Soldiers of Ice (6 page)

Martine set a punishing pace until finally, exhausted, they reached the woodsman’s lonely cabin.

Once inside, Vii built a fire while Martine squirmed out of her bulky gear. Freed of its weight, she collapsed into one of the hard-backed chairs, exhausted and discouraged.

‘qrqhat will you do now?” Vii asked while adding bits of tinder to the fire.

The woman shook her head in resignation, her short, sweaty bangs clinging to her forehead. “Go on to the Great Glacier, of course. I’ve got a job to do.” With a groaning sigh, she considered just how much she had banked on the gnomes’ help to accomplish her mission. Now, without a knowledgeable guide, the chance of quick success was almost nonexistent. The same was true of her opportunity Soldiers of !ce

41

to impress the other Harpers with her efficiency.

Her fingers brushed Jazrac’s knife, and then it was in her hand. Weighing the dagger in her palm, she thought about writing to Jazrac for advice, an idea she quickly discarded.

Without thinking, she twirled the blade between her fingers effortlessly and flipped it point first into the tabletop, where it stuck, quivering.

Vil rumbled in disapproval.

Martine quickly whisked the blade back to its sheath.

“Sorry. Nervous habit. If you’ll have me as guest one More night, I’ll be gone in the morning.” She rubbed her hand on the table to smooth out the nick.

“Of course.” Vii stood to his full height. “You’re determined to go north, then?”

The Harper nodded.

Vil hung a pot of water on the firedog and swung it over the flame. “If you’re willing, I could guide you,” he offered almost casually.

“You?” Martine asked, realizing how she sounded even as she spoke. “I mean, I know you could, but aren’t you—”

‘Foo old?”

“—too busy?”

Vil chuckled. From him, it sounded strange. “In wintertime, there’s hardly a thing to do but split wood and hunt up here, and I can hunt at the glacier. I admit I know less about the north than the gnomes do.” The old warrior sat on the hearth and still managed to be taller than Martine in her chair. “But I know More than you.”

”You don’t have to do this.”

“I want to help.”

Just as she was about to voice another protest, Martine reconsidered Vil’s offer. There was no mistaking the earnestness in his eyes.

“How soon can you leave?” The question was cautious, designed to still give him an excuse to say no, but Martine 42

The Harpers

could only remember Jazrac’s old advice about allies that no one ever helps without a good reason. What was Vii-helm’s reason? She wondered if the old wizard would have

agreed to let him accompany her.

“As soon as you’re ready. Tomorrow?”

“Seriously?” It was Vil’s turn to nod. ‘q’hen tomorrow it is,” Martine agreed, still not comfortable with her choice.

The next morning found the pair airborne as Astriphie labored under the double weight of two riders. Vil sat behind Martine’s saddle, bloodless fingers clutching the saddle’s angled back. Although the wind was bitter at this height, it was More than the cold that made him shiver.

Even with a rope lashed around his waist, the man clearly did not feel safe. Martine tried to distract him, but between the wind’s howling bite and the hippogriff’s labored pants, it was only possible to communicate by shouting. After a few minutes of that, Martine knew she had to stop or lose her voice.

Nonetheless, the woodsman’s ability to guide from the air impressed the ranger, considering that common landmarks seemed to transform themselves from a height of a

thousand feet. At Vil’s direction, Astriphie was making a straight course for a low gap in the mountains to the north.

Unlike the pass at the southern end of the valley, which had been a smooth, open snowfield that stretched above the timberline, the northern pass stood out dark green as the trees marched right up and over the crest of the ridge.

To the left and right of the gap, the mountains sloped down like weak shoulders till they joined the curve of pass.

Below them, Vil pointed out the river that flowed from the pass, a churning white ribbon that cut though the green foliage. That, he shouted, was their path until they crossed Soldiers of !ce

4

over to the north ridge.

Gradually, pulling higher with each beat of Astriphie’

wings, the trio passed over the ridge, crossing from th gnome-occupied woods of the south to the cold and fer north. Beyond the ridge lay another valley penned in b mountains. It stretched out like a narrow finger to th north until it abruptly ended, truncated across its length b a sparkling wall that at this distance seemed to flow frm between the mountain peaks like frozen treacle. In th morning sunshine, the distant glacial ice looked like a di: mond set in silver. The wall’s many facets glittered an glowed, beckoning them forward.

