'Well,' Raffen announced in a loud whisper, 'now's our chance. We could make a run for it, and it'd be dawn before they could get after us.'
'True,' Poldarn replied with a yawn, 'but where in hell do you suggest we go?'
Nobody had an answer to that, so they went to sleep.
They were up again early the next day, still debating what best to do about the lost ford. Clearing it was out of the question-the rocks were far too big. In the end it came down to two possible choices: to press on to the next ford, or to turn round and head back to Ciartanstead. Neither option was in the least bit attractive. Taking liberties with the Sceldsbrook people was far too dangerous, the escort argued. True; but traipsing back to Ciartanstead and getting shouted at wasn't likely to solve anything. The ford would still be blocked when Eyvind sent them out again, and they'd have had a long and dreary ride for nothing.
'There's another way,' Poldarn said quietly. 'We could go up the mountain.'
The escort weren't at all keen about that. By now, however, they'd more or less forgotten that they were guards in charge of dangerous criminals, and when nobody else could come up with a better suggestion, they politely asked Poldarn what would be involved. He told them: they'd have to send back the cart and the horses and walk, but of course it would be a far shorter distance, as the crow flew, and there shouldn't be any danger from the volcano. They'd follow his original trail up the mountain, and when they reached the place where he'd diverted the fire-stream, all they'd have to do would be to follow it down into the valley, take a detour round the remains of Eyvind's wood and get to the farm that way. True, he admitted, if they were prepared to ditch the horses and the wagon they could probably get across the ford, using the fallen boulders as stepping stones, but then they'd have a very long walk round the edge of the mountain instead of a short one up and down it. It was up to them, Poldarn said; whereupon the escort said that they'd prefer to leave it up to him, since he seemed to be the man with the ideas.
So up the mountain they went. Poldarn set them a crisp pace, and they were able to reach the point where the fire-stream had been breached just before nightfall. The stream itself was grey now instead of cherry red, but it was still viciously hot, and the only water they had with them was in a couple of two-gallon leather bottles, carried by Asburn and Raffen. Only three of the escort were with them by this stage, the others having left to take back the horses and the wagon.
'And you actually smashed a hole in that?' one of the three asked in amazement, as the heat forced him to step back rapidly. 'Bloody hell.'
Poldarn grinned. 'It was a damn sight worse when we were working up here,' he said. 'Wasn't it, Asburn?'
'Much worse,' the blacksmith agreed. 'If we'd been standing as close as this, we'd be dead by now.'
The guard shook his head. 'Rather you than me, then,' he said. 'Even thinking about it gives me the horrors. Mind you, I've always been scared stiff of fire and stuff like that.'
'Oh, it's not so bad once you're used to it,' Poldarn said blandly. 'You've just got to treat it with a bit of respect, that's all. I learned that in the smithy.'
'Yes, well,' the guard mumbled. 'You wouldn't catch me doing that job, either.'
They were tired enough to be able to fall asleep immediately, in spite of their acutely uncomfortable surroundings, and they slept through till shortly after dawn, at which point they were woken up by a brisk shower of rain. At first, they couldn't figure out what was going on; it seemed as if they were being wrapped up in a small, predatory cloud that hissed at them like a small but fierce animal.
'It's the rain,' Poldarn realised. 'The rocks are so hot, it's turning to steam before it lands.'
As soon as they started walking through it, they discovered that the cloud was rather wetter than the rain would have been. They were soaked to the skin by the time they began the rather nerve-racking scramble down the steep incline that led straight towards Eyvind's ill-fated wood. The further down they went, the thicker the cloud became-presumably, Poldarn decided, because the surface of the fire-stream was hotter down below than up here, where its skin had thickened into a stout insulating wall-and finding their way without sliding or falling became a difficult and challenging pastime. Fortunately, the three escorts knew their own side of the mountain as well or better than the Haldersness people knew theirs; they were practically capable of navigating with their eyes shut. As was the way with terrifying experiences, the climb down to the relatively level plain seemed to take for ever, and then was suddenly over. Just when the ground started to level out under his feet, however, and the cloud seemed to be dispersing, Poldarn found that he was on his own. He couldn't see the rest of the party, not even as dim grey shapes at the edges of clarity, and he couldn't hear their footsteps or the sound of their voices. Also, he was looking at a very fine house, newly built and extremely smart, its pale yellow thatch not yet weathered to grey. That was very strange, since by his calculations he should be standing on the lip of the wooded combe, or the place where it used to be. He went a few yards further and realised that he could see the ground behind the house falling sharply away; that was the combe all right, no doubt about it, though there weren't any trees any more. He was wondering where he'd wandered off to when a cheerful shout made him jump.
He turned his head in the direction the voice had come from, and saw a shape taking form through the curtain of mist. He recognised it at once.
'Eyvind,' he said.
'There you are!' He sounded much happier than he had the last time they'd spoken to each other. 'I was starting to wonder where in hell you'd got to.'
'We got held up,' Poldarn said. 'The ford was blocked.'
'What, again?' Eyvind clicked his tongue and shook his head. 'I'm going to have to talk to Sceld about that. If he can't keep his damned cows from treading in the cutting, he'll have to find some other grazing for them. It's getting beyond a joke.'
For some reason, Poldarn felt prompted to look round at the mountain behind him. Its profile was entirely different, back the way it used to be before the volcano tore it apart, and it was capped with an elegant crown of pure white snow.
'Anyway,' Eyvind said, clapping an arm round his shoulders, 'you're here now, that's the main thing. Bersa'll be pleased. She's been hovering round the porch all day, looking to see if you were coming. She won't admit that, of course.'
Eyvind was frogmarching Poldarn along, giving him no choice but to walk with him towards the house. He had an idea that it wouldn't be advisable to go in there, but he didn't see how he could break away without giving offence. Then a crow lifted off the ground in front of them. Eyvind let him go and stooped to pick up a stone; he threw, and missed, and suddenly the cloud came down again. It lifted almost immediately, and Poldarn found he was looking at a very different landscape. There was no house, and no combe. Instead, the fire-stream marched straight as an army road towards a glowing red circle on the ground. On the edges, Poldarn could see the blackened stumps of trees. On either side, for about a hundred yards, the turf was burned down to ash and bare black soil. Boulders, dragged along by the stream and discarded at random, stuck out like a flock of feeding birds. The rain had stopped.
He looked round for the others and saw them, seven little dots in the distance, on the far edge of the red circle. The crow Eyvind had walked up swung in a wide circle overhead, screamed something offensive, and waddled across the sky towards the horizon.