Ark Veinsplitter's body stiffened.

"I do."

Raif waited.  Minutes passed, and still he waited, and finally the Sull
warrior spoke.

"The Hollow River runs from the southwest face of Mount Flood.  It is
easily found by the dark mass of spruce that grow on its banks, and the
glacier tongue that points down from the mountain toward it."

"And caverns.  Do you know of any that lie close to the river?"

The Sull warrior breathed so softly his breath failed to whiten in the
air. Raif saw that he had pulled on no gloves, yet he held his hands
unclenched. Without a word he moved around the tent to a sheltered place
where the three Sull horses had been stabled beneath a canvas of caribou
hide stretched on poles.  All three horses wore lamb's-wool blankets,
and the metal on their bits and harnesses was wrapped with fleece.  They
were huge animals, with

deep chests, thick coats, and feathered skirts around each hoof.

Their intelligent, sculpted heads reminded Raif of Angus' bay.

Ark Veinsplitter rubbed the gray's nose.

"The caverns lie beneath the river, not beside it."

The blue sniffed Raif, looking for contact or treats.  With his hands
bandaged and aching, Raif could offer neither, yet for some reason the
horse chose to stay.

"I don't understand."

"Kith Masso.  The Hollow River.  The Sull named it so."

"Why?"

Finally Ark Veinsplitter turned and looked at him, his ice-tanned hands
on his horse's bridle.  Strangely, he was smiling.

"I had forgotten you were a clansman," he said.  There was no malice in
his words, just a deep and terrible sadness that made Raif afraid for
all of them: the Sull warriors, Ash, himself.

Looking into Ark Veinsplitter's night-dark eyes, Raif knew he had not
made a mistake by asking about the river and its caverns, but there was
something here that he did not understand.  When the Sull warrior spoke,
each word seemed to come at a cost.

"Kith Masso is fed by the snow and glacier melt of Mount Flood.

During the moons of spring it is a deep river, fast moving with water
the color of sapphires and the scent of wildflowers and iron ore.

Beneath later moons its waters slow and stiffen, and a great crust of
ice forms upon the surface, while the river runs silent beneath.  Then
the headwaters freeze.  There is no more snow or glacier melt, and the
fountainhead of the spring that births the river becomes blocked with
gravel and ice.  So the waters of Kith Masso drain.

"This happens to a handful of other rivers in the Storm Margin, but all
except Kith Masso are broad and shallow.  Their ice crusts collapse, and
their headwaters find ways round the ice.  Kith Masso is different.  It
runs deep and narrow through a canyon of its own making.  When its
waters drain, its ice crust stays in place."

"The Hollow River."  Raif could not keep the wonder from his voice.

"So we named it."  The Sull warrior sounded tired now.  The horn and
metal rings in his hair clicked softly in the wind.

"To reach the cavern you seek, you must break through the ice crust and

walk along the riverbed toward the mountain.  Soon you will come to a
tributary that feeds the river to the west.  Take it.  It is the only
entrance to the Cavern of Black Ice.  "

Ark Veinsplitter met eyes with RaifSevrance.  Snow whipped and swirled
between them like clouds of tiny insects, each one deliver inga sting of
pure frost.  Raif's heart was pounding in his chest.  He wanted to ask
the warrior how he had known their destination, but something warned him
the answer was best left unsaid.  Later.  There will be time for
questions later, when Ash has visited the cavern and everything is done.

"The cavern can only be reached in winter when the waters that flow
around it have drained.  You are fortunate to have come when you did,
Raif Sevrance of No Clan."  The tone of the warrior's voice didn't make
Raif feel fortunate at all.  Before he could speak.  Ark said, "Come. We
have stood too long under this cold, moonless sky.  My scars ache like
new wounds tonight."

Raif followed him into the tent.  Mal Naysayer was spreading fresh goose
grease on the snow burns on Ash's face.  The Sull warrior with eyes the
color of ice turned to look at his companion as he entered.

An unspoken communication passed between the two, and Mal Naysayer stood
and left Ash.  Unlike Ark Veinsplitter, who had laid his weapons in
arrangement around his sleeping mat, the Naysayer had a six-foot long
sword couched in a harness at his back.  Raif could not see the blade,
but the hilt was cast from white metal, and its two-handed grip was
wrapped with leather one shade lighter than black.  The pommel was
shaped like a raven's head.

Raif let his dead man's cloak slide to the floor.  It was the first time
he had seen a raven's likeness stamped on anything used by a man.  All
clans and cities had their badges, and many, like Croser and Spire
Vanis, chose birds of prey, but none had claimed a raven for their own.
Raif did not know what ravens meant in the Mountain Cities, but in the
clan holds they meant just one thing: death.  A ghost smile crossed
Raif's face.  Perhaps it wasn't such a bad thing to have on a sword
after all.

"RaifSevrance of No Clan, and Ash March, Foundling."

Raif looked up as Ark Veinsplitter addressed him.  The two Sull warriors
were standing behind the fire pit the light from the flames glancing off
the down-facing planes of their faces.  They had spoken briefly in their
own tongue, but Raifs thoughts had been on Mal Naysayer's weapon, and he
had paid scant attention to the rough catch of their voices. Now,
though, he saw that they had been discussing him and Ash, and they had
come to a decision on something.

Instinctively Raif crossed to Ash, and the two parties faced each other
across the smoke and flames of the fire pit

Ark Veinsplitter spoke.

"My hass and I have spoken of your journey.

Like us, you travel north, and like us also, your path leads beneath the
shadows of Mount Flood.  The Naysayer tells me that the new moon which
rides tomorrow brings storms.  He says that those burned once by the
frost will likely burn again.  And he ill likes the thought of the
Foundling treading snow.  To this end we offer to travel with you and
take our axes to Kith Masso's ice.  "

"Ash March shall have my mount for the journey," said the Naysayer in a
voice so deep it made the air in the tent vibrate.

"And Raif Sevrance shall have mine."

Raif looked from warrior to warrior, and finally to Ash.  In the bright
light of the wood fire her face looked paler and more drawn than before.
It was too much to ask that she walk tomorrow; he knew that.  But it
didn't stop him from wishing that she would turn their offer down.

"What say you, Raif?  You think me incapable of walking on my own two
feet?" Although Ash made both her eyes and her face strong as she spoke,
it wasn't nearly enough.

He loved that she had tried, though.  Crouching down, he felt for her
hand through the blanket.

"I know how capable you are of walking, but it would ease my mind if you
rode."  He waited until she nodded before giving his answer to the Sull.

"So it is settled."  Ark Veinsplitter's face was grim.

"What say you, Naysayer?  Is two days' hard travel enough to reach the
kith?"

"Nay," Mal Naysayer said.

"More like three."

CHAPTER FIFTY-THREE.

Marafice One Eye o the Halfman is gone?  "

"Yes, and God and the devil help him if he ever returns."

"Are you sure he murdered Hood?"

"Do not question me like one of your flunkies, Surlord.  I know what I
saw. Seven dead men cannot slit a live one's throat."

Penthero Iss studied the Protector General of the Rive Watch carefully
as they walked side by side in the black limestone vault below the Cask.
Something would have to be done about his eye.  He had been back only
one full day, yet already the whispers had started.

Marafice One Eye, they called him now.  It was not a sight to warm a
mother's heart; the spur he had fallen on had punctured his left eyeball
and raised great welts of flesh in a sunburst around the socket.  Little
doctoring had been done, and Iss suspected that the Knife had simply
plucked out the deflated eyeball, pressed his fist into the cavity to
staunch the bleeding, doused the entire thing with alcohol, and then got
thoroughly and disgustingly drunk.  Iss smiled faintly as he stepped
into shadow.  This would certainly add to the Knife's reputation.  The
Protector General of the Rive Watch might become a legend yet.

Marafice Eye had returned from Ganmiddich alone, tell inga tale of how
Asarhia had blasted his sept with sorcery in the slate fields below
Ganmiddich Pass.  All the sept had died, their spines snapped like
sticks, their ribs smashed to pieces and driven like nails into their
hearts.  Marafice Eye claimed that although he was flung with equal
force to the others, the soft body of one of his brothers-in-the-watch
broke his fall.  Regrettably, that brother's boots had been kit ted with
steel spurs.

"I will not be sent on any more of your petty errands, Surlord.  If you
want that cursed daughter of yours brought back find another fool to do
it."

Penthero Iss nodded.  It was obvious now that no one could get near
Asarhia until she reached.  Better to wait until it was done and collect
her then. Besides, he needed his Knife here, with him.

"You know the Master of Ille Glaive has doubled the number of his Tear
Guard, and has turned no Forsworn from his gates all winter?"

The Knife grunted.

"He swells his numbers, as all the Mountain Cities do.  The clan holds
at war is a tempting target to one and all."

"No doubt.  But if anyone is going to make first claim upon the southern
clans, it will be the armies and grange lords of Spire Vanis.

Not the Master of the City on the Lake.  "

"There is good land beyond the Bitter Hills.  Swift rivers.  Fine
grazing. Roundhouses with proper battlements and defenses, not like
those stone turds they build up north."

So the Knife had liked what he had seen of Ganmiddich.  Perhaps the
journey north hadn't been an utter failure after all.  Penthero Iss came
to a halt by a limestone column carved with the image of a three-headed
warhorse impaled upon a spire and turned to look the Knife in his one
remaining eye.

"A dozen grange lords are massing armies as we speak.  Lord of the Straw
Granges, Lord of Almsgate, and the Lady of the East Granges and her son
the White- hog are just a few who have been calling their hide clads to
arms. They see the time coming when they will ride north and claim
portions of the clan holds for themselves."

"Lord of the Straw Granges!  That fool couldn't piss out of his own bed,
let alone lead an army north."  Marafice Eye punched the column with the
heel of his hand.

"And as for that tub of lard Ballon Troak, who now styles himself Lord
of Almsgate .  .  ."  Words failed the Knife, and he punched the column
again.

"I'd sooner follow the bitch of the East Granges into battle.  At least
she knows how to ride a man then leave him for dead."

Penthero Iss smiled thinly.  Marafice Eye's assessment of the three
grange lords might be crude, but it was entirely true.  He was clever in
low ways, the Knife.  It was easy to forget that.

"Whatever their faults may be, meekness isn't one of them.  They want
land. All the grange lords do.  They have sons and fosterlings and
bastards and nephews, and the city hold of Spire Vanis is hemmed in by
mountains and barren rocks.  North is the only way to expand.  North,
into those fat border clans."

Aware that his voice was growing louder, Iss worked to control it.  The
thick walls of the Blackvault created echoes, and broken bits of his own
words floated back.

"The world is about to change, Knife.  Land will be won and lost.  A
thousand years ago Haldor Hews rode out with a war host and claimed the
ranging ground south of the Spill and all land west of the Skagway.  A
thousand years before that Theron Pengaron marched north across the
Ranges and founded the city where we stand today.  Now another thousand
years have passed, and it's time to take more.  War is coming, make no
mistake about it.  Houses and reputations will be made.  Men will be
made.  Fortunes will be brought home and divided amongst brothers and
kin.  And the only question that really matters is, Will Spire Vanis
move first to claim her portion, or will we wait until it's too late and
let the Glaive, the Star, and the Vor take it all?"

