Winter Door (14 page)

“You have reached the changing time,” the centaur observed. “You are no longer a child, though you are not yet a woman. It is a time of great power and confusion among my kind and maybe your kind, too. This is my mother, and the leader of our tribe, Suria Lightfoot,” he added proudly, gesturing at the other centaur.

“Greetings, Rage Winnoway and Billy Thunder,” the female centaur said regally. “I hope that you will be able to find a way to end this deadly winter.”

“You honor us, Lady Centaur,” Billy said courteously. “I hope we can help.”

“Greetings, Princess Nomadiel of the little folk. How fare you?” Suria Lightfoot addressed the child with grave courtesy.

“I fare as well as we all do in this dark time,” Nomadiel said surprisingly softly.

“We have human garments that, though not beautiful, will serve to keep your friends warm,” Suria said, taking a pack from her back and dropping it into the snow. She nodded to the male centaur, who removed his own pack and dropped it beside the first. “There is food and other supplies such as you may need in the other pack.”

“Will you carry us to the castle trail?” Nomadiel asked.

“I will bear you there,” the male centaur said. “I did not know that you would travel, Princess, but I can carry all three of you, if you desire it. I am Galantir Longleg.”

“Thank you, Galantir Longleg,” Nomadiel said with dignity. She turned to Billy and nodded at the packs. “You had better dress so that we can go.”

Rage and Billy picked up the packs and carried them into the hut. Rage was relieved to find warm leggings, undershirts, and soft hide boots. There were also thick overtunics and warm, hooded coats. All the clothes were mud colored, roughly made, and scratchy, but they were warm, and that was the main thing. As they dressed, Rage asked Billy what he made of Nomadiel’s manner.

“She smells wounded,” he said, but before he could elaborate, Nomadiel came to the door and asked if they were not ready yet. “We must ride at once, for Suria Lightfoot says another storm cycle will soon begin.”

They quickly gathered their things, then clambered onto Galantir’s broad back, apologizing for their clumsiness. There were no stirrups or saddle to help them. Once they were mounted, Billy in front of Rage and Nomadiel behind her, Billy was commanded to tangle his fists in Galantir’s flowing mane. Then the centaur gave a wild neighing cry and broke into a canter that soon became a gallop.

The wind in Rage’s face was so cold that her eyes watered. She was glad not to be in front; Billy was shielding her from the worst of the icy wind. After a little, she found a way to peer over his shoulder. She was disappointed to see only a snowy road winding between two high, snowy banks. Before long, she felt drowsy from the rough monotony of the movement and the sameness of the view. She dreamed that she was walking in a dark, desolate place.

“See what will coming now, stupid ragewinnoway,” snarled the firecat.

Rage stiffened and whirled, but she could see no sign of the brightness within which the wretched creature hid its true form. “Where are you?” Her voice was sharp with anger and frustration, and she quickly modified it. “Will you come and speak with me? I’m sorry I didn’t listen before but—”

“Too late,” the firecat hissed.

This time when it spoke, there was a flare of light. It seemed to be coming from a puddle of oily liquid caught in a depression. Rage crossed to it and looked in. Sure enough, a reflection of the firecat glared out at her, its red eyes glittering.

“I said that I was sorry,” Rage said, trying to keep her voice even. “Now, if you want me to help the wizard, you must tell me what he sent you to tell me. Was it something about closing the winter door? Something about the gap between Valley and my world?”

The firecat gave no response.

“Please,” Rage said. “If you don’t tell me, I can’t help the wizard.”

“Ragewinnoway hates wizard,” the firecat said triumphantly.

Rage could not bring herself to lie. “I don’t much like him, it’s true. But that won’t stop me helping him.”

A cunning look shifted in the molten eyes. “Maybe firecat bringing you to wizard. You wanting that?”

Some instinct held her from agreeing. “Where is the wizard?” she asked. “Why didn’t he come himself, rather than sending you?”

