‘It must be the Snow River,’ said Anyara.
She was right. There was no other watercourse of any size that flowed from the Car Criagar in these parts.
‘It must be,’ he agreed. ‘I can’t see why we’re following it, though.’
Their exchange roused Rothe from his trance-like exhaustion. He lifted his head and looked around without breaking his stride.
‘It is the Snow,’ he said. ‘It’ll only lead us into a trap if we keep going.’
Orisian realised at once what he meant. He had never seen it with his own eyes, but his uncle’s hunters had talked of the gorge through which the upper reaches of the Snow passed. At its head it grew sheer-sided and narrow, ending in a high waterfall where the Snow spilled from the crags. The hunters called those falls Sarn’s Leap, and called them cursed as well. Few went there. When a man reached the falls there was nowhere to go but back the way he had come. Already the land to either side of them was rising in rocky ridges like the funnel of a wildfowler’s nets.
‘Ess’yr,’ Orisian called, ‘there’s no way through here. We can’t get past the falls.’
She ignored him.
Inurian murmured something. Rothe slowed and looked down at the na’kyrim he bore, as if surprised that he was still alive.
‘Trust her,’ Inurian was saying.
Cliffs towered above them when they at last came to a halt. The Snow River was sunk deep in a gigantic furrow of stone. They rested beside it and drank. The sound of Sarn’s Leap came from somewhere up ahead, a continuous hiss of cascading water. It was hidden around a curve in the gorge.
‘What now, then?’ demanded Rothe.
Orisian was staring at the thick stand of willows that lay between them and the waterfall. The trees thronged the floor of the gorge. There was no way round them. He knew what they were.
‘We go on,’ Ess’yr said to Rothe. ‘They will not follow.’
‘There’s nowhere to go,’ muttered Rothe. ‘This is a cursed place. Sarn had no luck here. No one does. Why shouldn’t they follow, and trap us at the falls?’
Ess’yr turned her back on him.
‘It’s a dyn ham,’ explained Orisian. ‘A burial ground. It must be an old one; abandoned. The Kyrinin dead are in the trees.’
His shieldman looked doubtful. ‘So that’ll keep the White Owls off us? Fine, but what do we do once we’re at the falls? Fly? They only have to wait. There’s no way out of here, Orisian.’
‘There is,’ said Varryn.
Orisian felt a sharp premonition of something awful. The Kyrinin’s voice had a dead finality about it. The decision had been made some time ago. This was the crux of it.
Inurian was lying on the ground. He raised himself on one elbow and beckoned Orisian.
‘Listen to me, Orisian. In the mountains above us there is a ruined city. You know it?’
‘Criagar Vyne? I’ve heard of it.’
‘Ess’yr can show you the way. There is a woman there: Yvane, a na’kyrim. She can give you shelter. I don’t think the White Owls will go so far into Fox lands. Perhaps the Black Road won’t either.’ He clasped a hand to his mouth to smother a racking cough. When he lowered it again there were flecks of blood on the palm.
‘But we have to get to Glasbridge, or to Kolglas. We must…’ Orisian fell silent as Inurian seized his arm in a vice-like grip.
‘No, Orisian,’ the na’kyrim said raspingly. ‘Think. It won’t take the White Owls more than a few hours to run you down. You’re not in the valley now: you’re in the forest, and that’s Kyrinin territory.’ Inurian’s grey eyes held Orisian fast. They burned with an intensity unlike anything Orisian had seen there before. ‘Anduran’s gone, perhaps Tanwrye as well. Glasbridge will be next. Get Anyara to safety, Orisian. Yvane can get you to Koldihrve, on to a boat there. Both of you.’
Orisian found tears in his eyes. He was barely listening to what Inurian said. ‘You will come with us,’ he said defiantly, though he could not keep a tremor from his voice.
Inurian closed his eyes. ‘No,’ he said. His strength was failing. His hand fell away from Orisian’s arm.
‘Yes!’ Orisian shouted, taking hold of Inurian. The others turned at the sudden outburst. Ess’yr came up on his shoulder. Inurian murmured something to her in the Fox tongue. She reached down and began to prise Orisian’s hands away from the na’kyrim.
‘He cannot come,’ she said in a level tone.
Orisian pushed her away. ‘He comes with us!’ he cried. He looked from face to face. ‘He comes with us,’ he insisted once more.
Anyara was crying without a sound, tears leaving tracks through the dirt upon her cheeks. Ess’yr and Varryn said nothing. Their eyes met his with a steadfast gaze. Only Rothe looked away. The shieldman bowed his head.
‘Rothe,’ Orisian said, ‘you have carried him this far.’
Rothe cleared his throat and gave an uneasy flick of his head, as if shying away from his thoughts.
‘He will stay,’ said Varryn. ‘We cannot carry him. The climb...’
‘Climb?’ shouted Orisian, driven by some deep instinct to turn his anger upon Ess’yr. ‘Why did we come this way if you knew we could not take him with us? We should have gone some other way.’
The pain he saw in the delicate, normally impassive face of the Kyrinin woman was more than he expected. Its depth took the heat out of him. She said nothing.
‘He knows,’ Varryn was saying. ‘His idea. There is no other way.’
Orisian hung his head. There was a desolate impotence in him he had felt only once before, five years ago, watching a black-sailed boat sail out from Kolglas for The Grave, bearing bodies wrapped in white winding sheets.
‘You should have told me,’ he said in a broken voice. In that moment he felt a fluttering touch upon his hand. Inurian’s long fingers were brushing his skin.
‘Be still, Orisian,’ the na’kyrim murmured. His eyelids were fluttering. ‘Be still,’ he breathed again. ‘Be strong. I will rest here a while. You must go on.’
‘I won’t leave you here,’ Orisian groaned.
‘You will, because I ask you to. You have always trusted me and you must trust me in this. Aeglyss is coming for me. I can hear him, inside my head. That is why I have come with you this far, to draw him in to this place where he can go no further. His Kyrinin will not willingly go beyond the dyn ham, and neither will Aeglyss if he has me. But you must keep going. Others might come: Horin-Gyre or worse. This only delays them. You cannot tarry.’
Orisian shook his head.
‘Where is Ess’yr?’ Inurian asked, and she moved forwards and knelt down.
Orisian followed nothing of what passed between them. It was murmured, in the fluid language of the Fox, but his mind was numb in any case and he could not tear his gaze from Inurian’s elegant hand that lay still beside his own. He sensed from Inurian’s tone that he was asking Ess’yr a question. She did not reply at once. Varryn took a few quick steps closer and snapped something. He was angry. Ess’yr gave an answer, and her brother spun away and strode towards the dyn hane. Inurian was smiling. Ess’yr bent and laid a kiss upon his lips.
‘Go,’ whispered Inurian.
It was a moment before Orisian realised the command was meant for him. He shook his head again.
‘Take him, Rothe,’ said Inurian. Ess’yr had risen and was walking away. Her shoulders were rigid, as if only their strength contained something within her.
Rothe took hold of Orisian’s arm. ‘Come away,’ he said.
Anyara knelt down and embraced the na’kyrim. ‘Goodbye,’ she whispered, then she stood up and followed after the Kyrinin.
‘Orisian...’ Rothe said, but Orisian shook his hand off and held Inurian as his sister had done. He tried to enclose his body, to gather it to himself. He could feel Inurian’s ribcage rising and falling, hear his faltering breath.