A Sword From Red Ice (72 page)

And knew instantly it was maer dan. It sucked at
her, like ash dragged into a powerful fire. When she turned her eyes
toward it she felt her senses elongate.

"Lan," she called. The Far Rider had not
slowed his pace and was some distance ahead of her, easily navigating
a path between a giant spruce and a cedar that was growing around a
felled stump like a squid on a rock. He did not hear her, so called
again, louder. "Lan." It felt strange saying his name.

The Far Rider turned and looked at her. Whatever
he saw on her face was enough for him to bring the stallion to a
banking halt. Clods of dirt and snow sprayed the trees. Lan's eyes
met hers and she was surprised to see a question in them. He was
Sull. She had assumed somehow he would have known.

"Something is coming from the south,"
she murmured, her wet hair sending icy trickles down her spine. "Maer
dan."

Shadowflesh. Lan continued to look at her, his
pupils enlarging. She had a memory of Mal Naysayer drawing his sword
at such a moment his face hard and terrible, his eyes burning like
the cold blue stars at the farthest edge of the sky. She recalled
feeling . . . not safe exactly, but protected. If anything wanted to
reach her it would have to get past the Naysayer and his foot-long
sword, first. Lan Fallstar reached for his bow. "Point," he
demanded, his voice terse. Light reflecting off the snow illuminated
the hollows of his cheeks and the space under his jaw. With a fluid
motion, he drew his first arrow. It had a hole drilled into its steel
head, she noticed, but had no idea why.

Ash drew her own weapon, the sickle knife and
weighted chain. "This way," she cried, kicking the gelding
into motion. She'd be damned if she was going to point.

The creature poured like liquid through the trees.
It was accelerating, and she had the sense of powerful muscles
bunching and unbundling. Something howled in a long single note that
made the metal in her hand vibrate. Ash caught sight of a glistening
flash of blackness plunging through shadows cast by the prehistoric
pines. It was massive, and it had never been human. Not even close.

It moved on four limbs and it had thick shoulders
and a small, frighteningly sleek head. She was reminded of hyenas and
lammergeyer—carrion feeders who plunged their entire heads into
organ flesh. Its eyes were slits. Its clawed footpads ripped up the
snow.

Ash made an uneasy adjustment to the reins,
transferring them into one hand so she could be free to swing the
chain. The gelding flicked back its ears but held its course. The
creature was moving as fast as a big cat, its hip bone springing in a
wavelike motion. Its howls hurt Ash's ears. Carefully, as Ark had
taught her, she raised the sickle knife above her head. The peridot
weight bounced once against her buttocks before she whipped the
chain into motion.

The creature was not heading toward her, she
realized as the chain built up speed and began to whumpf. It was
coming straight for Lan Fallstar. The Far Rider had followed her at a
slower pace; she could hear the sound of his stallion blowing out air
and the jingle of harness metal. Perhaps he was aiming the bow. She
did not look round.

Squeezing the gelding with her thighs, she shifted
her course. The chain was spinning so fast it had passed into
invisibility. The peridots in the weight scribed a green circle in
the air. As she judged distance and time, the creature closed in. Its
elongated jaws sprang apart, revealing dense layers of inward
slanting teeth.

Ash stood in the stirrups and yanked the weight
forward. The beast leapt its muscular hind legs propelling its body
like springs. Shocked by the speed, she realized her shot had fallen
short. Hot pain coursed along her shoulder as the weight reached the
end of its tether with momentum to spare. It snapped with a crack.
The chain crumpled in the middle as the weight shot back toward her.
Ash flicked her wrist with force, sending tension back into the chain
and throwing the weight wide of herself and her horse. As she did
this she was aware of a series of soft retorts.

Thuc. Thuc. Thuc.

Three arrows were loosed in quick succession. The
creature dropped as soon as the first one hit, collapsing into the
snow with a dull thud. Its flesh began to hiss as the other two
arrows struck the big ridge of muscle on its shoulder. The creature
rippled. The outline of its body softened, as if it were somehow
losing its form. Air crackled like a sheet of breaking ice. Ash
breathed it in and wished she hadn't. It was empty of whatever her
lungs required for fuel.

