The Fall of Neskaya (8 page)

“There!” Rafe said.

Coryn couldn’t see what the old soldier pointed to, but as they approached, he made out a rough overhang where a huge flat shard extended like a tabletop beyond its supporting boulders. It was barely deep enough for the two of them, but the ground underneath looked relatively dry.

“Saddlebags—there. Blankets—there.” In a few terse commands, Rafe organized the little shelter. “In!” He half-pushed Coryn to the back of the overhang. “Out of those clothes!”

“But—” Coryn bit off his protest. His shirt and vest were soaked to the skin, and now that he was no longer climbing, chill seeped through. It was better here, out of the wind, but not much. Even as a child, he knew wet clothes would steal body heat even when the outside temperature wasn’t that cold.

He set aside his cloak, which was thick enough to be dry on the inside. Shaking, he tugged off his boots and wet clothing. A sudden gust cut across his bare skin like a knife edge. The next moment, Rafe shoved a bundle into his hands—his winter-weight shirt and pants of soft thick wool, which Rafe had somehow dug out from the bottom of the
chervine’s
pack.

By the time Coryn had pulled on his dry clothes, Rafe crawled in beside him and forced the
chervine
to lie down, its body blocking the worst of the wind. The horses, tethered close to the opening, assumed postures of sullen endurance with their heads down and tails clamped against their rumps.

Thunder sounded again, shivering through the rockfall. Coryn couldn’t tell its direction. The rain redoubled its strength; the sound shifted to a harsher note.

Coryn caught a glimpse of the pellets of ice over the
chervine’s
shoulder. He began to shiver again.

“Ah, there,” Rafe said gently, drawing his own blankets around Coryn.

A sudden deafening noise, louder than thunder, jolted Coryn. His eyes focused on gray light outside. The din increased, as if some giant were slamming boulders into the hillside above them.

Rafe sat bolt upright, grabbing for the
chervine’s
reins. The animal let out a terrified bleat as it struggled to rise. Rafe grabbed the
chervine’s
head, using it as a lever to force the animal back down, on to its side.

Coryn caught a glimpse of rocks pelting down the hillside. Their impact quivered through the boulders around him, through the very earth itself. Rain sleeted, now straight down, now gusting to spray his face with half-frozen droplets.

The outer edge of the overhang splintered with a resounding
crack!
One of the horses screamed, suddenly cut off. Coryn flinched and gathered his feet under him. Every fiber in his body shrilled to
get out now!

As Coryn scrambled for the opening, Rafe reached out with his free arm and grabbed the neck edge of his cloak. Coryn spun around under the power of the older man’s grip. For an instant, he struggled as mindlessly as had the
chervine.

“No chance out there.” Rafe jabbed his thumb back at the avalanche and shouted over the racket. “Only hope—wait it out.”

Coryn’s eyes focused on the hillside beyond. There was no sign of the horses. Some of the hurtling stones were small as pebbles, others massive. If one of those struck him, or even the fist-sized stones, a lucky blow to temple or spine, a slip on the wet ground . . .

He shuddered, drew his knees up, and crossed his arms over his bent head. A moment later, he felt Rafe hunker down beside him, placing his body between Coryn and the hurtling stones.

Help . . . Help
. . . ran through Coryn’s mind. The syllables pulsed in time with his racing heart. Without thinking, he reached for the pouch which held his starstone. His fingers pushed through the folds of silk to grasp the crystal. It warmed immediately under his touch.

Help . . . Help
. . .

For an instant, Coryn thought he felt a response, but could not be sure. The uproar outside seemed to lessen. A short time later, he made out the sounds of individual stones from the differences in pitch.

He lifted his head. Rocks blocked three-quarters of the entrance. In the gloom outside, he saw that the rain had dropped to a drizzle, then a mist. For seconds at a time, no stones rushed past.

When several minutes had gone by in silence, Rafe straightened up, handed the
chervine’s
reins to Coryn, and clambered toward the opening. He had to push aside a heap of rocks in order to climb through. Widening the opening did not, however, bring any more light into the little cave.