Iss met eyes with Marafice Eye.

"What say you.  Knife?  It's been a hundred years since an army rode
forth from Spire Vanis.  The grange lords will raise their own forces
and carry their own banners, but one man alone must lead them."  He
stopped there, knowing he had said enough.  It was always better to
leave a man enough room to reason things out on his own.

Marafice Eye's face was hideous in the candlelight.  His missing eye
needed stitching, and weeks of white-weather travel had turned his skin
to hide. Earlier Iss had detected a limp, and even now, as the Knife
stood silent and still, he clearly favored his right leg.  When he spoke
his voice was harsh.

"So you would give me an army, Surlord?  Send me to wet-nurse the grange
lords and their armies and claim land in the names of their soft-arsed
sons?"

Iss shook his head.

"You will ride at the head of all armies.  First claims and first
plunder will be yours."

"Not enough, Surlord.  If I wanted land, don't you think I would have
armed myself and taken some by now?"

"But what of your brothers-in-the-watch?  Would they turn such an offer
down? Clan land and clan plunder would mean riches to them."

That made him think.  It wasn't as easy to turn down wealth for his
sworn brothers as it was for himself.  The Knife was deeply loyal to his
men.  Just this morning, the first thing he had done upon entering the
fortress was walk to the Red Forge and tell his brother sing-the-watch
how he had lost eight of their men.  Fool that he was, he had brought
back all the dead men's weapons, and they had fired up the forge then
and there.  The mercury-treated metal was cooling even as they spoke.
New swords had been cast.  The retiring deepened the red taint and set
the memories of brothers lost in steel.  It was the closest the Rive
Watch came to belief.

"Ganmiddich is fine land," Iss murmured, echoing the Knife's own words.

"They say in spring the hunting is so good that a man just has to ride
with his spear sticking out, and elk and deer simply run themselves upon
the tip."

Marafice Eye snorted.  Still, Iss could see the gleam of interest in his
one blue eye.

"Who would watch the city if the Rive Watch rode to war?"

Careful now, Iss reminded himself.

"He who leads an army must also raise one.  Almstown must be smashed.
Able bodies must be recruited and trained.  Every man in this city who
can fight must be made to do so.

The grange lords can do only so much.  They are known and feared only in
their granges.  You, Knife, are known from Wrathgate to Vaingate and the
grange holds beyond.  You could raise an army and a safekeeping force
single-handed.  "

"The Rive Watch has defended the city and the surlord for twelve hundred
years."

"The Rive Watch was birthed in war.  Thomas Mar forged the first red
swords with the blood of his brothers-in-arms.  When he and his last
twelve men took them up, they wrested the northern passage from Ille
Glaive."

Marafice Eye could not deny it.  Nor could he deny that it was the Rive
Watch who smashed the city of High Rood, slaying the settlers and masons
who had come from the Soft Lands to build a rival to Spire Vanis one
hundred leagues to the east.  The Rive Watch rode forth when it suited
them; both Iss and the Knife knew it.  And the only question that now
remained was.  Would they ride forth with Marafice Eye come spring?

Iss needed them.  The grange lords and their hide clads were not enough
to take on the clans.  Oh, they thought they were, with their swords of
patterned steel and their horses bred as tough and ugly as moose stags,
but the Surlord knew differently.  Without a hard man behind them, they
would crumble as easily as oatcakes in the hands of a child.

"What say you, Knife?  Will you lead the army north to crush the clans?"

"My men will be given first claim on all land?"

"And titles of grange lords as soon as roofs are raised over land held
in their names."

The Knife stroked the dagger at his belt, his small lips pressed so
tightly together that it hardly looked as if he had a mouth at all.

"There is risk here, Surlord."

"Name what else you would have."

"Your tide when you're dead and gone."

If the branch of candles lighting the Blackvault had been nearer to the
two men, the Knife would have seen Iss' pupils shrink to specks.

Always there was someone who wanted his place.  It wasn't enough to be
surlord, not when any man with land and power could arm himself and
unman you.  Here, in this very chamber, Connad Hews had been held
captive for thirty days of his hundred- day rule.  His brother Rannock
had stormed the fortress to free him, but he'd come seven hours too
late.  Trant Gryphon had already put a broad blade through his heart.

Hews of the Hundred Days they called him now.  And Penthero Iss could
name a dozen other sur- lords who had ruled less than a year.

It was a thought that brought him no peace.  Quietly he said, "No
surlord can name his own successor; you know that as well as any man.

I had to seize power from Borhis Horgo.  If you want power, you must
seize it yourself.  "

"Don't think I haven't thought about it, Surlord."  Marafice Eye was
suddenly close, his dead socket inches from Iss' face.

"I have lost three septs to your daughter.  Three septs.  One eye.  And
the skin off my ankle and foot.  There's witchery here, and there's more
to come--I can smell it like a dog on a bitch.  I know you, Penthero
Iss, and I know you're clever enough to take the clan holds with or
without me, but I also know your interest doesn't end with the clans.
You have those pale, drowned-man's hands of yours in meals bloodier than
clan meat And I don't want to find myself in a position where me and my
men are sent forth to battle only to be abandoned when a brighter prize
catches your eye."

He was so close to the truth, Iss wondered if losing an eye hadn't
endowed him with second sight.  Clanholds first, Sull second: That had
always been the plan.  Strike hard while their attention was diverted.

Strike hard, claim land for Spire Vanis .  .  .  and a crown for
himself. Surlord wasn't enough.  He hadn't come this far, pulled himself
up from farmer's son to ruler, spent ten years as a grange lord
fosterling, put to work as a retainer rather than the kin that he was,
then another twelve years in the Watch, working his way up, always up,
until Borhis Horgo named him Protector General and made him his right
hand, to have it all taken away from him by some usurper with a blade.
He had worked too hard and planned too long for that.

Keeping his face still, he said,

"You are crucial to me in all things.  Knife.  As I rise so do you."

"Name me as your successor."

"If I did it would mean nothing.  A surlord must have the support of the
Rive Watch and the grange lords If I named you as my successor, the
grange lords would laugh at both of us.

"Who do Iss and the Knife think they are," they would say, 'the Spire
Kingand his son?  "" "They say the Lord of Trance Vor has taken to
calling himself the Vor King."

"Yes, and they also say his brain is addled with ivysh and he takes
pleasure in little boys."

Marafice Eye sneered.

"I want to be named, Surlord.  It's my business if the grange lords
laugh or plot death behind my back.  Today they think of me only as your
creature, your Knife.  Name me as your successor, and before this war is
over I'll make them think again."

Iss stepped back from Marafice Eye.  He reeked of meat and horses, and
he suddenly seemed dangerous in the way that wounded animals were.

The journey home had taken eleven days.  Eleven days alone with a blind
and stinking eye and the memory of eight men's deaths.  Iss shivered. He
did not like this new and subtle Knife.  What he proposed was unheard
of--a surlord naming his own successor--but Iss could understand the
Knife's motives and even recognize the sense behind them.

Marafice Eye was nothing to the grange lords a cutthroat with a
red-tainted sword.  He was not born to land as they were; he was a hog
butcher's son who spoke with the words and accent of Hoargate.  While
grange lords sons were learning swordplay in their wind-sheltered
courtyards, Marafice Eye was learning to cut the hands off anyone who
stole sausages or pork belly from the front of his father's shop.  He
had joined the Rive Watch when he was fourteen, after his father began
to suspect that not all the thieves his son maimed had actually thieved.
Marafice Eye would have their hands for just a look.

As far as Iss knew, the Knife had spent his first three years in the
Watch being bullied in the usual brutal way.  Perhaps it had done him
some good: Iss did not know.  What he did know was that by the time the
Knife turned seventeen he had won himself the right to wear the
red-tainted sword. Marafice Eye, a hog butcher's son from Hoargate,
wearing the red alongside grange lords bastards and third sons.

Iss had always assumed that the Knife had joined the Rive Watch thinking
he would become one of the Lower Watch: those men who were bound without
oaths and could not wear the red and patrolled only those parts of the
city where no one but the poor and starving lived.  Now Iss found
himself wondering if ambition hadn't been within the Knife from the
start.

As Protector General he had risen as high any baseborn man could.

Now, by publicly declaring his intent to become surlord, he sought to
take the final step.  Oh, he knew the grange lords would be
incensed--they'd shake their well-manicured fists and swear they'd never
accept a commoner as a surlord--but that wasn't really the point. Slowly
he was going to get them accustomed to the idea.  In five years' time
what had once seemed so outrageous would have mellowed to plain fact: So
Marafice Eye wants to become sur- lord .  .

well, even Iss himself thinks him fit for it.

Iss breathed thinly.  There was gain here, but danger also.  Your title
when you're dead and gone, the Knife had said.  Yet would he be content
to wait that long?  It was easy to imagine him seizing control of Mask
Fortress, sealing the Cask, and taking his surlord's life.  The Rive
Watch was his and his alone; if he commanded them to march through the
Want in midwinter, they would do it.  And yet.  .  .  The Knife was no
fool.  He needed legitimacy, and he would not get that by murdering his
surlord.  He needed time to remake himself as grange lord and warlord,
and leading Spire Vanis to victory against the clans would be half of
it.  Iss' resolve stiffened.  Far better to have Marafice Eye close, let
him have a vested interest in this war--he would fight better and longer
for it--and later, when it was over and done . .  .  well, who could say
what might become of a general on his long march home?  The Northern
Territories were about to become an extremely dangerous place.

Comforted by that thought, Iss said,

"You do know you will have to acquire yourself a grangedom by fair means
or foul?"

The Knife shrugged.

"There's a lot of ugly grange lords daughters out there."  His mouth was
too narrow for grinning, but he managed a fair semblance of a leer.

"Or mayhap I'll find some old fart willing to foster me, just as you did
when you first came to the Vanis.  I heard tell that the land you were
born to was some sodden piece of farmland on the poor side of the Vor,
not some fine castle held estate."

Iss ignored the gibe.  Land was land, and his father may have been a
farmer, but his great-grandfather had been born Lord of the Sundered
Granges.  There was a world of difference between Marafice Eye and
himself, and if the Knife didn't know that, then he was a fool.  No
common born man had ever ruled Spire Vanis.  Never had.  Never would.

Stepping toward the candle branch, Iss turned so the light limned his
shoulders and shone through his fingertips and hair.  "Tomorrow I will
begin spreading the word that I see you as my natural successor.  My
word alone cannot make a surlord of you, but I will do what I can to
change minds.  In return you win form an army for me and lead the Rive
Watch and the grange lords north."

Marafice Eye nodded.  '"Tis agreed."

Iss looked at the Knife's ruined face and trembled at what he had done.

t t t The Crouching Maiden crouched in the shadows at the rear of the
house. It was a pleasant building, its faded yellow stonework glowing
warmly in the noonday sun.  The wind-damaged chimney stack leaked smoke
near the base, and all the surrounding roof snow had turned black with
soot and ash.

