A Sword From Red Ice (63 page)

The guide pushed himself to upright and left the
room. Bram sat alone in the darkness and watched as smoke poured
under the door.

The Rift Awakens

Raif was awaiting delivery of the Forsworn sword.
Stillborn had sent it to Piggie Blesdo for a refiring four days back
and had gone off this morning to retrieve it. Piggie was an
ex-Dhoonesman and blacksmith who had built a tower furnace on one of
the high eastern ledges, and did most of the steelwork for the Maimed
Men. Stillborn had gone to retrieve it three hours back, but Raif
wasn't worried by his absence. Stillborn was an expert at whiling
time. Besides, it was good to be alone.

Yelma, Stillborn's sand-filled quintain, was
creaking on her iron chain that was suspended above the fight circle.
For reasons Raif could not guess, Stillborn had dressed up the
practice dummy in ugly iron turtle armor and a red skirt. She didn't
have a head, but the top of her torso boasted a fleece hat with ear
warmers. Stillborn had nailed it in place. Raif had taken a few
swipes at her earlier, but had quickly lost interest. He had not yet
found the balance of the sword Stillborn had lent to him, yet even
with that disadvantage it was too easy to spike the quintain's heart.
Stillborn's cave consisted of a single chamber shaped like a wedge of
cheese turned on its side. The rock ceiling above the cave mouth and
fight circle was high and vaulted, but toward the back of the cave,
the ceiling lowered sharply and ended, thirty feet into the cliff
cave, in a point. The point was where Stillborn stowed his least-used
possessions: rusted spears, heaps of old clothing, an iron bathtub, a
stool with a broken leg, a preserved bear head, several saddles, a
silver urn decorated with enameled balls, and other trophies from
his raids and hunts. Raif sat among them, the rock ceiling less than
a hand's length above his head, and tried to decide if it was worth
sanding the rust from one of the spears. The spear he had in his hand
was good and heavy, its shaft made from a single piece of rolled
iron, its head bladed with a rusted but decent point. Stillborn had
told him to help himself to anything he found here. "Except the
bear head," he'd added thoughtfully, squinting into the
possession pile. "I might have a go of tacking that on Yelma."

To remove himself and the spear from the tight
wedge of the back wall, Raif had to walk in a crouch, holding the
spear horizontal at his waist. Ahead, he saw a figure step into the
light surrounding the cave mouth. Raif moved through the shadows
toward it.

Mallia Argola gave a small scream as she spied him
coming toward her, armed.

"No," Raif cried out, holding the spear
away from his body. "I . . . I'm just going to clean it."

She glanced from the head of the spear to his
face, lips pressed together, forehead knitted into a deep frown. "You
scared me."

"I'm sorry." Raif set down the spear and
moved forward with his back hunched. Twice he'd seen her now and both
times he was walking like an idiot. "What do you want?"
Right away he realized it was an ungracious question, but it was too
late to take it back.

Holding out a package wrapped in some silky kind
of cloth, she said, "Your gloves and cloak. You left them at our
home." Her voice was faintly accented, and prickly with the
emotions that followed unjustified fear. She was wearing a
long-sleeved dress of a color that fell between deep green and deep
blue, and the same black bodice that had snugged her waist yesterday
on the ledge snugged it again now. An airily woven black shawl
covered a narrow strip of her arms and shoulders. "Take them."

Raif approached her, and they shared a few awkward
moments as the package was transferred between them. She smelled like
marsh fern, spicy and green.

"Are you not going to look?"

Puzzled, Raif glanced down at the package. It had
been tied neatly with black cord.

"The cloak," Mallia said, as if she was
stating something that should be obvious to him. "I repaired it
for you."

The Orrl cloak had been damaged in the Want; he
had not given it much thought since then. Seeing that she was
waiting, he tugged on the string and unraveled the package. The silky
cloth fell to the ground, revealing his black boarhide gloves resting
on top of the cloak. She watched him carefully as he tucked the
gloves into his gear belt and then inspected the cloak. He could not
remember exactly where the varnish had started to chip and grew more
anxious as he searched and couldn't find the spots. He knew she was
expecting him to praise her work. After a minute or so he gave up and
looked at her, preparing an apology in his head.

