A Sword from Red Ice

Nor was being shackled and kidnapped, but Chedd did have a point. It was hard to imagine any clansman anywhere—even one who was cursed—selling clan children to the mine lords. Perhaps Waker was up to something else, but Effie couldn't imagine what that might be. Only two things were clear: they were slowly heading east toward Gray; and Waker wanted her and Chedd alive. So far the going had been slow. It wasn't just that they were paddling upstream, it was the need for caution. With all sorts of armies fighting over Ganmiddich, the Wolf River had become a dangerous place. Waker's father had knowledge of the waterways, and sometimes they would leave the main river and portage to the backwaters; the streams and meanders, the flood-season creeks and pools. They had circumvented the Ganmiddich roundhouse entirely, and Effie still hadn't quite worked out how. She just knew they left the Wolf for a day, poled up a fast-running tributary, portaged through an overgrown shrub swamp and then floated the boat on a second tributary, following the current downstream to the Wolf.

Waker always paddled from the bow while his father guided the boat from the stern. Chedd paddled from the center, though he wasn't very good at it, and tended to cheat after a while when his shoulder got sore. So far Effie had not been assigned any tasks. Which was just as well really, as it was hard getting used to the boat.

It was a new and distressing experience, being afloat. Hailsmen had never been rivermen—probably because no navigable river flowed close to the roundhouse—and it wasn't unknown for clansmen to live and die without once setting foot in a boat. Effie hadn't really given them much thought before, even when she'd stayed with Mad Binny out on Cold Lake. Just being outside was trial enough, let alone being outside on dangerous, changeable, death-dealing water. She couldn't swim, even though two summers ago Raif had tried very hard to teach her at the beaver pond in the Wedge. It would have helped, she had to admit, if she'd actually got in the water. Poor Raif tried everything to coax her in—letting her know how warm the water was, promising to keep hold of her at all times, and then finally attempting to bribe her with cakes—but she wasn't having any of it. So she had watched from the rocks as he did swoopy things with his arms and kicked his feet. It didn't look very hard, and she'd decided it was a bit of a worthless skill, like dancing, and promptly dismissed it from her mind.

That had all changed five days ago when Waker had made her step into the boat. "Easy, girl," he'd warned as he held the gunwales to steady the long, thin watercraft. "Bend at the waist, keep yourself low.

That was all very well, but it was only her second day in leg irons, and she was still working on the techniques required to walk with only two feet of slack. That was one thing Chedd excelled at, the shuffling, the sidling and—when all else failed—the one-legged hop. He was pretty quick on his feet, she had to give him that. In the end she couldn't manage to step in the boat and had to be picked up. Waker had not been gentle as he plunked her down on the seat.

Things were getting a bit better now, but there was always the fear of falling in the water. The boat rocked and swayed, especially when Waker and his father stood to use the poles. Chedd said farther upstream there were rapids where the water frothed and bucked like a rabid raccoon. He said they'd probably die trying to pole against them. There was a lot wrong with those two statements, Effie decided. Waker and his father obviously had experience of the river, and if they could circumvent an entire roundhouse they could certainly find a way around some rapids. Plus she doubted very much that either one of them would attempt anything that placed themselves and the boat in danger. And finally, if there was anything less like water than a rabid raccoon Effie Sevrance would like to see it.

"Girl. Cover the fire. We leave within the quarter." Waker didn't even look at her as he spoke. They'd finished repairing the ice damage and the boat was now back in the free-flowing water beyond the ice. As Waker's father held the craft in place, Chedd and Waker began to load the supplies. They traveled light, without tents or fireirons, and it made for swift camps and departures. No comforts were afforded. Waker's father had a distrust of fires and let one be lit only for the time it took to boil a kettle for the trail tea. Yet even when the fire burned for only half an hour and left the smallest possible footprint, Waker was meticulous about covering all traces of it when he left. Effie had a feeling she knew why.