The door and windows were especially interesting to the maiden, for
while first glance showed the usual oak and basswood frames and rusted
iron latches, second and third glances revealed other details to the
eye.  The windows were equipped with two sets of shutters, and although
the inner ones had been painted in the same dark color as pitch-soaked
wood and certainly looked like wood from a distance, they had the smooth
texture of cast iron. Similarly, the door itself was a great hunk of
weathered and peeling oak that apparently hung on two horse-head hinges
that were crusted with black rot. Magdalena had been studying the door
for quite a while and had come to admire the subtle untruth of the
thing.  It would take more than two rusted pot-iron hinges to support a
block of oak a foot thick.

The thickness of the door was not in question.  An hour earlier a young
girl with fair hair had stepped from it, revealing the true width of the
wood. The girl, whom Magdalena thought to be about seven winters old,
had moved no farther than the front step.

"It's freezing," she had called to someone inside, "but the sun's
shining as if it were spring."  A woman's voice had replied, telling her
to shut and bar the door before all the heat fell out.

Magdalena pursed lips few living had ever kissed.  Shut and bar the
door. The Lok farmhouse was built like a fort.  Oh, it didn't look it,
and the maiden was full of admiration for the person who had modified
the original structure in such a way as to fool the casual eye, but the
simple fact was that all the entrances and exits could be sealed.

It was that fact more than anything said by the roofer Thurlo Pike that
made the maiden certain she had found the right place.

"The Lok family will be living in seclusion," Iss had said.

"Angus Lok trusts no one with their whereabouts, not even his
close-lipped brothers in the Phage."

Magdalena knew several assassins who refused to take commissions against
any man or woman who was believed to be associated with a Steep House,
as the Phage named their secret lodges.  But she had looked deep within
herself and found little fear of sorcery or those who wielded it.  She
had been born in the Cloistered Tower, raised by the green-robed sisters
there, and she had known a man once who had sworn she wielded a brand of
sorcery all her own. Magdalena bared dry teeth.  She had killed the man,
of course, but his accusations still tugged at her from the grave.  She
was the Crouching Maiden; all the power she needed lay within her own
two hands.

Suddenly uncomfortable with her position in the dogwood that grew
beneath the stripped canopy of old growth at the back of the house,
Magdalena stood and stretched her legs.  Shadows followed her like small
children, and although she had little fear of being spotted by anything
more troublesome than rabbits and birds, she still moved no closer to
the house.

Gainingaccess was going to be a problem.  Obviously the women took due
care with their own safety, and at night the door and the windows would
be barred. Breaking locks and hinges was noisy and troublesome and not
the maiden's way.  Also, if there were defenses in place on the outside
of the house, it was fair to assume that there would be arms close at
hand within.  Iss had offered no insight into the characters of the Lok
womenfolk, but Magdalena suspected that the mother and oldest daughter
would likely know their way around a knife.  By all accounts Angus Lok
was a swordsman of high order, and it would take a foolish man not to
see the sense of passing along some small portion of those skills to his
daughters and his wife.

No.  Magdalena shook her head.  It would be too dangerous to break into
the house and chance being caught in darkness by people who might be
armed.  It was a risk the Crouching Maiden would not take.

Assassination was all about reducing risk.  Those who didn't know about
such things assumed all an assassin did was stalk their mark down a dark
alley, slit the mark's throat, then flee by some secret route.  Truth
was, Magdalena had killed only one man in an alleyway, and it had been
one of the most dangerous commissions she had ever taken.  She had been
young then, her fee a mere sparrow's weight in gold, and she hadn't
realized how difficult it was to approach an unknown man and simply kill
him.  This particular man had lived through four other assassination
attempts, and even though the maiden had approached him quietly and from
behind, he had caught wind of her intent even before moonlight found her
blade.  He was large and brutal and had broken two of her fingers before
she finally located his windpipe with her knife.  His blood was all over
her arms and face, and his cries had alerted people in nearby streets.
It had taken all her maiden's skills to return to her safe house
undetected.

She had since learned to arrange situations more carefully, to use lures
and props as means to insinuate herself into others' lives and create
little "death plays" where she was playwright, player, and stagehand in
one.  Take Thurlo Pike: The man had been so taken with the thought of a
drug that knocked women senseless, he had walked right into his grave.

And that was another thing few gave proper thought to: the arrangement
of the bodies later.  Not all assassinations called for a corpse
spreadeagled on a bed.  Most called for greater subtlety than that;
patrons asked that the means of death be disguised as natural illness, a
rogue attack by thieves, an accidental fall into cold water, suicide, or
murder by a third party's hand. And quite a number of patrons requested
that the corpse be permanently lost, so that no record of death
remained.

Magdalena stripped off her thin leather gloves and massaged the
deepening chill from her hands.  As the Lok girl had said, it was
bitterly cold, yet the sun shone with all the absurdity of a king at a
beggar's feast.  The maiden was sensitive to the cold.  She worried
about her hands yet could not bring herself to wear thick woolen mitts.
Touch was everything to an assassin.

With a small animal sound, Magdalena turned her attention back to the
house. Iss had left all decisions concerning the Lok women's deaths to
her, as was proper in such cases, and had asked only for "discretion."
This suited the maiden well enough.  Whenever she took the trouble of
placing herself in a tightly knit community like that of the Three
Villages, she preferred to leave blameless once the commission was over
and done.  Thurlo Pike's death would actually help her in this regard,
as it was quite possible that blame would fall upon him.  If indeed
there was blame to portion out.

Magdalena still hadn't made a decision about that yet.  She might make
the deaths look like an accident.

Slowly she began to work her way around the side of the house, moving in
a wide-turning circle around farm buildings, stone pens, rusted plow
bits, a covered well, a grove of winter-withered apple trees, and a
retaining ward built in the crease where the slope of a neighboring
hillside met level ground.

The front entrance was not well used; the maiden saw that straightaway.
Not one pair of footsteps were stamped upon the path, and a wedge of
drifted snow lay undisturbed against the door.  No one ever came or went
this way, and Magdalena suspected that the door was sealed permanently
closed.  She saw no evidence to suggest this, but she had seen enough of
the farmhouse defenses for her mind to work in the same way as the
person who had constructed them.  A second door was an unnecessary risk;
far better to board it up and perhaps the front windows as well and so
leave only the back of the house vulnerable to invasion.

Magdalena suppressed the cold wave of curiosity that rose within her.

Why Angus Lok chose to keep his family in protected seclusion was not
her affair.  He feared something, that she knew, and the fact that she
was here now, an assassin crouching in the shadows at the side of his
house, was proof that he feared correctly .  .  .  but nowhere near
deeply enough.

She studied the door, its frame, jamb, and pitch weatherproofing for
only a minute longer before heading back to the woods.  It was her last
night working at Drover Jack's, and she saw no reason to be late.  She
had worked under many taskmasters in her time, and Gull Moler was kinder
than most.  The fact that he had fallen a little in love with her was
reason enough to be moving on.

Tomorrow.  She would leave the Three Villages tomorrow, under cover of
darkness, once her commission here was done.  She had made her decision
about the deaths: By the time she had finished with the bodies it would
look as if a terrible tragedy had taken place.

Fire was always good for that.

CHAPTER FIFTY-FOUR.

The Hollow River he wind howled as the Sull warriors took their axes to
the ice.  Great bear-shaped Mal Naysayer put the full force of his body
behind each blow, send inga battery of sharp white splinters into the
air.  Ark Veinsplitter worked on the dimple holes he had created,
chipping away at weak points, thaw edges, and cracks.  The river ice
smelled of below ground places, of pine roots and iron ore and cooled
magma.  It rang like a great and ancient bell as the Naysayer's pick
found its heart.

Raifwas standing on a raised bank that was heavily forested with
stick-thin black spruce.  Above him towered the massive, glaciated west
face of Mount Flood.  Boulders as big as barns rose above the snow cover
at the mountain's base, towering over fields of rubble and dead,
frost-riven trees.  All surrounding land sloped down toward the river in
a great misshapen bowl. Rock walls plunged beneath the surface, sheer as
cliffs.  A frozen waterfall hung like a monstrous white chandelier above
a bend in the river's course, and countless dry stream beds tunneled
wind along the ice.

The Hollow River itself ran through a granite canyon and into the maze
of knife-edge ridges that formed the mountain's skirt.  Raif raised his
bandaged fingers to his face and blew on them.  From where he stood by
the horses, the river looked like a sea of blue glass.

It had taken them three days of hard travel to reach here, as the
Naysayer had promised it would.  The two Sull warriors chose paths Raif
would never have dared to take: across fields of loose shale, past
seepage meadows bogged with melt holes, and over lakes fast with ice.
Always they trusted their horses.  Even when neither Ark nor the
Naysayer was riding, they let the blue and the gray lead the way.  Ash
had ridden a Sull horse before, and it was easy for her to hand her
stallion the reins and allow it the freedom to choose its own path.

Raif found himself constantly pulling his stallion back the first day,
the reins held so tightly around his wrists that for once his fingers
went numb from lack of blood, not cold.  The state of his hands did not
help, as it was difficult to fine-guide a horse without fingers on the
reins.

The pain was excruciating.  Raif had dreams that his hands had been
skinned, and turned and sweated in his blankets as his dream- self
watched Death and her creatures pick the last scraps of meat from his
bones.  Raif woke shivering and filled with fear.  Once he had torn off
the bandages, just to see for himself that there was living flesh
beneath.  Straightaway he wished he hadn't.  There was living flesh,
pink flesh lying beneath a black-and-red jelly of blisters and cast
skin, but the sight was almost as bad as the pared fingers in his
dreams, and he couldn't get the Naysayer to rebandage them quickly
enough.

Mal Naysayer saw nothing in the blistered, shedding skin to be alarmed
about. In one of the few long speeches Raif had ever heard him speak in
Common, he said,

"They will work again, I promise you that.  I've seen worse in my time
and doubtless caused worse, too.

This hand here will be capable of hold inga drawn bow, and this finger
here able to hold and release a string at tension.  They will not look
pretty, and they'll be frost shy from now on and must be tended like
newborns in the cold, but that is the price you pay for killing wolves.
"

It did not occur to Raif until much later that Mal Naysayer had no way
of knowing that the bow was Raifs first-chosen weapon and had simply
assumed it was so.

Both warriors carried fine recurve long bows made of horn and sinew,
with lacquered risers and wet-spun string.  The Naysayer hunted on foot
as he traveled alongside the packhorse and managed to flush a few
ptarmigan and marten from their lairs.  Whenever he made a kill, he
plucked the lacquered arrow shaft from the carcass, slipped it back into
his case, and then drained the blood into a lacquered bowl and served
it, still steaming, to Ash.

Ash remained weak, but she insisted on walking for increasingly longer
periods each day.  The Naysayer had given her a coat that was so long it
dragged behind her as she tramped through the snow.  It was a thing of
alien beauty, combining lynx fur and woven fabric in a way that Raifhad
never seen before.  Ash refused to have it cut to fit her and cinched a
leather belt around her waist to raise the hem by less destructive
means.  She looked, Raifhad to admit, just as he imagined a Sull
princess would look: tall, pale, and covered from head to toe in the
silvery pelts of predatory beasts.