She was smiling. "Maybe I have done too good
a job."

Raif felt relief and strong attraction.

"Here." She took the cloak from him.
"Just there by the hem. See? And there in the front." She
moved into him to demonstrate her work. Now that she pointed it out
he could see where she had applied something—lacquer, varnish,
metallic paint—over the bald spots, carefully overlapping and
matching, nearly perfectly, the original finish.

"Thank you," he said, pleased. She had
shiny spots of pigment on her fingers.

"It took me most of the night to match it. I
have never seen anything quite like it."

She was so close he could see the fine golden down
on her cheeks and temples, and see how quickly and wonderfully it
became deep brown at her hairline. He spoke to distract himself.
"It's made by the clansmen at Orrl. They wear them to hunt in
winter."

"Orrl," she repeated, as if committing
the word to memory.

"It's the most westerly of the sworn clans."
His voice sounded wooden to his ears but he couldn't seem to stop
speaking, "its territories border Scarpe and Blackhail, and its
warriors hunt as far as the Storm Margin."

"Storm Margin. I have heard of that."
She smiled again, and he could not tell if she was stating a fact or
gently mocking him. Her breasts were full and round beneath the
fabric of her dress. Her waist was cinched small enough to be circled
by his hands.

Crazily, Raif wanted to grab her and squash her
against his chest. Afraid that he might actually do so he stepped
back.

She stepped with him. "Your cloak." As
she handed it back to him her fingers touched his wrist.

Raif breathed sharply. He had no experience of
women. Was it possible she expected him to touch her back?

Mallia Argola looked at him with green-brown eyes.
She was older than he was, perhaps by four or five years. "Give
me your hand," she said to him.

Maneuvering the Orrl cloak over the crook in his
left arm seemed to take forever. He was sure she must think him a
fool. When he was done, he held out his right hand and was surprised
to see it didn't shake.

She took it firmly, forcing the fingers up and
also forcing him to move toward her. Raising his hand to her face,
she studied its scars and bow calluses. He could feel her breath
wetting his skin. Slowly she pushed his palm to her lips and kissed
it.

Wildness threatened him then. He wanted her and
could perceive her heart, and somehow the two things got crossed in
his head and the only thing he knew for sure was that given long
enough he would harm her. He could not tell the difference between
desire to kill her and desire. Fearful of losing his mind, he
wrenched back his arm.

In that final instant of contact he felt her teeth
nip the base of his thumb.

"It is done," she said to him, calmly.
Her eyes glinted with something that might have been
triumph—whatever it was, she blinked it away. "Tooth and
hand. In my land that means we will be more than friends."

He turned away from her, stirred and barely sane.
Blood was ricocheting around his body. The Orrl cloak was on the
floor.

"I must leave," she said, her voice
trailing toward the cave mouth. "My brother sends a message:
Come see him tonight."

With that Mallia Argola was gone.

Raif told himself not to look around. He paced to
the back of the cave and found himself soon thwarted by the low
ceiling. Casting around for something to . . . use . . . his gaze
alighted on the rusted spear. Hefting it over his shoulder he took a
run at the quintain. The spear's point was cankered and blunt, and
the force required to punch it through iron plate was immense. Raif
drove it through Yelma's chest armor, yanked it out, and then drove
it through again.

He was still stabbing the quintain a quarter-hour
later when Stillborn sauntered into the cave holding an oil lamp on a
pole.

"Gods, lad. What are you doing?" he
asked, setting the lamp down on the cave floor.

Raif stopped. He was shaking and drenched with
sweat. One of his fingers was bloodied; he had sliced it on a jagged
edge of plate.

Stillborn came over and took the spear away.
Laying a hand on his shoulder, he guided him firmly around. "Come
and rest for a while."

Raif allowed himself to be led to the sleeping
mattress. When Stillborn thrust a cup in his fist, he drank. It
wasn't water. He told himself he'd just lie down for a while to calm
the pounding in his head. The sun was setting and rich pink light
filled the cave.

