A Fortress of Grey Ice (Book 2) (56 page)

So far no one had challenged him or even stared too hard, but that didn’t stop him from feeling anxious. In his mind he rehearsed what he would say to the gatekeep. It was only a few words, but he worried he’d get in a muddle and they’d come out wrong. As the line shortened he experimented with his staff, trying for a pose that seemed unthreatening. Tucked under his belt or slung on his back it seemed too much like a weapon ready to be drawn, and in the end he settled on holding it in his hand as if it were a flagpole.

Just as he was about to reconsider the flagpole hold, the hay wagon trundled under the gate, and a voice called out, “Next.”

Crope moved forward into the shadow of the gate tower, glad of Town Dog’s warmth near his heart. A man-at-arms cloaked in red leather with a bird broach at his throat presented his spear.

“Name?”

“Crope of Drowned Lake.”

The man had to tilt his head to look at Crope’s face. The guard’s gray eyes glanced over the ragged beard that had grown on Crope’s face since he’d left the pipe, and the thick scars on his ears and neck. He said tersely, “Trade?”

Crope could no longer stand the scrutiny. “Free miner,” he replied, looking down.

“You’re too late for sapping. Army’s moving out within the week.”

Crope didn’t understand what he meant. Slowly the panic began to rise.

The guard was losing patience. He lowered his spear. “On your way, big man. The Spire’s been closed to freebooters and mercenaries since yesterday at noon, under order from the surlord himself.”

Knew you had suet for brains.
Crope struggled to make sense of the guard’s words, but it was difficult with the bad voice speaking in his head.

Someone in the queue behind him shouted, “Stop holding up the line.”

The guard turned toward the sentry post to summon more men. As he took a breath to make the call, Crope mumbled, “Not mercenary. Not here to fight.”

The guard hesitated. “What you here for, then?”

This was the question Crope had practiced for. Although he didn’t much want to, he raised his head. “Here to visit with the priests in the Bone Temple.”

Something behind the guard’s gray eyes changed. He raised the spear. “Best get going, then,” he said quietly, stepping aside.

Relief made Crope’s ears glow with heat. Half a century later and the words taught to him by the black-skinned mummers of the Ivory Plains still worked like magic.
Learn them
, long-limbed Swalhabi had commanded.
There is not a city in the Known World that does not possess a Bone Temple. And when we travel north to new places and pale men bar our way, we speak these words and watch the pale men step aside. Bone Temples house powerful magic, and no man, pale or dark, will risk that magic being turned against him.

Every night for thirty days Swalhabi had made Crope repeat the words until they soaked into the fabric of his brain. Swalhabi had sold him half a year later to the salt mines, but Crope had never blamed him for it. Once the giant-slaying masque had grown old there were no more parts for him to play.

Mumbling his thanks to Swalhabi and the other mummers, Crope entered the city of Spire Vanis.

It vibrated with the presence of his lord. Hundreds of miles west, over mountains, frozen lakes and tilled fields, and somehow the journey had overshadowed what he sought. He hadn’t meant to let it, but the world above the diamond pipe was unknown to him, terrible and fraught with danger, and during his travels he’d drop to the ground exhausted at night and spare barely a thought for his lord. Tears of shame filled Crope’s eyes.

Come to me
, his lord had commanded. And now, at last, he had.

An early dusk was setting in behind the walls. Candles were being lit within buildings, filling the blank squares of windows with golden light. Ahead, the driver of the hay wagon had stopped to light his driver’s lamp. Crope watched the careful precautions the man took before striking his flint, using his body to shield the load from stray sparks. By the time the job was done and the horn guard was secured over the flame, Crope had caught up with the rear of the wagon, deciding to follow in its wake for a while.

The city was very large and grand. It seemed more orderly than most he’d known, and the ways traveled by the hay wagon were wide and open. Mounds of slush were melting along the roadsides, sending little streams of water spiraling down drains. The air was still between the high buildings, and mist was beginning to form.

Town Dog grew restless and wriggled against Crope’s chest until he set her down. As they followed the wagon west and then south, he was overcome with the conviction that he was drawing closer to his lord. It had been the same with Mannie Dun, who always knew the best place to dig for diamonds. Crope had asked him once how he did it, and Mannie had tapped the bridge of his nose and said he felt them in his bones. That was how it was for Crope: Baralis was in his bones.