Ark Veinsplitter had offered gifts to Raif: mitts made from flying
squirrel pelts that had the softest, richest fur Raifhad ever touched, a
hood of wolverine fur that shed even breath ice with just a shrug, and a
padded inner coat that was woven from lamb's wool and stuffed with
shredded silk.  Raifhad refused them.  He had no wish to be further
beholden to the Sull.

Ark Veinsplitter had nodded his head at the refusal and said something
that Raif did not understand.

"To Sull, a gift is given in the offering, not the accepting, and I will
hold them for you until such a time comes when you need them, or the
Sender of Storms claims my soul."

Raif had thought a lot about that over the past three days.  At first he
had assumed it was just a way for the Sull to claim a debt even when a
proffered gift had been refused, yet now he thought differently.  Ark
Veinsplitter had separated the mitts, hood, and inner coat from his
other possessions and made a parcel of them, which he placed in the
bottom of his least-used pack.  And Raif believed with growing certainty
that the parcel would be opened again only on his say.

The Sull were a different race.  They thought in different ways.  Raif
found himself thinking back to what Angus had said about them, how it
had taken Mors Stormyielder fourteen years to breed a horse to repay a
debt.  He understood that now.  It was quite possible that Ark
Veinsplitter would carry that package with him, unopened, until the day
he died.

"We're through!"  The cry came from Ark Veinsplitter, and it broke
through Raifs thoughts like a whip cracked against his cheek.  Both he
and Ash looked down to the riverbank where the two Sull warriors
continued to chip at the ice.  Ark Veinsplitter's bent back was turned
toward them.  They waited, but he said no more.

Raif glanced at Ash.

"Are you ready?"

"Yes."  Her gray eyes flickered with snow light as she spoke.

"It's time this was over and done."

He let her walk ahead of him to the bank, glad for a few moments to
settle his mind in place.  He waited to feel fear, expected to feel
fear, but there was nothing but emptiness inside him.  Their journey was
coming to an end.

Readying himself as he walked, he pulled on his gloves and packed the
spaces between his fingers with dried moss as the Naysayer had taught
him.  He had no weapon or guide stone to weigh his belt, yet he tugged
on the buckle to check its hold as if it were loaded down with gear.

The hard edges of his dead man's cloak curled in the wind as he
approached the river's edge.

The two warriors stepped back, their faces reddened by exertion, their
axes sparkling with ice.  No one spoke.  Ash shivered as she looked down
upon the hole they had created.  The ice was nearly two feet thick,
carpeted by an uneven layer of dry snow.  The hole was roughly circular
in shape, its blue and jagged edges creatinga trap for the light.  Score
lines caused by ax strokes drew Raifs gaze down through the shadowless
rim to the utter darkness at its center.  It was impossible to see the
riverbed or anything else that lay beyond.

"How deep is it?"  Ash's voice was a whisper.

"Let us see."  Ark Veinsplitter unhooked the coil of rope that was
attached to his belt by a white metal dog hook.  Swiftly he fed the
weighted end of the rope into the hole and let it run through his
half-closed fist until it halted of its own accord.  He pulled up close
to fifteen feet of rope.

"It will be deeper near the middle."

Raif looked out across the ice.

"I'll go first."

The two warriors exchanged a glance.  Ark said,

"Blood must be spilt before you enter.  This is a place of sacrifice to
the Sull."  Almost instantly the warrior's letting knife appeared in his
hand, the silver chain that linked the cross hilt to his belt chiming
softly like struck glass.  With his free hand he pulled back his sleeve
and bared his forearm.

Raifs hand shot out to stop him.

"No.  If anyone must pay a toll for this journey, it will be me."
Biting the end of his glove, he stripped it off.

"Here.  Cut the wrist."

Muscles in Ark Veinsplitter's face tightened.  When he spoke his voice
was dangerously low.

"Your blood is not Sull blood.  It comes at a cheaper price."

"That may be so, Far Rider, but Ash and I will be the ones who make this
journey, not you."

"I don't understand," Ash said.

"I thought" -- "Nay, Ash March," the Naysayer said, his gruff voice
almost gentle.

"We travel with you only this far."

"But you will wait for us?"  Ash glanced from Raif to Ark to the
Naysayer. The fear in her voice was barely masked.

"You will wait for us?"

The Naysayer's ice blue eyes held hers without blinking.

"We cannot stay here, Ash March.  We must pay a toll for the passage we
have opened and ride north before moonlight strikes the ice.  We are Far
Riders. Kith Masso is no place for us."

Ash looked at him, the plea slowly slipping from her face.  After a long
moment she matched his unblinking gaze.

"So be it."

Raif held his face still as he listened to her speak.  The hollow place
inside him ached for her, and he wanted nothing more than to lift her
from the ice and crush her against his chest.  Instead he thrust his
wrist toward Ark Veinsplitter.

"Cut it."

The Sull warrior's eyes darkened, and Raif saw himself reflected in the
black oil of his irises.  Slowly Ark raised the letting knife to his
mouth and breathed upon the razor-thin edge.  His breath condensed upon
the metal, then cooled to form a rime of ice.  With a circle of wool
dyed midnight blue, he wiped the edge.  That done, he grasped Raifs
forearm and jabbed his fingers hard into the flesh.

Raif could feel him searching for, and finding, veins.  With a movement
so fast it could not be followed with the eye, Ark Veinsplitter slashed
Raifs wrist.

Raif felt the shock of cold metal, but no pain.  Blood oozed quickly to
the surface, rolling in a wide band along his wrist.

Only when the first red drops landed in the snow above the river's
surface did the Sull warrior release his grip.

"There.  Clan blood has been spilt upon Sull ice.  Let us hope for all
our sakes that this angers no gods."  Ark Veinsplitter turned and made
his way to his horse.

Raif breathed deeply and then jammed his knuckles into the wound.  The
pain in both his hands was blinding, and it made him wonder if he'd lost
his mind. What had he been thinking, letting Ark Veinsplitter spill his
blood?  He counted seconds as he continued to press against the cut
vein.  Truth was, he knew what he had been thinking; it just didn't make
much sense, that was all. He didn't want the Sull paying for his
journey.  Not this part, the last part, after he and Ash had come this
far.

"Here."

Raif looked up.  Mal Naysayer held something out for him to take: a
broad leaf, deep green in color and covered with rough hairs.

Recognizing it for what it was and what it did, Raif thanked the
Naysayer and took it from him.  Bracing himself, he laid the leaf flat
in his palm and then pressed it against the cut vein.  Comfrey or, as
some called it, wound heal: Clans used it like the Sull to stop the
bleeding of small wounds.

As the Naysayer walked a small distance to retrieve the pack he had left
on the bank, Ash turned to Raif.

"You knew they wouldn't come under the ice with us."  It was not a
question.

"I thought they wouldn't, but I wasn't sure until I saw their faces when
we first reached here this morning."  Raif adjusted his grip on the
comfrey leaf; a thin trail of blood was still leaking from the wound.

"They know this place, Ash.  I think" -- He stopped himself before the
words they even fear it left his lips.

"You think what?"

He shrugged.

"It means something to them, that's all."

Ash gave him a look that made him feel like a liar.  She was so pale and
thin, he wondered how she stood against the wind.  After a moment she
nodded toward his wrist and said,

"He cut you pretty deeply, didn't he?"

Raif couldn't deny it.

"It'll heal," was all he said.

As if by unspoken agreement, the two Sull warriors picked that moment to
converge upon the hole in the ice.  Both held packs in their hand, and
Ark Veinsphtter held a length of stout rope woven from flax that Raif
had seen him use to raise the tent.  The dark-eyed warrior handed his
pack to the Naysayer.  No words passed between the two men, yet Raif
knew and understood what was happening.  It shamed him.

The Naysayer held out both packs toward Ash.

"Here, Ash March, Foundling, I offer you these gifts for the journey.
There is a stone lamp and what oil we can spare, food and blankets and
herbs to ward off sickness, and other such things as one who travels
beneath ice might need."

Ash's eyes filled with tears as the great bear-size warrior spoke.

With a small movement she tugged down her hood so he could see her face
wholly.  When she spoke her words were as formal as his, and the wind
dried her tears before they fell.

"I thank you, Mal Naysayer, Son of the Sull and chosen Far Rider, for
these gifts that you have given.  Without them I would have neither
light nor warmth along the way.  You have saved my life, yet claimed no
debt, and for that I owe you, and give you, a piece of my heart.  May
all the moons you travel beneath be full ones."

The Naysayer stood still, his ice eyes unblinking, his back straight as
a black spruce, his lynx hood shedding snow, and studied Ash without
speaking. His face looked carved from stone.  After a moment he laid
both packages in the snow, then bowed so low to Ash that the crown of
his hood touched river ice.  He bowed again to Raif and then walked
away, and Raif knew he would not come back.

Ark Veinsphtter knelt on the river surface and hammered an iron stake
into shore-fast ice three feet from the hole.  Raif watched his bent
back, feeling nothing but shame.  The Sull warrior had not wanted his
gifts refused a second time, so he had passed them to his hass, who had
given them to Ash.

"There.  It is done."  Ark secured the rope to the fixed stake and then
tested its strength by tugging on it.

"It will hold well enough."

Raif pushed his mitt over his hand, covering the bloody bandage and the
letting wound, and stepped forward.  Ark Veinsplitter's eyes met his.
Raif knew it wasn't his place to thank the Sull warrior for the gifts he
had given to another, so he said only,

"Thank you for heeding my call in the darkness."

Ark Veinsphtter nodded slowly, the flat plains of muscle on his face
suddenly looking worn.

"It was Mal who gave the word to aid you."

"That may be so, but I've only known Mal Naysayer to give one answer to
any question he is asked."  Raif held his gaze firm, and both men stood
in silence, feet apart, the wind blowing their clothes separate ways.
After a moment Raif held out his hand.

"I thank you, Ark Veinsplitter, for asking the right question."

The Sull warrior clasped Raifs arm, his face grave.

"Do not thank me for something we both may come to regret later, Raif
Sevrance of No Clan.  Thank me instead for the use of my horse, and my
tent, and my rope."  He smiled roughly.

"Perhaps we can both live with that."

Raif nodded.  He found he could not speak.

Together he and Ark Veinsplitter secured the rope around his chest.

The Sull warrior rechecked all knots and took care to thread the rope in
such a way that it removed all possible strain from Raifs hands during
the drop. Fifteen feet was not a great drop, but a bad landing on hard
rock could break bones.  Raif had walked on dry riverbeds before, but he
had no idea what he would find beneath Kith Masso's frozen crust.

Ark Veinsplitter pinned Raifs arms flat against the ice as Raif eased
his legs and lower body into the hole.  Muscles bunched beneath the Sull
warrior's lynx coat as he transferred Raifs weight to the rope.

Raif thought he was ready for the pain as his gloved hands closed around
the flax, but he wasn't.  Streaks of white fire shot up his arms to his
heart. The letting wound on his wrist suddenly seemed deep enough to
sever his hand, and as his fingers sprang from the rope in fear, his
body dropped.

The world he entered was as cool and still as a guide house The blue
glow of ice light closed around his body, like water around a sinking
stone.  All was quiet.  Raif heard his own heart beating.  The sharp
tang of air trapped beneath ice stole into his nose and mouth.  Above
him, Ark Veinsplitter lowered the rope.  The flax ticked with strain,
the free swinging ofRaifs body making it saw against the ice edge.

