A Sword from Red Ice

She waited but he said no more, simply picked up the sack and went about his business on the beach. As Effie watched him the memory she'd been grasping for all day rolled into place. Automatically, her hand reached for out for her lore. Girlie, girlie, girlie, girlie. Wonder why it wasn't early? Of course! Her lore hadn't warned her the night of the kidnapping. Her lore always alerted her to danger. Always. But not then. So why? It was a question she tried to answer as she gathered sticks for the fire.

THIRTEEN Stormglass

Raif dreamed he was awake and could not sleep. When he woke he lay on his bed, eyes closed, and rested. Today he would leave the Want.

Or try to.

Light angling through the clarified hide walls filtered into his mind's eye. Silvery rings floated across his vision. It was peaceful just to watch them for a while. Soon he found it was one of those rare times when he could picture Drey, Effie and Ash without feeling the pain of losing them. No hurt, no longing, just memories of their faces. Effie grinned, showing him a great big hole where her front baby teeth used to be. Drey was still, offering himself for inspection, his large brown eyes vigilant and unblinking. Ash was still also, but unlike his brother and sister, Raif could not see her clearly. Wind was moving through her long silvery hair and she smiled gently as her image faded.

Raif rose and dressed, scrubbed his teeth with pumice, drank a full pitcher of water, combed and rebraided his hair, shaved. Forming a pile of his possessions in the middle of the tent, he carefully inspected his weapons, waterskin, gear belt, the Orrl cloak and half a dozen other lesser things. Those items requiring care he carried outside.

Diffused sunlight shone across the dunes. A net of high clouds drifted overhead, and at ground level the wind was mild and halting. A lamb brother just beyond the tent circle was skinning a large carcass, rolling back the hide with one hand as he pared the pink, fatty flesh. With a shock, Raif realized they had slain the dead brothers mule.

He crossed to the fire. Three prayer mats were laid out side by side upwind of the smoke. Raif settled his possessions in the pumice and went to look at them. They were simply woven, made from dyed and polished wool. The background of the closest rug was the same deep brown as the lamb brothers' robes, and only two other colors had been used to weave the design: warm amber and silvery yellow. Raif recognized the buffalo and lambs from Tallal's story. The animals were lined up along the top border, as if ready to journey down the length of the rug. His gaze tracked the design. Exotic trees and animals he could not name formed small islands along the way. Suns picked out in the amber thread were shown rising between the cleft of two hills and setting on a flat desert plain. Resting atop the bottom border was a shining expanse of silver, worked to look like water. No, ice, Raif corrected himself, for some kind of bird stood atop it, pecking at the surface. The bird was worked in the same brown as the background and its features were hard to see. The only way to make them out was to study the overweave created by thread being placed on top of thread. Hairs rose along Raif's neck as he made out the shape of the bird's bill.

Briefly, he scanned the other two rugs. The designs differed but the story remained the same: the lambs and buffaloes on a journey toward the ice. He saw no more ravens and was relieved.

Returning to his equipment he studied the sky. He knew it was futile to judge time from the sun's position in the Want, but he could not break the habit of eighteen years. The air was like crystal today, revealing the landscape in sharp-cut lines and crisply focusing light The dunes had shifted while he slept and things that had once been covered were now revealed. Rocks as round as eggs, petrified tree limbs and a rack of antlers had emerged from the pumice overnight. Raif wondered what had become of Farli's body. Was there anything left for the dunes to cover? Did he want to go and find out?