The wagon seemed to be heading toward the massive, high-walled structure that dominated the south of the city. The fortress. Torches burned from the ramparts and the wailing of horns blasted from the walls. The streets grew busier, and it seemed to Crope that everyone was moving in the same direction as the wagon. The bad voice began to whisper to him, telling him that he’d better be careful or he’d make some thick-headed mistake and fail. Crope curved his neck and shrank his shoulders, praying for something he’d never known in his life: obscurity in a crowd.

He was so close to his lord now—he could shut his eyes and
see
him. His lord was in the dark place . . . and he hurt. Crope could not bear to think about how he hurt.

“Make way! Delivery for the stable!” The driver of the hay wagon stood on the running board and cracked his whip. He’d arrived at a gate in the fortress wall, but couldn’t approach it due to the press of revelers who were standing in front of the lowered portcullis.

One of the men-at-arms manning the wall shouted a reply. Six heavily armed red cloaks emerged from the gate station and began moving back the crowd.

Come to me.

Crope suddenly knew he had to be inside the fortress. While everyone else was moving back, he moved forward. Grabbing hold of the wagon’s ring hook, he hoisted himself onto the tailgate that ran along the rear.

The wagon lurched forward, traveled a few paces, and then halted. Booted footsteps sounded. Someone called, “Check the hay,” and a series of sharp crunching noises followed as one of the red cloaks stabbed the bales. Crope kept very still, but he knew it was only seconds before he was spotted.

A spear blade passed close to his knee. Town Dog growled.

A man’s voice called, “Driver! Is this your man?”

Crope heard the rider shout, “Ain’t no one pitching hay but me”—and then a spear tip jabbed the back of Crope’s neck.

“You’d best step down, hay man. And while you’re at it you can tell me what business you intended in the fortress.”

Knew you wouldn’t get it right.
Crope raised his arms and turned slowly to face the red cloak. His ears were hot, and he couldn’t think of any words.

Two other red cloaks joined the one with the spear, and all three men kept their weapons raised as Crope jumped from the step. The revelers were quiet now, sensing entertainment. The driver of the wagon peered around the back wheel to get a look.

The red cloak with the spear said, “Do you want to spend the night in jail?”

Crope shook his head.

Someone in the crowd piped up, “He came to try his chances with the bride!”

Laughter spread in an ugly wave. A woman shouted, “He’s almost as handsome as the Knife.”

Crope felt the color rise up his neck.

“Enough!” shouted one of red cloaks. And then, to Crope, “Speak up for yourself, man.”

“Wedding. Come to see the wedding.”

The red cloak rolled his eyes. “You’re too late for that. Wedding took place this morning. It’s the feasting tonight.”

As the red cloak finished speaking, horns blared within the fortress, sounding a call to attention. Crope looked up along with everyone else, and saw the heralds in all their finery atop the wall. Torches blazed around the flat-sided tower closest to the gate, throwing light and shadows across the stonework. At the halfway point of the tower an embrasured balcony had been draped with a silk cloth that showed a fearsome red bird on a silver ground. As Crope watched, two heralds stepped onto the balcony and sounded a fanfare before stepping aside. A moment passed and then a man and a woman came into view, and the crowd began cheering and stamping their feet.

The woman was dressed in stiff red silk that glittered with diamonds—even from a distance Crope knew them for real. She was black-haired and pale, and she did not smile. The man standing at her side was large and broad, and when he took her hand in his it was like watching a wolf eat a chick. One of his eyes was gone, and he wore no device to conceal it.

The pair stood uncomfortably, and suffered the attention of the crowd. After perhaps a minute had passed, another man stepped into the light . . . and robbed the very breath from Crope’s throat.

It was the pale-eyed man, the one who had taken his lord. Eighteen years later and Crope knew him as surely as if he’d looked into the man’s face every night. His lord’s captor. His enemy. The man who had left him to die.