“Amazing!” Martine leaned back as she shouted so Ľ

could hear. The Harper had never seen such a great wall ice before. The jewel-like glacier rose over a bed of darl brooding green, a virgin forest that seemed to shrin before the ice’s advance. The glacier towered over even th tallest trees and then stretched backward into the mom tains until everything disappeared in a tangled horizon smooth ice rivers and rock.

‘WV’here to now?” Vil bellowed.

Martine realized she didn’t actually know what she wa looking for. Jazrac had been long on explanation about h!

elemental rift, but the wizard had never really told her whl to look for. He had said it was on the glacier, but that w, all. Martine didn’t realize then how vast a glacier could b, Still, she couldn’t admit not knowing what to do after dra ging her host this far into the wilderness.

“When we get there, look for some kind of a disturbanc something unusual on the glacier.” Although her answl seemed a safe bet, she was thankful that the yelling effe tively hid any doubt in her voice.

“How long?”

“What?”

“How long for your mount to get us there?”

44

The Harpers

“An hour, maybe less,” the Harper answered as she

scanned the valley floor, trying to gauge their distance to the ice wall. Just then she thought she spotted something below. “What’s that down there?” Used to traveling alone, Martine pulled Astriphie into a quick dive, prompting Vil to clutch frantically at her waist. “Hold on,” she remembered to caution tardily.

“Look down there,” she asked, pointing toward a small clearing as they leveled out once More. ‘
-hat’s that?”p>

Vil strained, his eyes tearing against the cold, until he made out what had caught her attention. It was a thin stream of smoke rising from the edge of the clearing. As they swooped closer, he made out a cluster of long narrow huts in the shadow of the trees.

“Gnolls—this is their valley. They are the reason the Vani would not come here.”

“The gnomes were afraid?” There was no mockery in

Martine’s question.

“Each respects the other’s valley. Usually there is no trouble. Besides, it is best not to rouse the hornet’s nest.”

As he spoke, three figures darted from the huts for the dark shelter of the woods. “Best to fly high. They are skilled with the bow.”

Were she alone, Martine would have swept as low as she dared for a better view. Instead, she heeded Vil’s warning and pulled Astriphie back up.

“Are there many of them?”

‘I’he gnolls? It’s not a large tribe, but More than the Vani … enough to be a threat.”

Vil’s answer sounded ominous. Although there were More questions she could have raised about the skills of the gnolls, their hunting patterns, and even their totems, Martine lapsed into silence, the cold and the shouting getting the better of her throat. There was a great deal you could learn about such creatures from things like totems, Soldiers of lee

45

she thought idly. Take a bear totem—it meant the tribe respected strength and solidity, a good sign all in all, even in savage creatures like gnolls. On the other hand, if the totem were, say, an ice worm, that wasn’t a good sign.

Tribes that chose totems like that were too often cruel and ravenous like their god.

Given the proximity of the glacier, she wouldn’t be surprised if this group had chosen the latter. The closeness of the ice probably made for sudden death. Hard lives bred hard gods.

A tug at her coat reminded Martine of her duty. ‘q’here!”

Vil shouted at her ear to be heard over the wind. “Over there!” Tentatively easing his grip, he pointed to a swirling plume of ice, a jet of frozen crystals, that heaved and spurted like the irregular storms of the sea against the crested shore. The icy column rose up until it expanded like some swollen vegetable—a cauliflower instantly came to Martine’s mind.

“See it? Is that it?” Vil shouted again, uncertain if she had heard him.

“It must be. It’s certainly unusual,” she howled back.

Martine had no doubt it must be her goal. What else but a geyser of hoarfrost would mark a rift such as Jazrac had explained? She understood now why the wizard hadn’t bothered to describe it. With a rekindled confidence that she could end this quickly, Martine leaned the hippogriff in a broad arc that would carry them toward the plume.

