A Cavern of Black Ice (24 page)

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 nipper, 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 unhooked 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 hunting as 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.

*** Moose's rump was awash with blood.
A pair of foxes, a weasel, a marmot, a side of jackrabbits, three
minks, and a snagcat 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. Tem was often in them, thrashing in his hide tent,
beating against 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 clansfolk 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 clanhold, 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 elkskins on snow, the rattle of arrows in a bowcase,
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 Bailie 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, Bailie
the Red had his bow drawn and sighted. Dropping the reins, Raif
raised both arms into the air. "Bailie. It's me. Raif Sevrance.
Don't shoot."

"Stone balls, lad!" roared
Bailie, 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 guidestone, 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 Bailie 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 Bludd-road. Mace has had word that a
party of forty hammermen and spearmen 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 Blackball. "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
clanhold, 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,"
Bailie 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 clanholds, 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?"
Bailie 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 dogskin gloves to make them sit right on
his hands. "I'm not sure he should come, Bal. Mace said only
yearmen and full clansmen. With the dangers involved, 'tis only right
and fitting."

"Aye. You speak the truth."
Bailie the Red set his fierce gray eyes 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 snagcat. 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."

Bailie 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 bowfinger than Bailie 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?"
Bailie the Red's question seemed to come from a very great distance.

"Sixteen."

"So you're due for your yearing
this spring?"

Raif nodded.

"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 elkskin coat as he stamped his
booted feet upon the snow. "Stone Gods, Bal! 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 shrinking as they cut out a portion of the light. So
Mace Blackhail would stand Chief Watch in the guidehouse, lashed to
the north-facing plain of the guidestone through twelve hours of
darkness, alone, unspeaking, eyes open to see the faces of nine gods.
His spine would touch granite in three places, and the chief's mantle
that he wore would soak up graphite oil and fluids from the
guidestone. Afterward, when Inigar cut him free with the Clansword,
chiefblood 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 birthclan 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 hammerman looked impatient to be
on his way. He kept glancing at 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 cowlmen to our borders. So none of us can trust
our own shadows from now on. Mace'll catch up wi' us within a day."