He dreamed of Ash. She was floating on a plate of
ice carved from a glacier. He was standing on the shore, and at first
the current moved her toward him, and there was a moment when, if
they'd both reached out their hands, they might have touched. He
called her name and reached for her, his hand touching space she had
just occupied. Yet Ash March no longer looked at him, and the current
carried her away.

At first he thought the clanging was part of a new
dream. A bell was tolling in the distance and he knew, as you knew
things in dreams, that the sound was coming from a place where he did
not want to go. He struck a path in the opposite direction, telling
himself that the faster he moved the quicker the sound would
decrease. He jogged and then sprinted. Someone called his name.

"Raif. Better be up. The Mole's sounding the
alarm."

Opening his eyes, Raif saw it was full dark. The
pole lamp Stillborn had brought earlier was the only illumination in
the cave. Stillborn was squatting next to him. The spare tooth
embedded in his neck tissue was biting.

"The alarm," he repeated, his hazel eyes
glittering like cut stones. "Something's out there."

The noise was barbaric. A great clashing of
tempered and untempered metals, beating out of time and driven by
fear. Raif had never heard anything like it; the boom of gongs and
peal of bells, the rasp of ridged metal being sawn across rock, the
bedlam of iron plate smashing against iron plate like cymbals, and
the hammer of hundreds of cook pots as the Maimed Women came out upon
their ledges and tried to beat back the dark.

Standing upright, Stillborn cinched his gear belt.
Two swords, a nail hammer and a knife hung there. "I best get
going. Follow when you can."

Raif swung his feet onto the floor.

Nodding at Yelma as he passed her, Stillborn said,
"Looks like she's got a case of exploding boils."

"Still," Raif said. "The sword?"

"Foot o' the bed, my old friend. Foot o' the
bed."

The Forsworn sword had been wrapped in a length of
cheesecloth and laid at the end of the mattress. Kneeling forward,
Raif tore off the fabric and uncovered the blade. The flat had been
polished so finely it reflected his face like a mirror. Drawing his
thumb along the edge he tested for sharpness. It opened the skin but
drew no blood. Good. The point was like a diamond, hard and
brilliant, and the only thing he saw that was not perfect was a
slight warping in the pattern of the steel where bent metal had been
fired and hammered back to true.

Raif removed Stillborn's borrowed blade from his
sealskin scabbard and replaced it with the Forsworn sword. The rock
crystal surmounted on the pommel flashed as he moved across the cave.
As he clasped the newly repaired Orrl cloak around his throat he fell
some shame about what had happened earlier with Mallia Argola. He did
not understand himself.

Grabbing the pole light on hit way out, Raif
Sevrance headed toward the greatest concentration of noise.

The night was clear and lit by stars. Snow glowed
blue. The moon had not yet risen, but Raif calculated it was due. He
moved quickly, leaping from Stillborn's ledge to the one above and
then up the rope ladder to one of the longer ledges that ran east.
Others were moving too. Maimed Men, their faces blank, their knuckles
white where they gripped scythes, stone-bladed axes, sharpened and
fire-hardened wooden staves, cruciform halberds, forked spears,
swords, knives. The frenzied clangor of the alarm worked on their
bodies like a drug, making arms twitch and neck tendons spring out
like wires. The clash of metal chopped Raif's thoughts into slices.
He could no longer think of whole things, was incapable of
formulating or retaining a plan; instead he thought in pulses. I must
go up this ladder. I must avoid the hoist lifts. Too many people: Get
out of my way.

He drew his sword. Two women kneeling on the
ledge, heating cauldrons against the rock, cried out his name. Naked,
their bodies obscenely shadowed and missing flesh, they hissed as he
stared at them. Slowly they began beating out a new rhythm on the
rock. "Twelve Kill. Twelve Kill. Twelve Kill."

He turned his back on them. Maimed Men made way
for him as he landed on the lowest of the three great rimrocks that
spanned the city.

Hiking on top of a boulder, he tried to see the
way ahead. Armed men were moving across the snow. A watch fire had
been lit by the mouth of the pool cave, but the flames were sluggish
and needed pumping. A blind man beating a sheet of scrap metal by the
fuel pile had caught the rhythm of the hags above and now fell in
time with them. Twelve Kill. Twelve Kill. Twelve Kill.