Wincing, Raif forced both hands around the rope and guided his body
down.

His feet hit bottom with a jolt.  Quickly he worked himself free of the
makeshift hoist and called for Ark to pull it back.  As the rope
disappeared above his head, Raif pressed his mitted hands against his
jaw.  He hated being weak.  Hearing the soft catch of Ash's voice above
him, he turned his attention to the icy blue tunnel that surrounded him.
He did not want to hear what words passed between her and Ark
Veinsplitter.

To his left, the granite bank glittered with lenses of ice.  Flecks of
iron ore shone darkly within the wall like pieces of ossified bone.

Beneath his feet the riverbed was a rough valley of rock, frozen pools,
and desiccated litter of fish carcasses and caribou antlers, pine
needles and algae.  A white scum of frosted minerals lay over
everything; salts and rock silt condensed as the river drained.  Above
it all stretched the ice ceiling. It was like nothing Raif had ever seen
before: warped, folded, jagged and then smooth like a wall of
transparent rock.  Light and color poured from it, creatinga waterfall
of sea greens and silver grays and dark midnight blues.

Raif felt as if he were standing in the underbelly of a glacier, in the
place where ice and shadow met.

Dry matter crunched beneath his boots as he stepped aside to make way
for Ash's descent.  To either side of him darkness pooled beyond the
light.

Ash came down smoothly, both hands feeding rope.  Raif caught her before
she hit the riverbed and pulled her free of the hoist.  She was
shivering.  The blue light reflecting off her face looked like
moonlight.  When he pulled his hand free of her waist, she made a small
movement as if to hold it there.  As they waited for Ark Veinsplitter to
lower the two packs, Raif watched Ash closely.  Since the night of the
wolves she had not lapsed into unconsciousness, but he didn't know if
she was still fighting the voices.  By unspoken agreement, neither had
mentioned them in front of the Sull.

By the time the packs were lowered, Raif could already perceive a
darkening above the ice.  This day was the shortest winter had shown him
so far.  He wondered what Drey and Effie would be doing now, then closed
the thought off from his mind.

"You will need to remember this place," Ark Veinsplitter called as he
let the rope drop for the final time.

"This may be your only way out, save for pick inga new hole in the ice."

Raif nodded; he had already thought of that.

"From here you head upriver until you come upon the tributary that
branches west.  That may be frozen, too."  Ark's ice-tanned face finally
appeared above them.

"You must take due care, Raif Sevrance of No Clan and Ash March,
Foundling. The Naysayer says the riding moon will bring no thaw, but
that which is cold and brittle may collapse."

"Then we will dance ice," Ash said, looking up at him, "as all your
horses do."

Raif thought perhaps the Sull warrior would smile, but his lips barely
stretched against his teeth.

"The Naysayer and I head north.

We will leave such a trail as can be followed by a clansman, if you
choose to take our path.  " He left them then, with no word of farewell
save the sound of his footsteps beat inga cold rhythm upon the ice.

"Come," Raif said when all was still.

"We need to use the last hour of daylight as best we can."  He picked up
both packs from the floor and slung them over his back.  One was a lot
heavier than the other, and metal items jingled dully within.

Ash did not move or speak.  She stood in the circle of diminishing
daylight directly below the hole in the ice.  Raif did not like the
quick manner in which she was breathing.  He touched her lightly on the
arm.

"Let's go," he said, his voice as gentle as he could make it.

"We've come too far to stop now."

Slowly her gaze turned upon him.  Her eyes were made brilliant by
reflections of ice, and he almost didn't see the fear that shone through
them like light from a second, weaker source.

"They know I'm here," she said.

"They know .  .  .  and terror grows within them."

Raif found himself watching the ice ceiling as they walked.  The mass of
frozen and suspended water weighed upon his thoughts.  It was a slice of
the river, frozen from the surface down; smooth above, where he could no
longer see; and roughly coved below, like the roof of a cave.  The ice
was thickest nearest the bank, where frozen white piles rested against
granite and cantilevered the great weight of ice.  Raif had already
decided that he and Ash were safer close to the bank, yet as darkness
fell and the air around them cooled, the ice supports began to creak and
rumble like a roundhouse in a storm.

Ash carried the soapstone lamp the Naysayer had given her, cupping it in
both hands for warmth.  Raif wasn't sure what kind of oil fueled it, for
it burned with a silver flame and trailed the sweet, musky,
not-quite-human odor of whale yeast in its smoke.  The single flame
produced was housed in a protective guard of mica, but it was more than
enough to light the way.

"Do you think Mal and Ark know what I am?"

Raif was surprised to hear Ash speak.  She had been silent since she had
lit the lamp.  Switching his gaze from the blue glass of the ice ceiling
to her face, he said,

"Perhaps.  Tern once told me that the Sull know more than any other
race.  He said they pass knowledge from generation to generation and
some even inherit memories, like clans folk inherit the will to fight."

Ash hugged the lamp closer.  Above the cuff of her mitt, Raif could see
the white stick of bone and flesh that was her wrist.

"I think Mal gave me something that first night to make the voices go
away."

"A warding, like the one Heritas Cant set?"

"No.  Something different... I can't explain."  She shrugged.  "It's
gone now."

Raif glanced into the tunnel of shadows ahead.  Even in the far

distance light from the lamp created a corona of blue light around the
ice.

"Perhaps we should stop here for the night.  Build a camp.

Sleep.  "

Ash shook her head even before he had finished speaking.

"No.  They'd have me the moment I shut my eyes.  They're desperate now.
And so close .  .  ."  She swallowed.

"So close I can smell them."

A spark of anger flared within Raif as she spoke.  Suddenly he hated
everyone who had helped her come this far: Ark Veinsplitter and Mal
Naysayer, Heritas Cant, even Angus.  None of them were clan.  No
clansman would have forced a sick girl to travel north in full winter.
Tern Sevrance would have kept her warm by the stove and taken his hammer
to any shadows or dark beasts who approached her.

Abruptly Raif stopped.  Emptying the contents of both packs onto the
riverbed, he searched for something to use as a weapon.  Amid the
pouches of lamp oil, cured salmon, and wax, he found a slender spike of
steel the length of his forearm.  An ice pick.  He weighed it in his
hand, forced his fingers around the squared-off butt.  It would do.  It
would have to do.

Ash frowned at him.

"You can't fight what isn't here."

Raif thought of a reply but didn't say it.  Instead he began scooping
the spilled contents back into the packs.  Bits of river litter stuck to
his mitts like frost, and deep beneath the fur he felt blood trickle
along his wrist as the scab that had formed over the letting wound
stretched to breaking.  When he was done, he slid the pick through his
belt.

"We'll travel through the night."

Hours passed in silence.  No wind disturbed the air in the tunnel, and
the only sound was the shifting of the ice and their own booted feet
grinding dried and frozen pine needles to dust.  The riverbed rose
steadily as they moved upriver, and the ice ceiling grew closer with
every step.  Raif was constantly aware of the fragile mass above him.

Tons upon tons of frozen water, suspended above his head.  After a time
it became impossible to walk near the bank, and Raif set a course close
to the river's middle, where the ice crust was at its thinnest.

From time to time the dark, gaping holes of tributaries breached the
granite wall of the bank.  Most channels were choked with clumps of gray
ice that spilled out onto the riverbed in rubble heaps several feet
high.  Pools of frozen water lying flat beneath the rubble told of
late-season thaws and water running after the channel had hard-froze.
Raif dismissed each channel as he came upon it; the one he was looking
for had to run from the west and be clear enough to let a man and woman
pass.

The passage of time was difficult to gauge.  Raif felt his body growing
colder and his mind moving slowly from thought to thought.  He forced
Ash to eat some strips of cured salmon, but he had no stomach for food
himself.  The air in the drained riverbed was becoming thicker and more
condensed.  The river itself was shrinking, and soon Raif found himself
walking with his back and neck partially bent.  The ice crust was so
close he could reach up and touch the hard glassy surface, see the flaw
lines and pressure whorls within. Tiny bubbles of trapped air shone like
pearls.

On and on they walked, following the bends and bow curves of Kith Masso
as it skirted the mountain's base.  Raif watched Ash constantly, find
inga dozen excuses to touch her in small unassuming ways.  Her face was
gray and tightly drawn.  Too often her eyes were focused in a place he
tried to but could not see.  At some point she had stripped off her
mitts, and her bare hands were now closed around the lamp so tightly it
looked as if she were trying to crush it.  Her knuckles showed white and
jagged like teeth.

He spoke to her little, and received few responses, yet he feared to do
much more.  She was fighting the voices, and even Tern's hammer would
have proven useless against those.

Eventually they entered a stretch of the river where the granite walls
were jagged and twisted as if something had been wrenched from them at
force. Stone ledges broke through the ice crust.  Great piers of black
iron rock jutted from the walls, and troughs gouged deep into the
riverbed were filled with dark ice.  Raif turned his head sharply as a
cry that came from nothing human ripped through the tunnel like a blast
of cold air.  The flame within the soapstone lamp wavered.  Ash inhaled
sharply.  Her eyes met Raifs and she nodded, once.

"They draw nearer," she said.

"Their world touches ours in this place."

Raif closed his eyes.  He had used up a lifetime's worth of prayers the
night the ice wolves had attacked him, and he knew better than to ask
the Stone Gods for more.

In silence they continued walking.  Ash could no longer stand fully
upright, and Raif wondered how long it would be before they'd have to
get down on their hands and knees and crawl.  Time passed.  Progress was
slow over the warped and concertinaed granite that formed the river's
floor.  Fear grew in Raif slowly, filling the hollow places in his
chest.  A second cry came: high and terrible, almost beyond hearing.
Listening to it, Raif wished he were back on the snow plains, facing
wolves.  Other sounds followed: hisses and broken whispers and the wet
snarls of things with snouts.  As he rounded a bend in the river's
course, Raif breathed in the faint odor of charred meat and singed hair.
When he breathed again it was gone.

Noooooooooo.

The hairs on Raifs neck pricked up all at once.  Something other had
spoken, yet it reminded him of another time and place.  When he realized
what it was it made him sick.  The Bluddroad.  The Bludd women and
children.  The sound of desperation was the same in both worlds.

With his back bent almost double and his stomach heaving, he almost
missed the gash in the far bank.  He thought at first it was just
shadows, as there was no telltale gleam of ice on the surrounding
riverbed, but the darkness ran too deeply, and the surrounding rocks
were too flat to cast shadows of any depth.

"Ash.  Bring the lamp."  He waited until she reached his side before
crossing the riverbed.  The river was barely the length of three horses
now, and the ice ceiling dipped to chest height in parts.  Light in the
tunnel dimmed noticeably as Ash crouched to set down the lamp.

The gash in the rock was bell shaped, tall as Ash's shoulders, and
completely clean of ice.  Raif stepped through to check the way.  Here
the air was different: colder, drier, shot with the smell of iron ore.
No ice ceiling stretched overhead, just a barrel curve of rock.

The tunnel led west into the mountain, disappearing into darkness so
complete, it gave Raifa chill to see it.

