The horse beneath him snorted. To his right, Charra appeared within the swirls as if part of the downfall. Around them, the quickly accumulating precipitation muted the sound of hooves and wagon wheels, and offered better footing than would normally be possible over water frozen by Eldanhill’s Matii. Folded within layers of fur and leather, the remainder of Eldanhill’s folk and army trudged along.
Dagodin, and what was left of the Seifer and Nema clans, guarded the flanks. Sifting through which among them were the enemy had taken some time, but the mountain men had their own torturous ways to discover the truth. Ancel cringed with the memory of rope tied around privates or to arms and legs and attached to horses pulling in opposite directions. Worse than that was watching a few of the prisoners as wolves or daggerpaws savaged them.
Somewhere behind their convoy, Shin Galiana kept an eye on their rear along with Kachien. Loneliness weighed heavy on Ancel. Even with Mirza’s presence next to him, he felt as if he’d lost everything. Mother, Da, Irmina, Ryne. All that was important to him had been torn away. He hunkered deeper into his cloak against the howling wind.
A recollection of Ryne’s voice screaming the name Sakari made him shiver. In the moments since, his link with Ryne had flitted around like a buzzing fly before finally settling somewhere well ahead of them. For a while, he’d sensed Mater in unbelievable amounts surge to Eldanhill’s north. The last time he’d encountered something similar his mother had been taken, and his father lay at death’s brink in Galiana’s hospice.
Did his father survive those injuries only to die now? Had he regained Irmina to lose her once again? Could he really trust her to remain true to her word and find a way to keep the council, and more importantly, his father, alive? She’d been adamant that if she wasn’t there to greet the Tribunal they would simply kill whomever they found and pursue him and the others. Thoughts a gray muddle, he sank further into himself and his furs, inhaling their musty odor.
Time crawled by as they continued their exodus, the storm’s fury constant, keeping them hidden. When they crossed off the frozen river and up the banks, the swirls of snow abruptly ended. The wind still bit as he looked back. The tempest covered the Kelvore River and beyond, but here several miles before the Red Ridge Mountains, all was calm.
“What in Amuni’s name …” Mirza said.
Inclining his head toward the Matii huddled together near the river’s edge, Ancel pulled down the scarf from around his mouth. “The storm was all their doing.”
Dagodin stood guard near them and helped to usher those on foot up onto the open plain past the riverbank. Several folk stopped to stare in awe as one moment they were walking through a near blinding snowstorm, and the next they were standing with only residual flurries touching them in a light spray. A few dropped to their knees in a brief prayer as if the journey was over.
Ancel knew better. Their trek had just begun.
Caked in an icy layer, Galiana appeared last. Kachien followed close behind.
Galiana threw back her hood and unwound a cloth from around her face. “Set it to hold for a few more hours,” she shouted above the wind. “We should be long gone before then.”
A Teacher nodded and passed the instructions to the others. They stood motionless for a while, facing out into the storm, the wind whipping their cloaks. The squall intensified for a moment before settling. More than one of them sagged when they were finished.
“Get those too tired to ride off their mounts and into the wagons,” Galiana said to a nearby Dagodin. “Use their horses for a few of those on foot.” She rode closer to him. “So far, Ryne’s distraction worked.”
“Good,” Ancel said, trying to sound braver and more confident than he felt. “He’s somewhere ahead of us.”
“We will pick him up on the way and find out what this detour is that he requires. Until then make sure we have not lost anyone. You too, Mirza. Remind them, no lamps until we are past the foothills.”
“Yes, Shin Galiana,” they both said and rode off.
With Charra accompanying him, Ancel split off from Mirza to check one side of the refugee lines while his friend rode along the other. Relying on the twin moons whenever they peeked from behind the clouds was a test in patience on a night that was otherwise drab and gray, but Ancel made sure to ask each Dagodin if they lost any from the groups they supervised. To his relief, the answer every time was no.
An abrupt flash of pain seared across his mind. Immediately, he knew it was Ryne. Weariness, hurt, and shivering cold suffused him. A vision bloomed in his head. Hands freezing, turning blue, a body huddling against icy rocks, then falling down a hill and kicking up snow. The link cut off.
Ancel whirled, gazing up to the left and the looming, dark countenances of the Red Ridge Mountains. Ryne was up there, and he was hurt. He whipped his reins and raced to Shin Galiana. She glanced up from advising a Dagodin and an Ashishin. The thud of other hooves announced Mirza’s arrival.
“You completed your-”
“He’s hurt,” Ancel wheezed. “He’s hurt badly. Probably dying. We need to go to him now.”
“Who?” Galiana asked. “Where?”
Frantically, Ancel pointed up the Red Ridge’s slopes. “It’s Ryne. Up there. I–I can feel him.”
Galiana turned to the two Matii. “Continue on this route. You will meet the Dosteri contingent at Colvar’s Gap. From there head to Calisto, get supplies, then make your way to Torandil. Kachien, stay and help them.” She turned to face Knight Captain Steyn. “See them there safely, Knight Captain.”
“What about the Tribunal?” Steyn asked. “Won’t they be using the Gap and Calisto?”
“No,” Galiana said. “The Dosteri refused them access to either. It was their answer to the Tribunal’s lack of help in the negotiations with the Sendethi.”
“As you command, Shin Galiana.” The Knight Captain wheeled his horse and rode off with the Ashishin following at his heels.
“Come,” Galiana said. She cocked her head for a moment when she saw Mirza.
“There’s no way you’re leaving me behind,” Mirza said before she uttered a word.
Ancel opened his mouth to tell his friend to stay with the others. The defiant look on Mirza’s face and his earlier sentiments concerning the Ashishin spoke for themselves. Ancel smiled.
They rode east, cutting a swath through fresh snow as high as the horses’ knees. Beside them, Charra bounded, unhindered by the drifts. The deep fluff made for slow going, but Ancel would let nothing stop them. At the back of his mind, the lump that spoke of Ryne’s location pulled him, the feel of it as tremulous as the day when Ryne stepped out from the woods. Locking onto the location in case he lost the link entirely, he slogged on. The wind whipped and howled about them as if possessed, kicking up powder that made him pull his scarf even tighter and duck his head. Icy flecks caked the cloth around his mouth, the material carrying the scent of his breath, steam collecting moisture that soon froze. Hands gripping the reins tight through his fox fur gloves, he concentrated on the thought of reaching his mentor in time.
The plains, broken by the occasional tree or slope of land, seemed to go on forever. The towering silhouettes of the Red Ridge Mountains appeared to move farther away. Undaunted, Ancel snapped his reins, ignoring the stallion’s snort of protest. He lost track of time, but not of the lump. Soon, they reached the first foothills.
The going became tougher then, the route more treacherous as the snow grew deeper and the slopes icier. As much as he wanted to push his mount, Ancel slowed, choosing their path carefully. It would do little to help Ryne if his horse broke a leg now. Even deep in furs, his bones were still chilled and his feet numb. At times, he couldn’t feel his fingers. Ignoring them, he plowed on.
The Red Ridge Mountains rose up before them like massive white monoliths. In warmer weather, red, dusty sand covered these slopes, but now no such color existed. Enveloped by winter’s freezing breath, they were expansive precipices and cliffs glowing silvery blue whenever the moons peeked from behind the clouds.