The firecat glowed. “Ragewinnoway trying to trick firecat!”

Confused, Rage shook her head. “Trick you how?”

But there was no answer because something was dragging Rage away.

Rage opened her eyes to find that she was lying in the snow looking up at Nomadiel. She was carrying a small lantern, and all about them was impenetrable darkness.

“Are you all right? You fell off,” Billy said apologetically. “Luckily, you fell into a snowdrift.”

“Luckily,” Rage echoed wryly, struggling to her feet with Billy’s help. The road was bordered on either side by trees half buried under mounds of snow. Beyond the light given off by Nomadiel’s lantern, the darkness was as thick as molasses. There was no sign of the centaur.

“What happened?” Nomadiel demanded worriedly.

“I fell asleep,” Rage said, feeling stupid.

“Asleep!” Nomadiel snapped. “Our world is in deepest danger and you sleep!”

Rage opened her mouth to snap back but bit back her retort, remembering what Billy had said about Nomadiel smelling wounded. “I’m sorry. What happened to Galantir Longleg?”

“I told him to go back to his village. If he had stayed with us any longer, he would have been caught on the road in the storms. In fact, as it is,
we
may be caught if we do not hurry. We are not too far from the entrance to Deepwood. We can still get there if you can manage to stay awake long enough.”

Rage did not react to the small girl’s tone because she was impressed that Nomadiel had cared more about the centaur than about their own welfare.

“Maybe we can find some shelter and wait out the storm,” Rage said. “There used to be a village near here.”

“There is no waiting out the storms that come through the winter door,” Nomadiel said. “They are not natural storms but sick black conflagrations bent on destruction, and if we are not within Deepwood when this one strikes, we will die.” She turned and began to trot up the road.

Rage and Billy followed. “We can’t get to the wizard’s castle before the storm arrives,” Rage puffed.

“We don’t have to,” Billy assured her. “Nomadiel told me that we just have to get to the entrance to Deepwood. There is a hut close by where we can take refuge.”

“How can a hut be any use if those stone houses that were in the village can’t protect us?”

“The hut is part of Deepwood,” Billy said, “and Deepwood opposes the winter because it is not natural.”

“I hope it doesn’t decide that
we
are not natural,” Rage said.

“If it let Gilbert through, it will let us through,” Billy said reassuringly. Then he began to sniff the air.

“What is it?” Rage puffed.

“I can smell the storm. It smells…wrong.”

That word again. “Wrong how?”

Billy shrugged, annoyance tugging at his features as it always did when he couldn’t find words to explain a dog thought or experience.

“Use your energy for walking, not talking,” Nomadiel snapped over her shoulder.

All at once the darkness about them thickened, and the wind began buffeting them from all directions, sending powder snow into dervish spirals. Rage tried to ask Nomadiel how much farther it was to Deepwood, but there was a peculiar vibration in the air that tore her words away. One vicious gust extinguished Nomadiel’s lantern, and they were plunged into darkness so complete that Rage could see nothing at all, not even Billy or Nomadiel. She opened her mouth to call out, but the wind actually sucked the air out. She gasped with relief as Billy suddenly caught her hand in his. Her eyes adjusted to the slight glow given off by the snow, and she saw that he had also taken Nomadiel’s hand. The three of them struggled forward, but it was as if the wind deliberately opposed them, for it battered them spitefully as if trying to pluck them apart.

Rage thought of her mother and began to cry.

“Oh, Mam,” she whispered. The wind snatched the words from her lips and turned them into a mockery of wailing filled with self-pity. Rage felt a surge of disgust at herself. At her stupidity and selfishness. No wonder Logan and Anabel and Mrs. Somersby disliked her. No wonder the people she loved left her. She was stupid and dull and ugly.

Billy didn’t leave, even though you would have left him,
she reminded herself.
And Logan is your friend now
….