"Raif.  Here."

Raif backed out of the gash.  Ash was crouching by the lamp, her right
arm extending outward, her hand flat upon the river wall

"Look."

Raif quested for his lore.  A raven etched in stone marked the way.

CHAPTER FIFTY-FIVE.

A Cavern of Black Ice r^ I assy Lok woke to the smell of smoke.  Beth,
came the ^ thought straightaway.  She's been up making honey ^^^ ^ cakes
again and forgotten how many she put on the fire.  Cassy huffed in her
pillow, determined to go back to sleep.  I'm not saving her this time. I
don't care how many honey cakes have fallen through the griddle and
caught light.  .  . and I hope she gets fat from eating the ones that
turned out.  Fat and spotty with big rot holes in her teeth.

Cassy closed her eyes as tightly as she could, then scrunched up her
face for good measure.  Just this morning she'd caught Beth trying on
the good blue dress Father had brought back with him from Ille Glaive.
Her dress.  And she wouldn't have minded much-- well, not that much--if
it hadn't been for the fact that Beth was prancing in front of the
looking glass at the time, pretending to be a fine court-bred maiden,
nibbling on sweetmeats rolled in gold leaf and sipping wine through a
crust of rose-scented ice.  For sweetmeats Beth had used hazelnuts
coated in cinnamon.  For wine she had used plum juice.  Plum juice!
Cassy gritted her teeth.  And when this fine court-bred maiden had found
herself caught in the act, the first thing she'd done was twirl around
to face her elder sister, holding the cup of plum juice in her hand!

It didn't bear thinking about Mother said the stain would come out.

And Beth had spent the rest of the day following her around with a
kicked-dog expression on her face.  But still.  Father had bought her
that dress, and it fitted so well, and it was a grownup dress, without
any of those silly girlish frills that Father knew she hated, and it
didn't really matter that she had nowhere special to wear it until
spring.

"I'll take you dancing in it when I return from the North, Casilyn Lok,"
Father had said as he'd handed her the package.  "And that's a promise
as binding as I've made to any man."

Cassy un scrunched her face.  Perhaps she'd been a bit harsh on Beth
earlier. The smell of burning was growing worse, and if she didn't know
better, she'd imagine a whole tray of honey cakes had fallen onto the
fire.

The chimney.  Cassy sat bolt upright.  What if more bricks had caved in
and blocked the flue?  It was windy enough for it.  And the roofer
hadn't come today, as he was supposed to, and the whole stack was held
up by only a couple ofpinewood struts.

Quickly and in complete darkness, Cassy found her slippers and shawl.

As she stepped toward the door, a sleepy voice spoke out from the deep
shadows at the far side of the room.

"Cassy?  Is that you?"  Beth.

A small shift took place in Cassy's chest: not fear exactly, but the
first stirrings of it.  There were no honey cakes on the fire.

"Beth, put your coat and slippers on.  Quick now."

Sheets rustled in the darkness.

"You're not still mad at me, Cassy?"

Cassy shook her head.  Then, realizing her younger sister couldn't see
her, she said,

"No.  Not much," out loud.

"What's burning?"

"I think the chimney's caved in."

"But-" "No buts, Beth.  Do as I say."  Cassy was surprised at how sharp
her voice sounded.  Bare feet thudded onto the floor.  More rustling
followed.  A moment later she felt Beth's shoulders knock against her
arm.

"Here.  Take my hand."  Beth's hand was warm and sweaty: She always fell
asleep with her fists clenched.  Gassy led her toward the door.

"You didn't put anything to cook on the hearth tonight, did you?"

"No, Cassy."

"Good girl."  Cassy lifted the latch and opened the door.  A wave of
smoke and heat puffed through the room, making the shutters rattle
behind their backs.

"Come on.  Let's wake Mother and Little Moo."  This time she made sure
her voice sounded calm.

"It's hot."

Cassy felt her way through the darkness, her hand now closed tightly
around her sister's.

"I know.  Let's just get to Mother's room and you can tell her how you
found your way in the dark."  Even as she spoke, Cassy felt heat push
against her face.  A cracking noise sounded from the floor below.  Beth
flinched.  Cassy pulled her sister firmly in the direction of their
mother's room.

Mother and Little Moo slept in the room directly above the kitchen.

Heat from the fire warmed the floor through the cold months of winter,
and two large windows let in great squares of sunlight in summer and
spring. Cassy felt a wave of relief roll over her as she saw the pale
corona of light around the door: Mother had kept a lamp lit.  Little Moo
didn't like to sleep in the dark.  She said something called beemies
lived under her bed.  No one but Little Moo knew what beemies were.
Cassy suspected that Beth had frightened Little Moo with tales of
beasties and monsters and other fey things, and Little Moo had taken
this information and invented a whole new class of baby peril from it.

Cassy's fingers found the latch on first try.  Warm air rushed past her
as the door opened, pressing her nightgown flat against the back other
legs. Light stung her eyes.  Smoke rolled into the room, greasy and
nearly black. Cassy felt its hot little fingers slip around her ankles,
grasping like hands without bone.  Beth began to cough.

"Cassy?"  Darra Lok sat up in bed.  The beautiful honey-colored hair
that she normally kept pinned in a simple knot spilled over her
shoulders like dark fire.  For the first time ever, Cassy noticed gray
strands within the gold.

"Mother.  I-" Darra Lok nodded her eldest daughter into silence, her
eyes on the smoke.  Reaching over, she plucked the sleeping form of
Little Moo from the opposite side of the bed.  Little Moo's head rolled
onto her mother's shoulder, and she made a soft gurgling noise but did
not wake.  Darra spoke soft words to her anyway as she kicked the
blankets from the bed and rose to her feet.  Beth tugged on Cassy's arm,
wanting to go to her mother, but Cassy held her firm.  Darra Lok sent
her eldest daughter a look that said many things.  Cassy nodded.

"Come on, Beth.  Let's go downstairs."  It was easier to sound calm now
that Mother was here.  As she pulled Beth from the room, she heard Darra
Lok take the lamp from the washstand and follow behind with Little Moo.

Beth shivered as Cassy guided her into the smoke that rolled up the
stairs like a wave of black foam.  Cassy felt like shivering too, but
Mother had sent her a look saying.  Be strong now, for Beth and
yourself.  So instead of shivering she tugged her younger sister forward
and said,

"This is no worse than looking for mushrooms in the mist.  Remember that
time you found those big brown ones under the dogwood, and everyone else
had already looked, but you were the only who could see them?  Remember
that?"

Beth nodded.  Her small face looked pinched.

Cassy continued guiding her down the stairs, one step at a time.  "And
you said that no one could spot mushrooms better than you, and even
Father agreed."

"He said we couldn't eat them.  Said they were rabbits' bane."

Cassy managed a dim smile.  She could clearly hear the low roar of fire
now, coming from the front of the house.  Wood snapped and popped as it
burned, and Cassy imagined fang-shaped flames eating away at the house.

"Cassy.  We're going to the back of the house, to the kitchen."  Darra
Lok's voice was firm but calm.

"Can you see the way ahead?"

"I can!  I can!"  cried Beth.

"Cood.  Stay close to your sister and help her find the way."

Smoke was goutingalong the corridor that linked the front entrance to
the kitchen.  Scorched bits of matter sailed on the

warm currents of air that blew around the house.  Flaming embers,
ducking and darting like little red fishes, floated past Gassy's face.

The fire sounded like one long continuous roll of thunder now, a storm
bearing down on the house.  Still she could see no flames.

Perhaps the fire was burning from the outside in.  Perhaps the chimney
flue had collapsed and the wind had showered sparks over the roof.

Little Moo woke as Cassy and Beth made their way through the chest-high
smoke in the corridor.  The baby made a frightened, snuffling sound and
cried the words,

"Mize.  Mize."  Cassy hoped her eyes weren't stinging.  Mother hushed
her, and she was quiet for a while, but her breaths came in hard little
wheezes.

Beth was first to reach the kitchen.  There was less smoke here than on
the stairs and in the hallways, and the hardwood embers glowing in the
hearth provided a second source of light.  As Darra and Little Moo
entered the room, a mighty crack shook the house.  Hot air beat against
Cassy's back.  The stench of burning wood sharpened, and when she sucked
in breath, crispy little cinders caught in the back other throat.

"Cassy.  Beth.  Get the door."  Darra rocked Little Moo on her hip.

"Hurry now."

Cassy and Beth ran to the door.  By unspoken agreement, Cassy pulled the
top bolts while Beth took care of those at the bottom.  Cassy's hands
felt like clumps of clay.  Stupidly she found herself thinking about the
blue dress. Father would never take her dancing in it now.

The heavy door needed a good shove to start it swinging, and when the
final bolt was drawn both sisters put their shoulders to the wood.  It
gave a little, then jerked back suddenly as if something were blocking
its way. They tried again, but the door would open only so far.  Cassy
glanced at her mother.

"It's jammed."

"There's enough room to squeeze through, though," cried Beth.

"One by one," Cassy added in small voice.

Darra Lok looked from the door to the encroaching tide of smoke at her
back.  Little Moo began to cry.

"Beth.  Squeeze through and see if you can find what's blocking it."

Beth sucked in her chest much farther than it needed to be sucked.

Gassy could see the outline other ribs beneath her nightgown as she
forced her way through the foot-wide opening.  Her eyes were sparkling;
this was now an adventure to her.

"It's so dark I can't see anything," were the last words she said.

Darra called to her, but the roar and crackle of the fire drowned out
any reply.  They waited, but Beth did not return.  Cassy went to follow
her out.

"No," Darra said sharply.

"Here.  You take Moo.  I'll go after her."

Little Moo did not want to leave her mother's arms.  Her pudgy fingers
clutched at the fabric of Darra's dress, raising little nubs of wool as
Cassy pulled her away.  It was very hot now, and a great quantity of
thick black smoke was pouring into the kitchen.  Cassy moved so her back
was to it, shielding Little Moo.

Darra took the three steps toward the door, hooked the lamp on a nail
hammered into the frame, then turned to look at her daughters.  The
lines around her mouth were the deepest Cassy had ever known them to be.
Her eyes had stopped being blue and were as gray as steel.  She looked
strong and utterly beautiful to her eldest daughter.

"I'll be back in just a moment," she said.

Cassy almost called her back.  She would remember that afterward, and it
would tear her apart.  She almost said, Mother, please don't go.

But she didn't, and Darra Lok forced her way through the opening, and
Cassy never saw her again.

There was an intake of breath, sharp, as if Darra meant to scream, then
silence.

"Mother!"  Cassy called, rocking Little Moo against her chest.

"Mother!"

Somewhere inside the house hot air exploded, punching out shutters and
glass. A low ripping noise sounded, as hot plaster peeled off the
corridor walls. Suddenly Cassy could no longer see the glow of orange
light that marked the hearth.  She jigged Little Moo against her chest,
saying nonsense things to her in a voice that was ragged with fear.

Quickly she glanced at the door.  The foot-wide opening was dark with
shadows, and strings of smoke poured into it like water into a ditch.

One by one.  Cassy shivered as her own words came back to her.  Hardly
aware of what she was doing or why, she moved from the door to the
nearest window. Both sets of shutters were barred and bolted, and she
had to set Little Moo down on the floor while she dealt with them.