Coryn crawled forward, enough to see that dusk had come upon them. A stray gust brushed his face with icy fingers. The temperature was falling fast.

Rafe came back a few minutes later. Even in the gathering darkness, Coryn felt him frown.

“Not good. Whole hillside’s slid down on us. No way around now. Take us hours just to climb out.” He reached for the saddlebags with their trail food and handed a packet to Coryn. “Stay here tonight.”

“The horses? Are they—”

Rafe shook his head, barely visible. “No sign.”

Dancer
. . . And Rafe’s two mounts, innocent beasts they had ridden into danger. Coryn’s heart tightened into a knot of pain. They could have escaped, he told himself, but he did not believe it.

Although he was not hungry, Coryn managed to eat some jerked meat and fruit-nut bars, along with sips of water. His stomach tightened ominously, but eventually, his tired young body relaxed. He drifted into an unsettled dream of wandering naked across a sheet of ice under a featureless sky, of lying helpless while a shadowy cloaked figure drew near, of fire. Fire racing across the forested slopes, fire raining from the sky . . .

Fire lapped at him, strange blue flames. Shivering, he tried to avoid it, but as he moved away, the flames rose even higher, closer. Tongues of brightness consumed whatever they touched. From his outstretched fingers, the blue fire ran up his arm. The flesh of his hand crisped, leaving blackened, smoking bones.

“Help! Fire! Help me!”
he shouted as he tried to smother the fire with his good hand. Instantly, it, too, caught fire.

The flames slowed their course as they worked their way inward, into one shoulder and deeper, toward the core of his body. He screamed in earnest now, his own terror crystallizing into sound. His cries reverberated in his skull. In the distance, someone called out a name which he vaguely recognized as his own. The more furiously he beat at the blue flames, the faster they burned. If he ran outside, the rain might quench them—

“Coryn! Coryn, lad, what is it? Be no fire here! No harm, see?” A shadowy figure reached for him, blurred fingers closing around his arms. His charred bones splintered under the pressure.

“No! No!”
Coryn threw himself backward, desperate to break away. Horrified, he watched the blue fire creep up the hands of the figure. Any moment now, the very walls of the shelter would catch fire, too.

Then he was held immobile, clasped in an embrace as unyielding as stone itself. A glass vial was forced between his teeth and liquid gushed into his mouth. He sputtered, swallowing a little but spitting more out. His stomach twisted sickly. Turning just in time, he vomited, heaving again and again until there was nothing more to come. His eyes watered, and acrid saliva filled his mouth.

He heard a voice, so low and resonant that he could catch only a phrase or two. “Holy St. Christopher . . . Bearer of Burdens . . . Protector of children . . . Into Thy care . . .”

He looked down at his hands and saw, as if the images were painted on layers of gauze, his hands, whole and unharmed, and his other hands, his dream hands. Bits of heat-blackened flesh clung to splintered bones. Pain shrilled along his nerves. And still the fire burned, eating through the muscles of his chest, his ribs, his heart. . . .

As if from an immense distance, a voice whispered through his mind. It reminded him of tiny silver bells, sweet and full of light.
Who are you?

Who was he? For a panicked moment, he could not remember his name.

The fire! The blue fire! Help
. . .

Hold fast, little brother. We will send help
. . .

Though the voice faded into silence, though the words were few, a sense of immense calm flowed through Coryn. His muscles softened and grew heavy. His body sagged in Rafe’s arms, in some other, invisible arms. The blue flames flared once more, then receded. Finally, he slept. This time, no dreams came.

T
he sour smell of vomit filled the little cave. Coryn rubbed gummy residue from his eyes and sat up, finding himself alone. The opening had been cleared away, except for drifted rubble, and the light outside shone clear and bright. Both the older man and the
chervine
were missing.

“Rafe?”

Where had he gone? Crept away in the night to save his own skin? No—the saddlebags of food and warm clothing were still in the cave.

