Fisher came to his side. ‘What is it?’
‘I can’t walk away.’
‘I told you — they’re safe. The farther from here the better.’
But Kyle couldn’t shake the feeling that he was betraying the Losts. It felt wrong, just turning his back. Even if they didn’t want him to follow. ‘No. I have to go back.’
Cal-Brinn joined them. ‘They’re closing. We must keep moving.’
Kyle shook his refusal. ‘We should go back.’
Cal-Brinn’s already wrinkled and burnished features creased further in a frown of consideration. After a moment, he dipped his head in assent. ‘It is early yet, but I was going to have to tell you that we of the Guard cannot continue in any case. There is something pushing against us, so I must send my people back to find Stalker and Badlands. Will you accept this?’
Kyle clasped the amber stone at his neck. It was warm in his chilled hand. ‘I should go. They are my friends.’
‘Your loyalty is to be commended, but it is you our pursuers want, not us. And the Losts are our friends as well.’
He released the stone — the numbness from the bitter cold had gone from his hand. ‘Very well. I just feel … that I have let them down.’
Cal-Brinn inclined his head once more. ‘They would be angry if you showed up. Now, go.’ He motioned for Fisher to hurry him along, then turned to his company. ‘Jup, Leena, attend me!’
The bard took Kyle’s arm and urged him onward. ‘You and I must speak for the Myrni and the Losts above,’ he said, his breath steaming.
Kyle tried to bring his brows down to show his confusion, but his face was too numb. ‘What do you mean?’
‘I mean that any survivors will have been driven to the highlands, just like us. There will be a meeting of the families such as has never taken place.’ He waved to Jethiss, who waited ahead.
Kyle glanced back, still reluctant to go. Cal-Brinn now walked alone, his hands clasped behind his back. His long coat of armour kicked up snow as he pushed through the drifts. ‘A meeting? What for?’
‘To decide what to do.’
They caught up with Jethiss, who was carefully prodding the hidden ice with a broken branch he’d picked up when they had run across the dry stream bed. Kyle was grateful for this, as the great serpent of cerulean ice heaved and groaned as if in constant pain. Explosions of cracking ice would shudder beneath them, sounding up and down its length. The snowstorm and dark clouds obscured the way ahead, but it appeared to be steepening.
Night gathered as they walked, but shifting curtains of lights provided some illumination. They seemed to wreathe the heights, and they reminded Kyle of similar veils he’d seen in Korel, above the Stormriders. He thought they were some sort of manifestation of the manipulations of energy, whatever the source. They tramped on; Jethiss showed no need or inclination to pause. Kyle glanced back often down the sweep of the great serpent behind. Once or twice, through the gusting snows, he thought he glimpsed slim dark figures arrayed across the ice, tatters of cloth whipping from their shoulders.
They reached a plain of ice that lay like a plateau beneath a low bank of black clouds. Through gaps in the clouds he glimpsed a series of slim pinnacles, all bare ash-grey jagged rock: the peaks of this easterly range of the Salt Mountains. Then Fisher gestured ahead to where a group of dark dots marred the pristine silver expanse of blowing snow.
As they neared, the group resolved into four individuals, one sitting cross-legged in the snow, the other three lined up before him. They were a martial group, tall, in leather armour. Closer now, Kyle noted how young the three were, and that the sitting one, an older fellow, was impaled upon a wicked-looking spear.
Jethiss halted and Fisher stepped up to the fore. He raised his hand, calling: ‘Greetings! My name is Fisher and I speak for the Myrni. This is Jethiss, of the Tiste Andii. Kyle, who speaks for the Losts. And Cal-Brinn, of the mercenary company the Crimson Guard.’
The middle lad raised his hand. Kyle saw fresh scarring where a thrust had taken his right eye. A thick bearskin cloak clasped by a large bronze brooch humped his shoulders. ‘Welcome. I am Orman. This is Keth and Kasson. We speak for the Sayers.’ The lad half turned to the silver-haired elder. ‘This is … was … Buri.’
Fisher’s gaze, snapping to Kyle, was wide with wonder. ‘Buri in truth?’ he breathed, awed.
‘Indeed. It was he who summoned the ice-barrier anew.’
‘And who did this to him?’
The lad’s jaws writhed with suppressed emotions. ‘I did,’ he finally ground out, his voice ragged.
‘And why?’ Fisher asked softly.
‘Because he asked that I do so — to seal the invocation.’
Fisher was nodding. ‘I see. That must have been a … difficult … thing to do.’
With his one good eye, Orman was studying Fisher. ‘You give the name Fisher — not the Fisher, the bard?’
‘Yes.’
The Sayer was obviously quite impressed: he took a deep breath. ‘My father spoke of you. We are honoured.’
Fisher inclined his head in recognition of the compliment. ‘Any others? The Heels? No Bains survived?’
Orman shook his head, saying in a bitter tone: ‘The Bains are gone.’
‘Then we must decide upon our course of action.’
The Sayer glanced back to exchange a look with his two fellows. ‘How so? It is over. We can reclaim our Holdings.’
‘The Holdings are beneath rods of ice. But more to the point, we are pursued.’
‘Pursued? The outlanders?
‘That would be a simple matter. No, I speak of another enemy.’
The lad started in recognition. He exhaled a steaming breath in wonder. ‘The old enemy?’
Fisher nodded. ‘Aye. Our Army of Dust and Bone — the T’lan Imass.’
‘I know them only as the Undying Army.’
‘Close enough.’
‘But,’ Orman gestured back to the corpse of Buri, ‘the invocation was completed — this was his purpose …’
Fisher advanced until he could press a hand to the lad’s shoulder. ‘I know. And it has been successful. But some it seems are resisting enough to advance. Or a Bonecaster, one of their shamans, has come. In any case, we must flee.’
The Sayer lad appeared almost shattered by the suspicion that he had done what he did for nothing. Kyle could not help but step up as well, saying, ‘It is working — few are coming. We will escape, I’m sure.’
‘Someone is coming now,’ Jethiss announced, staring south. Kyle spun, his hand going to the grip of the white blade tucked in his belt.
Two tall figures emerged from the blowing snow, a young man and woman. Everyone drew weapons. Kyle took a few hesitant steps; he knew the one with the great bunch of wild curly hair. He raised his hand. ‘It is the Heels.’ He ran down to meet them. ‘Baran, welcome!’ He took his hand. The lad smiled behind the rime hardened round his beard. ‘Cull or Yullveig?’
The smile faded and Baran shook his head. He turned, pointing, ‘We aren’t alone.’
Kyle squinted into the gusts. Thin figures approached. Their tattered leathers and cloaks snapped and lashed in the wind and he shivered — for a moment he thought them Imass. They closed, and to his astonishment he recognized them … Shimmer, Blues and K’azz of the Crimson Guard. And with them a fourth person, a young girl, of obvious Iceblood heritage.
K’azz came forward. He walked bowed, as if struggling beneath a great weight. Kyle was shocked by his condition: emaciated and haggard, cheeks grey and drawn. The man was hardly more than skin and bone. Yet fire flashed in his eyes and he offered up a warm smile. ‘Kyle of Bael lands,’ he said. ‘It is good to see you.’
Kyle took his hands, found them frozen into rigid claws. ‘What by all the gods …’ he wondered aloud. ‘Why are you here?’
Shimmer approached and he embraced her, flinching when he found her skin as cold as the snow. It even held the same silvery paleness. ‘Kyle,’ she said. ‘We hear great stories of the white blade.’ He could only laugh as he gripped Blues’ hand.