Rage clung to the reminder, and to the truth she sensed in it, because Billy hadn’t left her, and she knew he would never willingly do so. And Logan might be a new friend, but there was something in him, too, that she felt to be as steadfast as Billy.
If I am worthy of their friendship and love, I am worthy of Mam’s,
Rage thought, and it seemed that the storm winds hushed for a moment. Only then did she become aware that they were no longer running against the wind but barely shuffling forward.

The others were hardly visible in the dimness, but Rage saw their dull, sorrowful expressions and understood that they must have been hearing their own voices of doubt. “It’s the storm!” she shouted at them. “Don’t listen to it!” Rage saw the other two stir and shudder as if she had awakened them. Billy gave her a strange, desperate smile, and on impulse she threw her free arm about him and kissed his cheek. “I love you, Billy,” she shouted.

Billy must have heard her, because his arm tightened, squashing the breath out of her. Then he turned and hugged a startled Nomadiel, too.

“How much farther to Deepwood?” Rage shouted.

Nomadiel looked about, she sniffed, and her face changed. Eyes alight, she pointed, then nodded so dramatically that Rage knew they must be very close.

The moment they stepped onto the path leading into Deepwood, the pounding force of the storm was muted. Rage wondered if this was magic or merely the closeness of the trees. Then she saw that there was no snow on the trees except for those bordering the road at the edge of Deepwood. Nomadiel led them off the main Deepwood trail to a round, windowless bark hut with a solid door and roof.

Once the rickety door had been pushed closed behind them, the deafening growl of the storm was cut even more. It was pitch black, but Nomadiel lit a rush torch and set it in a groove in the packed-earth floor. There was a small fire pit at the center of the floor, and once a fire had been lit, Nomadiel filled a pot with water from an earthenware jug set by the door and set it to boil on crossed sticks. She added potatoes and onion from the knapsacks given them by the centaurs, then cut bread from a brown loaf. Handing a fork brusquely to Rage, she told her to toast the bread.

Rage did not mind being ordered about. The savagery of the storm had beaten all the will out of her. It was not until they had eaten the soup that she felt restored enough to ask questions.

“What happened to your crow?”

“He is not my crow,” Nomadiel said in the disapproving voice she seemed to save especially for Rage. “Rally flew ahead to the castle when we mounted Galantir Longleg,” Nomadiel went on. “He will have let my father and Elle and the others know we are coming.”

Rage went out to relieve herself. It was raining quite heavily, and the wind seemed louder than ever as she made her way to the nearest tree. On her way back to the hut, a hand descended on her shoulder.

Rage screamed and leapt around, only to find Gilbert and Mr. Walker staring at her. She was slightly taken aback to see that Gilbert’s long ringlets were glowing as well as saturated. But otherwise he looked his dear, familiar, gloomy self, and she flung her arms around her friends and hugged them hard. Then Billy threw open the door, his face wreathed in smiles as he announced that he had smelled them. He pulled them all inside, banging the door closed behind them.

“It is so good to see you both!” he cried, hugging Goaty and Mr. Walker exuberantly.

Gilbert!
Rage reminded herself firmly, knowing how much it had meant to the faun to have his own name at last.

“You’re wet!” Billy said.

“Just a minute.” Gilbert lifted his fingers and made a peculiar twisting motion. Just like that, he was dry.

“You can do magic!” Billy cried.

“I am the wizard’s assistant now,” Gilbert said shyly.

“What about me?” Mr. Walker demanded.

“Oh, sorry.” Gilbert made the same twisting gesture toward Mr. Walker, but this only made the tiny man wetter. Water puddled on the floor under his feet. “Sorry! Sorry!” Gilbert muttered. “I’ll just try that again—”

“No!” Mr. Walker said, looking exasperated. “With my luck, I’m likely to explode.”

Rage gazed at the little man, seeing in his pointed ears and nose and his bright eyes the tiny Chihuahua that he had once been. Then because she could not help herself, she gathered him into her arms. He had grown, she realized, almost doubling the size he had been when he had first come to Valley, while Nomadiel was the size he had once been.