A soft hiss escaped from the creature's gut. All
was still for a moment, and then shadow discharged from its carcass
in an explosive rolling ring. The shock wave blasted Ash's face and
riffled through the fur on her cloak. It was cold in different ways
than the snow, coating her skin with the substance of another world.
Even as she struggled to make sense of it, the substance smoked away
to nothing, tingling as it ceased to exist. It smelled like the thin
air-starved atmosphere at the top of mountains.

Shivering, she turned her horse. Lan Fallstar
stood on his stallion's stirrups, resting his eared longbow. His
chest was pumping rapidly. He had a fourth arrow ready and unused in
his hand. He sat back in the saddle as Ash looked on and scooped up
the reins from his horse's neck. Slinging the bow over his shoulder,
he said to her, "It was foolish to get so close." His
voice was low and loose, and she was glad to hear the fear in it. It
made her like him better.

"It was a good shot. The first one. Must have
been a heart-kill."

His eyes went blank for the briefest moment before
he nodded. "This Sull had a good arrow."

Ash smiled at his modesty. She had traveled with
Raif Sevrance: she knew all about the cost and difficulty of heart
kills. "Come," she said, drawing abreast of him. "Let's
make camp away from this place."

Lan Fallstar returned the unused arrow to its
case, and actually allowed Ash to take the lead. The gelding was
panting and a bit scuddy around the neck so she spoke soft words to
him and set an easy pace. She did not look back at the blasted
remains of the creature in the snow.

As soon as they found a place away from the
carcass, they set up camp. Ash picked a clearing between the
cedars—the towering spruces made her feel too small. She
brushed down both horses while Lan built a fire and prepared food.
The stallion held itself perfectly still as she combed through its
long silky tail. When she was done it delighted her by presenting its
right foreleg for inspection. She checked and discovered part of a
pine cone wedged under its nail. Using her letting knife, she winkled
it out.

When she raised her head, she found Lan Fallstar
staring at her through the flames. She smiled, and although he did
not smile back she imagined she saw a softening in his face. His skin
was deeply golden in the firelight.

He had pitched the wolfskin tent. The sight of it
made heat come to Ash's face. Water spilled from her cup as she
drank. Fear had left her muscles and tendons humming. As she ate her
simple meal of cured horse meat and wafers, she tried to calm
herself. She'd felt better with the horses, she realized. Less jumpy.

Lan had heart-killed a creature that had forced
its way out of the Blind, and somehow that meant she had misjudged
him. It seemed more believable now that he was what he claimed: a Far
Rider. Why had she doubted him when he drew the bow? What did she
know about Sull and all the ways they had of fighting the Unmade? Mal
Naysayer was a giant, solid as a block of granite and terrifying in
battle, but she doubted that even he could have disposed of the
carrion feeder more efficiently than Lan Fallstar. One arrow, shot at
distance. She would not have been able to bring down the creature
herself. It was too fast and strong to be held by a chain. It would
have dragged her from the back of her horse. A Reach did not have
physical power, it seemed. She could track the creatures of the
Blind, but not much else.

Briefly she looked north and wondered where the
Naysayer rested this night. She would have liked to talk to him just
then.

Ash held her hands over the fire, letting its heat
warm her palms. The cedar logs were riddled with pitch holes and the
flames turned amethyst as they burned. Snow had stopped falling but
ice crystals moved through the air like pollen. Lan Fallstar reached
out and took Ash's hands in his. "Come."

He led her to the wolfskin tent where he had
already laid out blankets and furs in a single pile. Light came from
the fire; muted and reds and golds that flickered on Ash's skin. She
stepped out of her cloak, unbuckled her belt, and pulled her dress
over her head. She could smell her sweat, salty and darkly sweet. Her
stomach felt hollow and when Lan touched it muscles quivered. His
hand pushed under her breast, forcing it out so he could close his
mouth around the small hard nipple. His other hand slid between her
legs. Ash gasped. Losing her footing she stumbled backward and Lan
grabbed her hips and guided her down to the floor. As she lay on the
furs he pulled off her boots. He was naked and his sex stood out from
his body. When he had removed both her boots he lowered his head
between her thighs and kissed her sex. Ash tensed, surprised. Slowly
she relaxed as warm liquid heat rolled over belly and thighs. His
tongue slid back and forth, wet and soft. Soon the gentle pressure
was no longer enough and she pushed herself against Lan's face. His
tongue stiffened in response. She could hardly believe anything could
feel this good.