Why were there so many bolts?  Frustration made her careless with her
fingers, and she gouged her knuckles on a raised nailhead as she pulled
back the first set of shutters.  The pain was surprisingly easy to
ignore.  The second set of shutters proved easier, and she had them done
in less than an instant.  Cool, clean air wafted against her face.
Outside in the farmyard all was dark and still.  Shaking with relief,
she bent to pick up Little Moo.

Only Little Moo wasn't there.  Cassy turned her head.  A wave of
sickness and fear rose in her throat.  No!

Little Moo had crawled to the door.  Her fat little fist was in the
opening, and she was calling softly,

"Mama?  Mama?"

Cassy moved faster than she had ever moved in her life.  Her hands
reached out for Little Moo's blue-socked feet, but other hands beyond
the door found her first.  Little Moo was pulled through the opening.

Cassy clutched .  .  .  and clutched .  .  .  touched the soft wool of
Little Moo's socks.  .  .  and then nothing but cold air.

Cassy stared at the space her sister had left behind.  Stupidly,
ridiculously, she couldn't stop clutching at thin air.  Her heart was
dead inside her chest.

Mother gave the baby to me.

She breathed in that thought, took it deep inside herself, deep into the
place where her heart had ceased to be.  And then she stood and stepped
away from the door.  Someone on the other side wished her dead.  Someone
had lit a fire at the front of the house and then dragged something
heavy like a stone or a piece of timber in front of the back door, so
the Lok family would escape one by one.

Like a ghost Cassy moved through the smoke.  Sweat was pouring down her
face, turning the neck of her dress black and making it steam.  The
silver chain she wore at her throat burned like hot wire. Touching the
lamp was like touch inga hot coal.  The little copper disk that covered
the opening to the oil chamber swung back with a single flick.  As she
pulled a nearby chair under the window and stepped onto it, droplets of
pine oil sprinkled the floor.  She made no effort to disguise her
movements as she hefted her body onto the windowsill: Let those hands
that pulled Little Moo come for her.

Let them burn in hell.

She saw the shadow moving toward her as she pushed her body clear of the
frame.  Dark and fluid it came, moving like spilled ink.  The hands were
gloved in shiny leather, and they held the plainest sort of knife.  The
blade was immaculate, but Cassy wasn't fooled.  She had skinned rabbits
and spring lambs before now.  She knew how easily blood wiped clean.
Time slowed as the blade slid through air.  A second stretched to an
impossibly thin line as Cassy swung the lamp.

The knife touched her, and she was glad of it, glad because the lamp and
its free-spilling oil crashed into those gloved hands.

Fire whooshed into existence, creatinga wall of blazing light.

Suddenly there was no air to breathe, only hot, stinking gas.  Cassy
heard her hair crackle like dry twigs as smolder fell upon it, yet she
hardly cared.  The gloved hands were burning in a cauldron of bloodred
flames.

t t t Finally they came to a place where the walls were planed smooth.
The corridor of rock widened and heightened, and they could pick
themselves off the ground they had crawled over and stand erect on two
feet.  Raif pulled Ash up.  The lynx coat she was wearing had shed fur
at the elbows and knees, and it was matted with a greasy spume of
mineral oil and ice.  The palm sides of both her mitts were bald.  One
was torn, and there was blood around the frayed edges.  There was blood
on her cheek, too; sometime earlier she had stumbled into a spur of rock
that had sliced a thumbnail's worth of skin from her face.

Raifhad lost all sense of time's passage.  He no longer knew if it was
day or night.  How many hours had passed since they had left the Hollow
River was something he would never know.  If someone had told him he had
spent thirty hours on his hands and knees, crawling through openings no
bigger than a doghouse door and along passages so jagged that they had
torn his dead man's cloak to shreds, he would have nodded and taken it
as truth.  His hands burned.  Once during the journey he had made the
mistake of biting off his gloves and probing the bandaged flesh.  It was
like proddinga waters king fluid oozed around his fingers, lukewarm and
yellow as beaten eggs.  He had pulled the mitts back on and not looked
since.  Pain alone was easier to live with.

As he worked the soreness out of his legs, he looked at the smoothly
planed corridor ahead.  A vision of the night sky had been tattooed into
the rock. Stars and constellations glittered overhead, and night herons
and great horned owls soared the cold currents beneath a moon of pure
ice.  Shadow creatures with fingers of charred bone and eyes as black as
hell rode wraith horses from a rift cut deep into the stone.  Raif
switched his gaze to another section of rock, only to see a second rift
with things that had no place in the world of men spilling out like
maggots from an old kill.

Kill an army for me, RaifSevrance.

Softly Raif said to Ash,

"Dim the light."

She did, and when he took her hand in his it was warm with the lantern's
heat.  He knew she had seen the same things he had, and his heart ached
at her strength.  Never once during the journey had she stopped and
rested. Never once had she spoken about fear.  He loved her completely
and could no longer imagine a world where she was not at his side.  He
had to protect her for always.  She was clan.

In this smooth new corridor there was enough room for them to walk side
by side.  Briefly Raif let himself imagine a future where he and Ash
lived on a croft in some distant corner of the clan holds Effie would be
there too, and Ash would love her like a sister, and he would teach them
both how to fight and hunt, and together they would plant a good bed of
oats and another of onions and keep six head of sheep for wool and milk.
And Drey.  .  .  Drey would ride there twice a week and be closer than a
brother to them all.

Raif breathed hard.  Bit by bit he shredded the dream in his mind until
there was nothing but torn bits left.  It was a childish fantasy, and he
was a fool to imagine it, and the only thing that mattered was the
Cavern of Black Ice.

Noooooooo.

Ash flinched as the scream ripped along the corridor.  The voices had
been quiet for some time, and Raif had hoped against hope they had gone.
Yet even as the tail end of the scream faded into freezing air a second
scream came, and then another.  And then the wailing began.

Please, mistressss, no, mistressss .  .  .

So cold, mistressss, share the light.  .  .

Want it, give it, reach .  .  .

Raif's skin crawled.  He could hear the click of fingernails against
stone and smell the stench of burned things.  Everything that was within
him told him this was no place for a clansman to be.  He had seen the
moon and the night sky on the wall: This was the domain of the Sull.

And yet.  There was a raven too, and it had been guiding the way, and
there had to be something in that.

Setting his mouth in a grim line, he tightened his hold on Ash's hand
and led her through the keening of insane things to the cavern that
awaited her at the end.

There wasn't far to go, not really.  The voices had known she was close.
Suddenly there were no more decorations on the walls, only symbols
carved in a foreign hand.  An archway cut from mountain rock marked the
end of the journey.  It was another Sull- made thing, dark and shaded
with moonlight, with night-blooming flowers at its base and
silver-winged moths suspended in the stone.  A roughly carved figure
leaped over the cantle of the arch, his features turned toward the rock
so his face was unknowable, a sword of shadows in his hand.

As they passed beneath the arch Raif noticed a mated pair of ravens had
been carved within the deepest recesses of the rock.  Their bills were
open as if frozen in mid call and their clawed feet danced a jig upon
the stone. Without thought, he raised his hand to his neck and pulled
out his lore. Touching it, he entered the Cavern of Black Ice.

Clan had no words for this place.  The world of the clan holds was one
of daylight and hunting and white ice; it had boundaries and
borders--dozens of ways to separate one clan hold from another and one
clansman's holdings from his neighbor's.  This place was thin around the
edges, like a sword turned side on.  Its boundaries bled into another
world, and Raif doubted they were true boundaries at all.  It hardly
seemed to exist before his eyes, like something conjured up out of
moonlight and rain, yet even as he thought that, he was aware of the
weight and the sheer mass of the place.

The ice steamed like a great black dragon emerging from a frozen lake.
It glittered with every color ever seen at night.  Once, many summers
ago, Effie had gone trapping with Raina.  She was only a baby at the
time, barely able to walk on her own two feet, yet somehow she had
returned home with an egg-size granite pebble in her fist.  She was
excited about it in her own quiet way, and to please her, Inigar Stoop
had taken it to his mill-saw and broken it in two.  Raif could remember
watching the cooling water spill over the granite as the saw bit sliced
into stone.  He remembered frowning at the waste of a good skimmer. Then
it had split in two, and inside was a heart of pure quartz.  Dark and
smoky and flashing like the brightest jewel, encased in a rime of hard
rock.  Raif thought about that now as he looked upon the cavern.  It was
like standing in the center of such a stone.

He could not begin to guess what liquid had cooled to form the ice.

Slabs of it, some so smooth he could see his own face reflected there,
and some as jagged as spinal cords, lined every portion of the cave.  He
walked upon it as he entered, heard it tick and fracture as his weight
came down upon it, felt the entire structure shudder as stresses spread
around it like whispers around a room.

The cavern soared three stories high and was as wide as any cave he'd
ever seen.  It was massive and utterly cold: a boundary between worlds.

When he looked into the ice he saw shapes shifting and undulating in the
place where the cave wall should have lain.  Black fire burned within.
He saw the shades of hooded things, of beasts with many heads and wolves
with thrashing tails, and things that were not men, not quite.  He saw
nightmares and shadows and darkly craven things, yet when he looked
again the ice was still.

The voices were hysterical now.  They pleaded with their mistress,
begging her to turn back, to flee the cavern, to reach in another place.

Raif felt Ash pulling her hand free of his, and he hated to let it go.
She felt his resistance and turned to face him, and already he could see
that she was changing.  Her eyes were taking on the colors of the Sull.
No longer gray, they shone silver and midnight blue.  Her jaw was hard
set, and her chin was raised, but her lips were red where she had chewed
on them. Looking at her, he realized one thing: He could not help her in
this.

The ice pick he had jammed through his belt was no use here.  Tern,
Drey, Corbie Meese: No clansman could do more than stand and watch.

There was nothing of flesh and blood to fight, no necks or soft stomachs
that would yield to an ax.  Just shadows and black ice.  When Ash
reached she would do so alone.

Unbidden, the image of the women and children fleeing Hails- men on the
Bluddroad came to him.  He had stood and watched then, too.

Watcher of the Dead.  A shudder began at the base of his spine, but he
made himself rigid and stopped it.  He would show nothing but strength
to Ash.

She looked at him for a long moment, pinning him where he stood.

Slowly she stripped off her gloves and let them fall to the floor.

Her coat slipped off with a single shrug, and suddenly she was standing
in the cavern wear inga plain gray dress, with her silver gold hair
flowing loose over her shoulders.  Gently she smiled at

him, and gently she spoke.

"It's all right," she said.

"I'm here, and I know what I must do.  It's just dancing ice from now
on."

He did not smile.  Fear for her consumed him.  She knew he could
heart-kill beasts--she had seen him do so with her own two eyes--yet she
did not know he was Watcher of the Dead.  He should have told her sooner
.  for he could not tell her now.

"You must let me go, Raif."

He did not know he had taken hold other arm until she pulled it back.

She began to turn from him, and dread rose in his belly at the thought
other standing alone He had to protect her.  He, who had watched Bludd
women and children die on the Bluddroad, seen Shor Cormalin brought home
over the back of his horse, and killed three Bluddsmen in the snow
outside Duff's, had to keep her from harm.

