Extinction

The ghost opened its mouth, but all that came out was a gurgling groan. The tongue was missing, burned away by the acid that had consumed the rest of the woman's body. The wyrm that had killed her must have been a black dragon. Halisstra shuddered at the thought of the agonies its acid spittle must have wrought upon the priestess in the moments just before her death.

Can you sign? Halisstra asked.

In answer, the ghost let Halisstra's medallion fall to the ground and raised hands that were lumps of pitted flesh, the fingers burned away to skeletal stubs. Then, turning stiffly as if still suffering the agonies of her wounds, she motioned with one arm in a gesture whose meaning was clear enough: Come.

Halisstra glanced at her House insignia and saw that the ghost's touch had left it pitted and blackened. Not wanting to touch it, Halisstra left the medallion where it lay and followed the ghost.

Chapter Thirty

When Ryld saw the metal object peeking out of the snow, he thought it was another bit of battlefield debris. Corroded and pieced with black spots, the brooch looked centuries old. Then the shape of the piece caught his eye. Quickly he stooped to pick it up, then winced as something on the brooch stung his hands. Holding the brooch by the edges, he sniffed, and caught an acrid odor. Acid?

Turning the brooch over confirmed his guess. Only portions of it looked ancient. The clasp on the back was undamaged, and sections of the metal were still brightly polished. It was no battlefield remnant.

He peered at it more closely, trying to make out what design had been on the front of it. When he at last confirmed his guess, he shuddered.

It was Halisstra's brooch?the insignia that marked her as a noble daughter of House Melarn. Something must have surprised her, out on the wind-blasted plain. Had she been wearing the brooch on her piwafwi? If so, she might have been injured when whatever had aged the metal had struck her.

Searching the ground carefully, Ryld saw none of the usual signs of a struggle. Two deep footprints and a mark made by the hem of a piwafwi showed where Halisstra had squatted for a time, and a confused overlapping of footprints showed where she had whirled rapidly around, but there were no other prints in the snow.

Had she been attacked from above? Ryld imagined a black dragon swooping down on Halisstra, blasting her with its acid breath, and shuddered. But, no, that didn't seem to be the answer. Aside from Halisstra's footprints, the snow was undisturbed. Flapping wings would have stirred it up with their downdraft, and a black dragon's breath would have left spray marks in the snow.

It must have been a ghost?perhaps one similar to the officer Ryld had encountered?or some other noncorporeal creature that had startled Halisstra. Whatever it was, it seemed to have done no more than destroy her brooch. Halisstra had moved away at a walking stride in a straight line to the south. The trail she'd left was as before, normal and unremarkable.

No … not quite. About a pace to the right of Halisstra's footprints was an irregular line of dimples in the snow, as if something had dripped onto it?but not blood, Ryld saw with relief as he stooped to examine them. There was no trace of red, and the droplets were very small. Bending closer, he sniffed and caught the same faint, acrid odor. Cautiously, he touched a callused fingertip to one of the holes, held it there a moment, then jerked it back when he felt a slight sting.

Acid.

Wiping his finger, he considered. If Halisstra had run into a malevolent spirit, it certainly had a strange way of manifesting itself. Ryld had once encountered a ghost that left smears of blood on the ground wherever it walked?the ghost of a man whose throat had been slit. Had the spirit that confronted Halisstra?assuming that's what it was?been killed by acid?

Whatever had made the droplet trail in the snow, Halisstra had followed it. Her footprints overlaid the holes in several places. Grimly, Ryld followed the trail.

It didn't lead far. After about five hundred paces, Ryld spotted a black, gaping hole in the snowy ground. About three paces across, it looked as though it had been punched open from below. A scatter of rock and loose earth encircled it. Halisstra's footprints led to the edge of the hole, paused?then continued, as if she had descended into its depths. The trail of droplets also led to the hole's edge.

Drawing Splitter, Ryld crept forward, studying the ground. The hole sloped down into the earth at a gentle angle. Scuffs in the snow showed where Halisstra had placed her feet on the slope, but the droplets ended at the hole's edge. Whatever had led her to the hole hadn't gone inside.

Squatting at the edge of the hole, the weapons master used the point of his sword to prod the debris that had been thrown up around it. The soil was frozen solid. The pit had been created some time ago.