A Cavern of Black Ice (87 page)

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, Raif Sevrance. 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.

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 driving at 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 riverstone with
bare hands. Blood flowed from beneath his fingernails, running along
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. Tem 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 balancing a water bladder and a
bowl of sotted 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 sleeping and 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.
Clackl 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. Raif's
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 Raif drew himself upright, the
cell door burst open.

Blade metal gleamed like 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.

Blackhail
. Pride stabbed at
Raif's 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 yearmen
and clan sons. He was all hard edge; now.

"We are not brothers, you and I.
Blood ceased flowing between you 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 trust 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 Tem and broken saplings from
Longhead, and to back up incredible stories about bears fleeing over
thin ice and lone elk trampling tents. Drey ways waited.

Swords clashed in the chamber above.
The ceiling shuddered something heavy and metallic, like a charcoal
burner or an arms rack crashed to the floor. Drey stepped forward,
jabbing the air next Raif's 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 Hailsmen 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 Gleet 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, twisting
around itself to form a funneling afterbirth of soot and fumes. Raif
considered the band of darkness it created, noticed how Rory Gleet
lifted his visor so he could rub his stinging eyes and how Arlec Byce
held his swordhand 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 Hailsman joined them as they
filed out of the tower into the gray stormlight that shone upon the
Inch. Raif paid him no heed, yet he knew well enough that it was Bev
Shank, kitted 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
refired. 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 Gleet to defy him.

Rory was no riverman, 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 Hailsmen were wearing helms and plate. The water was
cold. Icy. Undertows and storm tows would pull them under in an
instant, send them smashing against the Inch. Raif knew 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 hammermen's
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.