When they had less than a mile to go, the air around them changed, the temperature plummeting with ferocious suddenness. Bone-gnawing cold attacked every inch of exposed skin, even penetrating through the layers of fur that had managed to keep them warm till now. Astriphie rocked and struggled mightily against the increasing buffets of the frenzied gale.

The trio were close enough now to make out vaguely, 46

The Harl)ers

through the swirling gaps of wind-burning ice, the star-shaped fissure, crudely heaved upward in cracked blocks.

The main ice jet, for now it was apparent there was a small group of lesser fumaroles, pulsed with the otherworldly ride that forced its icy discharge up from the center of the fissure and sent it flowing down one of the jagged arms.

The tighter the gap became, the higher the plume shot as the pressure increased until it hit the end. Lightning couldn’t have raised greater thunder as the geyser broke over the splintered end, blowing out chunks of glacial ice visible even at a distance.

Vil shouted something, but most of it was lost: “—so close?

Martine shook her head furiously at what she guessed he had said. “Closer. The less time on the ground, the better.”

She hoarsely shouted her explanation, although it was unlikely Vil could hear any better than she. With a firm command, she pushed the hippogriff, its normally keen eyes now flashing with fire, closer and closer. “We’ll move in quick and—”

The concussive boom of the roaring flux devoured the rest of her words. Astriphie’s wingbeats faltered, momentarily pitching the group into an unplanned dive. Behind

her, Vil’s weight shifted, threatening to overbalance the hippogriff. Dropping the reins from one hand, Martine thrust her arm back and levered the slipping woodsman back into his seat. The effort burned her throat in frozen gasps and triggered a fit of wracking coughs. The fire of ice scorched her lungs, left her mouth filled with pasty spit.

The shuddering gasps left her unable to steer, and by the time Marfine recovered, it was too late. Astriphie, uncontrolled, had panicked and plunged iceward while attempting

to wheel away from the fissure, the source of the beast’s terror. Just as the hippogriff slipped into a steep-banked turn, the geyser spewed forth another shuddering blast.

Soldiers of lee

47

The great pinioned wings were spread almost full against the outrushing force of the wind, catching it like the swollen sails of a yacht leaping before the ocean breeze.

Frantically sensing the danger, Martine pitched her slight body hard into the rushing wind the way a sailor on that same yacht would lean himself as a counterbalance against the tipping hull. Understanding the need for her move, Vii leaned with her. For a perilous moment, they held the balance, the arc of a perfect parabola suspended between the shattered white ground and the roiling sky. We can make it, Martine exulted.

And then it was over. Astriphie’s voice, a whinnying screech of pain, sundered all hope. The hoarse cry barely drowned out the sickening popping noise as the

hippogriff’s uppermost wing crumpled, flexing back over Martine and Vil to angle in directions it was never meant to point. The imaginary parabola collapsed as the rushing wind seemed to roll the crippled hippogriff completely over.

Suspended time was replaced by a whirling blur of snow and sky as the hippogriff tumbled from the heavens. The beast frantically beat at the air with its remaining wing, the other flopping uselessly with each roll, feathers raking the Harper’s face as she struggled to guide her frenzied mount down. Behind her, Vil could do no More than cling to whatever purchase he could gain, More than once finding himself suspended helplessly by the single safety rope around his waist.

Loosing the now useless reins, Martine lunged to the side, flattening against the hippogriff’s unsocketed wing as the fall righted the creature. The agonized screech from the pain she caused echoed in the woman’s ears, but the great wing responded and struggled to spread itself full once More. It was barely enough time, for the ground, all icy barbs and jagged ridges, was speeding up toward them.

There was no hope of slowing their furious glide, indeed 48

The Harjers

barely any chance of remaining righted. As the glacial landing field swelled closer, Marfine knew it meant the death of her brave steed and almost surely its riders.

“Cut free!” she screamed, one thick gloved hand fumbling for her knife. “Cut yourself free and jump!” With the jagged ice splinters that lay below, it wasn’t much of a chance, but it was their only one.

Martine heard a sharp twanging sound behind her, and the plummeting hippogriff lurched as its load suddenly shifted. The Harper thought she heard a human howl, and then it was lost in the sweeping gale.