A Sword from Red Ice

As far as Effie could tell normal kinds of trees—oaks and cedars and elms—grew at the rear of the roundhouse, so solid ground must lie back there. At the front of the roundhouse a series of landings and jetties projected out across the water and many small boats were tied up there. Guards were watching from both the turrets and the highest landing, but they never spotted Waker's boat. Waker's father was poling through the reeds on the southern shore and you couldn't even hear his paddle enter the water.

Effie had wondered about the passing. Beforehand both Waker and his father had been nervous, shifting in their seats, making adjustments to the load, communicating in the terse hand signals they seemed to prefer over language. Clouds had snuffed the moon and there was no mist. Good and bad. Just as they spied the first lights, Effie felt a little creepy sensation crawl along her skin. She thought it might be a cloud of midges, only how had the midges managed to fly into the bodice of her dress? Then she thought about the day Eggtooth had stopped the boat by chucking a big stone into the water. She remembered the prickly sensation in her mouth when Waker's father had removed her tongue and teeth; either winking them out of existence entirely or concealing them behind shadows so deep that no normal glance could find them. Whatever had gone on, Effie had been mightily glad to get them back.

The night they'd floated past Otler she suspected Waker's father had been up to his tricks. Nothing as drastic as with her teeth but something—a blurring or shadowing or some subtle misdirection—had taken place. How else could you explain the fact Otlermen armed with crossbows and looking out across the water had not seen a shallow boat containing four people moving along the opposite shore?

The creepiness Effie had felt subsided quickly once they'd passed the roundhouse. Waker's father had rested in the back while Waker returned to poling. The whole episode struck Effie as odd. Otler and Gray were neighbors, they shared borders and vulnerability to Trance Vor. You'd think they'd be friendly out of necessity if nothing else, seeing as they were both stranded in the far southeastern reaches of the clanholds. And they both held war oaths to Bludd. So why then couldn't a Grayman paddle past Otler at midday? Because Clan Gray is different, stupid. It's cursed. Effie frowned. Needing some distraction she did the crawly hands on the back of Chedd's neckJghedd's head jerked back and his hand came up to slap away the fly. Effie pressed her lips together to stop laughing and ended up making a snorting noise instead. The beauty of the crawly hands was that she could do it easily to Chedd but Chedd wouldn't do it easily back. It was a masterstroke of gaming and it very nearly made up for the now-legendary disaster that had become bear: naked!

"Eff," Chedd said, using the kind of voice she had not expected, quiet and puzzled. "There's half-things around."

"Ssh," Waker warned from the bow of the boat.

Effie looked at the back of Chedd's head. Her feet and legs suddenly felt cold, and the chains around her ankles chinked as she shivered.

"The way to Cray is lined with prey," Waker s father whispered softly in her ear. "Nothing worse than being cursed"

She hoped Chedd hadn't heard him.

The moon was setting now, slipping behind the low alders. Something rustled on the near shore, hopefully a muskrat or river rat—or weird nocturnal duck. Waker's father thrust his pole deep into the river mud and held it there for a moment, allowing Waker to swiftly turn the boat. As the butt of the poll came out of the water Effie saw it was glistening with tar.

Old peat and tar beds lay here, Chedd had told her earlier back at the camp, that was why the water was so black. You could dig up the mud, light it, and watch it burn. He was all for giving it a try, but then they'd found the pool with the fairy shrimp and got distracted. The water had been clear in the pool, she remembered. Snowmelt, not river water. It was difficult to imagine fairy shrimp—or much else for that matter—living within this murky, acidic water.

She really, really hoped it wasn't bog.

Things had started to change pretty quickly the day after the encounter with Eggtooth. The river cliffs north of the Mouseweed had sunk into the river, forming huge mounds of boulders and gravel. The hills to the south had begun to fail, and soon there were no uplands at all, just rolling forested plains. After that the entire landmass had seemed to sink. They'd passed a flooded forest and a series of big muddy river pools that smelled bad. East of Otler the water had begun to darken, and it wasn't always easy to tell when the river ended and the land began. Waker and his father appeared to know the area well and the campsites they chose were always firm ground above the water.