In his frustration, he tugged at the cord that held his lore.  The hard,
black piece of bird ivory jabbed against his gloved hands.

Raven lore.  He took it and weighed it in his fist.  It had warded him
all along.  And perhaps it warded the Sull, too.  And perhaps the ravens
he had passed on the archway and on the river wall had been guarding,
not showing, the way.

Swiftly he plucked it from him.

"Ash."

She turned her head toward him.

"Wear this."  He held out his lore.

"I can't.  It's part of your clan."

"You are my clan.  And you have no lore to protect you."  And ravens
always survive to the end.

"Take it."

Something in his voice compelled her, and she took it from him and
fastened it about her neck.  It looked dark and savage there, on its
cord of sweat-rotted twine.  Yet something deep within him eased at the
sight of it lying flat against her skin.  He could let her go now.

She walked from him in silence, the hem of her skirt trailing across the
ice. The cavern shuddered with every step she took and the voices
hounded her like dogs.

Hate you, mistressss, slash your pretty face.

Pull you down with us, make you burn.

Ash's chin stayed high, though the threats were terrible in their
violence and hatred, and the black ice was colder than a tomb.  He felt
the power cumulating in her, felt her pull what she needed from the air.
Her belly swelled, and her breasts rose and fell, and muscles in her
shoulders began to work.

The cavern glittered like dark fire, its borders and knife edges
flickering between worlds.  Into its center walked the Reach.  Firmly
she stepped, ice winds blowing her hair and the sleeves of her dress,
the corner other lip moving as she bit down upon it.  The air around her
thickened and warped, and slowly, very slowly, a fine nimbus of blue
light grew about her shoulders and arms.  Raif felt his face burn with
coldness.  He had seen light like that before, on the blades of clansmen
making kills in moonlight and in the cold inner hearts of flames.

As black ice creaked and shivered around her.  Ash March reached.  Later
Raif would remember her beauty as she stood there limned in blue light,
her fingers rising first, then her hands and her arms, as she reached
out toward a place that he would never, ever, know firsthand.

Later he would remember that.  .  .  but for now he felt only fear.

Up came her arms, spreading wide to encompass a world beyond his own.

Her mouth fell open and a terrible dark substance poured from her tongue
and blasted against the ice.  The cavern shook.  The mountain rumbled
with a deep bass note that sounded like the Stone Gods shattering the
world.  Yet the black ice remained intact.  The walls bent to her power,
yielding like saltwater ice, yet they did not let it pass.  The ice
stretched and contorted, forming grotesque black bulges and pressure
sores where the ice was stretched so thinly it was almost white.  The
cavern hummed with tension. And the voices screamed, higher and higher,
wail inga song of terror and damnation that rose from a place far deeper
than any hell.

On and on the power flowed, exiting Ash's body with the force of steam
venting under pressure and bursting against the cavern walls.

The black ice flashed under the bombardment, turning as

transparent as polished glass.  Within it, Raifsaw things he wished
never to see again.

A charred landscape.  A nightmare world.  A slithering, jerking mass of
dark souls.

Ash stood against them all.  He saw that now, clearly; he also saw that
the change that had begun the moment she'd entered the cavern was still
taking place within her.  She was becoming what had been only a word to
Raif before. A Reach.  It would never be over for her, not truly, even
after she left this place.  Heritas Cant had said as much, yet Raif had
not wanted to understand.  He had wanted to believe that the Cavern of
Black Ice marked the end.  Now, seeing the air rippling with heat from
her power and the skin of black ice straining to contain what she
unleashed, he knew it was just the start.

Ash's eyes were focused on some far distant point beyond the ice.

Briefly he glimpsed a sea of shifting gray waters.  or was it clouds or
smoke?  Heritas Cant had called it the borderlands and said that Ash was
the only person living who could walk there without fear.

Sobered, Raif watched her face.  He wanted it to end.

The cavern walls ground against each other as Ash's power continued to
drain. Sweat ran in rivulets down her neck and the high curves of her
breasts, and wet hair clung like chains to her face.  Words had failed
the voices now, and all that was left to them was the awful bleating of
herd animals penned for the kill.  Raif hated to hear them.  He thought
they would drive him insane.

Finally the noises faded to grunts and whimpers, then died completely.
The air stilled.  Dust drifted to earth as the milling of the cavern
walls ground to a halt.  The black ice glowed silver for a moment and
then faded to matt black.  It was used up now.  Raif imagined that one
quick stab with a pickax would be enough to shatter it like glass.

Ash was left standing in the center of the cavern, her arms held wide
before her, the light surrounding her body dimming into thin air.

Nothing moved for the longest moment.  Raif felt as if he were alone in
the cavern; it hardly seemed as if Ash were there at all.

Her back was rigid, and her eyes were far focused, and even the bit of
lip she had chewed on had paled.  The only thing upon her that seemed
wholly in this world was the ugly piece of raven around her neck.  That
was solid: dark with oils from Raif's skin, worn thin in the places
where he handled it, its ivory as cracked and flawed as an old man's
fingernail.  It belonged in the earth or in the remains of a burned-out
fire.  It did not belong in the land beyond the ice.

Raif waited.  He wanted to smash the ice to splinters with his fists and
snatch Ash away like a man kidnappinga child.  Yet he did not want to
hurt her.  She was so thin, like Effie almost; if he handled her
roughly, he could break her bones.

Slowly, breath by breath, she returned to him.

Her mouth closed, and after many minutes she blinked, and when her gaze
refocused it came to rest on something that both of them could see.  It
seemed difficult for her to relax her arms, and she made awkward little
movements as she drew them to her sides.  After a moment she raised her
hand to her throat and touched the raven lore.

She looked at it with her new silver blue eyes, brought it to her lips,
and kissed it.

"It guided me back," she said in a voice drained of all strength.

"I was lost and it guided me back."

Raif closed his eyes.  His heart had been so long without joy, he did
not know what it was that filled him.  He just knew he had to go to her
and take her from this place.

HEART OF DARKNESS

Retaining the thought was the hardest thing of all.  He could wait in
silence, unmoving, barely breathing, betraying not the slightest
reaction as the caul flies fed on his flesh.  That was easy.  Such was
the measure of his life.  It was the nursing of the thought that took it
from him.

When he is gone I will return to the place where I took him.  And this
time I go there alone.

The Nameless One ran the words through his head, sounding each slowly,
testing their meaning, afraid that at any moment he might lose the sense
of one or all.  Words were as water to him.  He grasped and cupped, yet
he still could not hold them in mind.  He had waited here before, in his
iron chamber, feigning senselessness or fatigue.

Yet though his body served him as well as a wheel-broken body could, the
words always left him in the end.  Without words he had no intent.

Without intent he was every bit as senseless as he feigned.

This time would be different, though.  This time I go there alone.

The Light Bearer watched him, suspicion sharp as needles in his eyes.

He had not liked being yanked back from that place.  Anger and
exhaustion made him shake.  The Nameless One smelled urine that was not
his own.  The Light Bearer was weak in many ways.

The blow when it came was hardly a surprise.

"Wake, damn you!  I know you can see and hear me.  I know you brought me
back too soon."

The Nameless One allowed his head to slump back against the iron wall.
His rotted chains rustled like dry sticks.

The Light Bearer watched his every breath.

"You think to play games with me?  You, who exist only on my say?"  Silk
slithered over metal as he drew closer.

"Perhaps I have left you untouched for too long.  Perhaps I should have
Caydis warm his hooks."

The Nameless One did not fall into the trap of fear.  Fear lost him
words. Unblinking, he focused his gaze upon the Light Bearer's left
shoulder and the image of the Killhound emblazoned there.

Time passed.  The Light Bearer felt it more keenly than he, shifting his
weight from foot to foot, breathing harshly, and finally pushing himself
away from the iron chamber.  He was not satisfied, but what more could
he do?  He could hardly beat the creature who was the source of all his
power.

"I will be back tomorrow," he warned as he retrieved his stone lamp and
headed up the stairs.

"And next time I will pull two flies from your back."  With the last of
his words the light faded and darkness came to the apex chamber, rising
from the ground to the ceiling as always, The Nameless One did not move.
When a measure of time satisfying to him had passed, he closed his eyes.
This time I go there alone.

It was easy, really.  The Light Bearer had shown him the way.  Power
enough he had, for he had learned the ways to keep a poor man's portion
for himself. The Light Bearer suspected this, but truth was hard to
extract from one who had lost all fear of pain.

With the soft clack of bones dropped in a pot, the Nameless One forsook
his flesh.  Up he traveled through layers of rock and surface tiles, up
through the Inverted Spire.  Pushing his in substance forward to meet
the night sky, he tested his attitude to freedom.  It was dark here, and
cold as ice smoke, and the horizon stretched and curved, stretched and
curved, as far as the eyes could see.  He could not say it pleased him.
He was still one man alone with a broken body and no name; a blue
firmament above him made no difference.  Fleeing his despair, he
journeyed to the place where the Light Bearer had taken him.

This time I go there alone.

The gray landscape of the borderlands was still in turmoil, roiling and
steaming like a sea settling down from a storm.  In his excitement the
Light Bearer had sucked the caul fly dry, wanting to go deeper, farther,
see if he could find the source.  The Nameless One took some small
portion of pleasure in recalling how he had wrenched his master back. It
had been worth the examination and the rage.  And now .  . .  well, now
he had the power to search this place himself.

Vast continents of ether floated before his eyes, great cliffs and
headlands of dust, yet he spared them little but a passing thought.

The Dark River was here; he knew it, he smelled it, and within it lived
his name.  Deeper and deeper he traveled, skimming the cold peaks and
fathomless troughs, until finally he saw it in the distance.

A line of utter darkness.  He sought not to allow himself hope, yet it
rose in his throat like a hard bright thing, and suddenly he felt like a
child.

He could not reach the river soon enough.  Cold were its waters and
strong was its current, so strong that it pulled him downstream.

Knowledge came to him in tantalizing glimpses; he remembered a man's
face and a night full of stars and the heat of yellow flames against his
cheek.  He did not remember his name.  Straining, he swam deeper, giving
himself wholly to the current, and when an undertow seized him with an
icy hand he did not struggle against it.

Heart ofDarknessss, you have come.

A voice spoke a name that was not his own, yet he answered to it all the
same.  If he had possessed a body to shiver, he would have done so upon
hearing the voice's reply.

We have waited such a long time, Heart ofDarknessss.

Suddenly the Nameless One was no longer in the river, he was standing on
a shore, and before him rose a wall that stretched to the ends of the
world. He had seen this place once before when he had journeyed here
with the Light Bearer, and that time, as this time, he perceived the
same fault.

Push against it, Heart of Darknessss, and in return we will give you
your name.

It was an offer he could not refuse.

The substance of the wall burned him as he touched it, burned with a
coldness so deep and so ungodly, he knew his flesh hands would pay a
price.  It mattered not.  For when the world shuddered and the wall
cracked and the cry of something not human rose from the breach, the
Nameless One received a thought.  ^_ It was his name, and he spoke it
out loud.  ^B'j "Baralis."