The pale-eyed man drew renewed cheers from the crowd. He was dressed in quiet finery of subtle hues; butter-soft suedes in gray and maroon, all edged with bands of gold. He was carrying something heavy in a small cloth-of-gold sack, and when he shifted it to ease the weight the crowd cheered. The pale-eyed man smiled but did not show his teeth. His gaze swept down to the gate, taking in the great crush of revelers. Instinctively, Crope stepped into the shadow of the wagon. He saw the pale-eyed man’s gaze track the movement, saw him peer into the shadow, and then look away.

The pale-eyed man appeared to lose a beat of concentration before leaning forward to lay a kiss on the bride’s lips. The cloth-of-gold sack had passed into the bride’s keeping, and she seemed to gain some color now that her hand was no longer in her husband’s grip. As she untied the sack’s drawstring and reached inside, the crowd began a singsong chant.

“
Fair bride, share your bounty. Cast the grain
.”

The bride took a handful of something gold out of the sack, and showered it on the crowd. Crope felt little pellets, like hailstones,
ping
off his shoulders and bounce to the ground. He caught a glimpse of one as it fell at his feet: a tiny nugget of gold cast in the shape of a wheat germ. The crowd surged forward, a cry went up from the red cloaks, and Crope found himself in the middle of a feeding frenzy.

When he looked up next the pale-eyed man had gone. The bride cast one more handful of golden grain and then withdrew into the tower with her husband.

Crope stood for a moment, watching the space the pale-eyed man had vacated, and then turned away. The red cloak who had challenged him waved him along with his spear. In the madness of the grab for gold he had more important matters on his mind. Crope whistled for Town Dog, and worried like a mother until the little dog appeared. Taking no chances, he scooped her up and tucked her under his cloak. Ducking his head low, he pushed gently through the crowd.

Come to me
, his lord had commanded. Now Crope had arrived he had to figure out how.

TWENTY-SEVEN

The Rift

T
he infant’s body was laid on a board, and the Maimed Women crouched beside it and washed it with spirits. The mother stood apart, her belly distended, her bodice stained dark with seeping milk. A Maimed Man was oiling the crude winch fixed to the edge of the rimrock, hunching his shoulders against the swirling snow.

Raif stood beside the cragsman Addie Gunn and watched as Traggis Mole approached the newborn’s corpse. The infant’s eyes had already been removed, and the eyelids sewn shut with black thread. Traggis Mole scattered the women with the briefest movement of his wrist, and knelt alone beside the board. Gently, and with great care, the Robber Chief lifted the newborn’s head. The baby’s scalp was covered with a fine down of auburn hair, and Traggis Mole ran his fingers through it before reaching for the hood. The Robber Chief’s face was dark. At the left side of his temple Raif could see the pressure line where the straps that held his wooden nose in place had dug into his skin.

Charms had been sewn into the little woolen hood: glass beads and drilled coins and sprigs of dried touch-me-nots. As Traggis Mole pulled the hood over the infant’s face, all who had gathered became quiet. The Robber Chief nodded to the man with the winch, signaling for him to come forward and take possession of the board. As the winchman secured the board to the cable rope, the Maimed Women began to keen. Raif felt hairs rise on the back of his neck. He had never heard such a sound made by humans; a deep and joyless howling, as if the wind itself blew through them.

When Traggis Mole gave the word, the winchman began turning the crank, and the board holding the stillborn infant was lowered into the Rift.

The mother did not move as the barrel turned. She was no longer young, and Addie Gunn whispered that this bairn would likely be her last. A boy stepped forward and handed Traggis Mole a burning torch, and the Robber Chief moved to the edge of the rimrock. It was late morning, and a cold snap had brought the high white clouds bearing snow. Snowflakes danced on the Rift’s updrafts, swooping and soaring; hissing into nothingness if they strayed too close to the Robber Chief’s flame.

“Poor thing,” Addie Gunn said quietly, dropping his head in respect. “Wasn’t whole enough to live.”

As the winchman cranked the barrel, Traggis Mole touched the cable rope with the torch. The rope’s tightly bound fibers crackled and charred, and then hot yellow flames caught light. The winchman continued cranking, and the burning section of rope dropped from sight as the infant was lowered deeper into the abyss. The Maimed Women bellowed, their song growing stranger and more terrible until the moment the tension left the rope.