At first, Coryn could barely recognize the landscape outside. Loose rocks, varying in size from boulders to pebbles, lay heaped with long-dead branches and trees torn from their moorings on the heights. Wetness gleamed like fresh-spilled blood in the slanting morning sun, pools and rivulets, even piles of quickly melting hailstones.

There was no way through the debris plugging the valley floor. Already, water had pooled upstream and every few minutes a tree branch would be dislodged to go swirling downriver. The reservoir kept rising, fed by the water draining off the hillsides.

The
chervine
stood downslope, browsing placidly on splintered branches which still bore fresh foliage. It whuffled a greeting as Coryn approached through the debris and streams. He patted the animal’s neck, checking for injuries. Low on the near foreleg, scraped skin and clotted blood marked a swollen joint.

Coryn left the
chervine
and climbed upslope for a better view. He couldn’t see much, even when he stepped up on the nearest large rockpile. Then he caught sight of a patch of brown hide marked with dark, almost black streaks, half-buried in a stack of heavy dark stones. He couldn’t tell which of the horses it was, as both of Rafe’s were bays. At least it wasn’t Dancer, who was a dun.

A breeze, ice-tipped, ruffled Coryn’s hair. He shivered and for an awful moment, the hillside seemed to ripple and heave. Acid rose in his throat. His knees wavered under him. He caught himself against the nearest rock, a waist-high boulder. When he closed his eyes, the swaying sensation intensified. He opened them and focused on the rock, the pattern of old weathering split by fresh, razor-sharp chipping. It felt solid under his hand. Gradually, his vision and his stomach steadied.

“Rafe?” He called. “Rafe!”

Coryn’s voice reverberated off the hillsides. A moment later, he heard a faint response. Echoes distorted its direction. He scrambled on top of the boulder, waving his arms above his head so he could be more easily seen.

At last, Rafe emerged from behind one of the bigger piles upslope. He led the other bay horse, which limped heavily.

Rafe waved, sunlight glinting off his broad smile. Coryn gulped, shamed that he had for one moment imagined the old soldier might have deserted him.

In his usual terse phrases, Rafe outlined their situation. Their assets included the contents of the saddlebags, two lame pack animals, plenty of water, and the fact that neither of them was seriously injured. The worst of the storm had clearly passed, although snow remained a danger. On the other hand, they could not follow their planned route. The only alternate involved even rougher territory with limited supplies and uncertain weather. But even worse, it would take them through lands belonging to the Storns of High Kinnally.

Coryn talked as they began pulling the blankets and saddlebags from the shelter. “When things were so bad last night, I—I don’t know, I called out for help. And someone answered.”

“Laddie, it was a rough night to put visions in any man’s mind. You screamin’ about fires everywhere—and the old wizard’s medicine only made you wilder.”

“But it wasn’t—” No, better keep quiet about what he’d done. And why.

“But Holy St. Christopher, Bearer of Burdens,
he
answered our prayers,” Rafe added in the low voice of a man who has witnessed a miracle.

It was useless to discuss the matter any further.

They loaded the animals and made their way back the way they had come. The horse favored its injured leg, but they could not leave it behind.

As morning wore on into midafternoon, the sky hazed over again, obscuring the huge red sun. Several times, as they entered a sparsely wooded area where fire had raced through the underbrush some years before, Rafe climbed the tallest trees to take his bearings. Coryn’s father told stories of men gifted with the sense of always knowing where they were, but whether this was common sense and experience or some minor form of
laran
, he never said. Whatever skill or talent Rafe possessed, he looked satisfied as he descended from his last climb.

“With luck, we’ll stay clear of the boundary,” he said, meaning the edge of High Kinnally territory. “Not that would make any difference to the Storn devils, should they find us out here.” His hand moved toward the long-knife strapped to his thigh.

“Well, if they have any sense, they’re home right now, warm and dry.” Coryn struggled to suppress another shiver. They’d been coming more frequently all morning, even as the day grew warmer. He was not cold enough to shiver, and he knew it. It was better that Rafe believe he was all right, that the prayers had worked.