She wondered why she kept seeing the shadow beast
tearing between the trees. Lan's tongue was moving along folds of
tender skin and she stopped breathing as its rhythm grew more
insistent. A single arrow to the heart. Such a small, compact head
and it had stopped something larger and more densely muscled than a
horse.

Ash grabbed at the furs as his tongue entered her.
Urgent pressure built in her belly. She did not want him to stop.

Do not wake, the voice called from the darkness.

As muscles contracted in her thighs and stomach,
she realized she had not seen the first arrow go in.

The Field of Graves and Swords

Vaylo Bludd rode his borrowed horse north to the
Field of Graves and Swords. Mogo Salt, second son of Cawdo, and
Hammie Faa were behind him. The wind was up and ragging, pushing
high and low clouds across the sky. An overnight frost had crisped
the receding snow and it cracked pleasingly when punctured. Vaylo's
horse was a fiery stallion, jet-black, with a long, sculpted head.
When he dug in his heels and loosened the reins, the animal raced up
the valley slope at full gallop.

Gods, but it was good not to think. Just ride and
be damned as your ears chilled to freezing and your tailbone took a
hammering against the cantle. He'd been shut up for too long in the
furry black walls of the hillfort. Too much damp, too many
whisperings, too much fear of what was to come. A hundred and seventy
Bluddsmen were garrisoned there. When had they turned into frightened
girls? We are Bludd, Vaylo wanted to shout out at the morning. We are
not built to sit and wait.

Arriving at the headland that topped the valley,
Vaylo reined in his horse. The Field of Graves and Swords lay
directly ahead of him and he felt the pressure that had been building
in his chest ease. Dead clansmen lay here. Respect was due. He walked
the horse forward through the dried-out heather stalks, rye grass and
snow. The stallion's neck steamed. Vaylo smelled horse sweat and
frozen mud. When he drew close enough to see the canker on the
nearest blade, he dismounted. His feet punched perfect impressions
in the snow.

Deciding to trust the stallion, the Dog Lord let
the horse stand free. Mayhap it would nose something tasty from the
snow. Behind him he was aware of Hammie and Mogo slowing their
mounts. Behind them, the wolf dog was high-trotting through the
white.

The swords were as Cluff Drybannock said: fallen
or falling. Vaylo counted eleven that were wholly upright, and
perhaps twice that number that pierced the snow at odd angles. Dozens
more must lie beyond sight. You could still make out the barrows,
though, the stone mounds that had been raised around the bodies.
Vaylo did not know if Dhoone preferred to cover their dead rather
than bury them, or if it was a case of men fallen in winter with the
earth too hard to be dug. The mounds gave him a chill more than the
swords, for he had not been expecting them. Man-shaped but three
times as big, they were swollen with new snow. Fox tracks led in
toward the middle of the field and Vaylo followed them, his left hand
resting on his horn of powdered guidestone. When he came to the
first sword he halted. Drawing his newly-acquired sable cloak around
his legs, he knelt in the snow. The sword's point was intact but the
blade had been eaten by rust and its edge was gone. It had once been
a greatsword, Vaylo reckoned, probably close to six feet long
including hilt. Someone strong and able must have wielded it. Leaning
forward he touched the cankered edge and was surprised to feel how
firmly it was fixed in place. He had thought the lightest pressure
might have tilted it, and now he wondered about the men who had
formed these mounds and set these swords in place. Had they poured
cement into the warriors' chest cavities and plunged the hilts
between their ribs? What had they feared? What had happened here to
raise these swords?

Slapping a hand on his knee, the Dog Lord rose to
standing. Two ovals of snow shed from the fur of his cloak. On the
periphery of his vision he saw the wolf dog ghosting along the edge
of the mounds. When he heard footsteps approaching he turned.