Chris Evans - Ashes of a Black Frost

“What’s wrong with this thing?”

“The lens cover. .” Private Meswiz said.

“Damn it,” Konowa muttered, ripping the cover off and re-sighting the telescope. He struggled to find the spot again. “I don’t see . . wait, there are figures there.” Something about that one looks familiar. . He moved the larger tube to bring the image into focus.

He lowered the telescope.

Kritton .

Do you see? This is what that fool Konowa has brought down upon us all!” Kritton said, throwing his hands around to encompass the snow-covered desert. He glared at Visyna. There was a certainty of purpose in his eyes that would brook no dispute. In someone else it might have been viewed as fierce determination, but Visyna knew this was something different, something lethal.

He’s losing control, she realized. It was only a matter of time before he tried to kill them all.

Kritton continued to rage, all the while flailing his arms around. His uniform hung in tatters from his lean frame. His hair was unkempt and his caerna was little more than a rag.

She lowered her head and turned away, partly to avoid antagonizing him further, but also to protect her face from the wind-whipped snow buffeting her. After the warm confines of the tunnel, she was finding it difficult to catch her breath in the cold. None of them were dressed for this weather, and all of them were tired, hungry, thirsty, and nursing wounds. They wouldn’t last more than an hour or two in these conditions.

She waited, bringing her hands in tight to her chest to warm her fingers in case she had to begin weaving. Kritton cursed and walked away, shouting orders to the elves to keep their muskets pointed at the prisoners. Visyna searched their faces, looking for a sign of compassion, of regret, or even shame, but all she saw were masks of indifference. The look in their eyes was as cold as the steel of their bayonets. Visyna had no doubt in her mind they would kill all of them without hesitation.

Hrem appeared beside her a moment later. “I think I was right. There’s a fort just ahead of us on those rocks. That has to be Suhundam’s Hill.”

Visyna squinted into the wind. What at first she took to be more darkness resolved itself into the outline of a jagged collection of rocks topped off with a squat, square box. “We need to act before we get inside there. Kritton is coming apart.”

“Elves could die,” Hrem said, his gaze still fixed on the fort.

“They made their choice. It’s time we made ours,” she said, echoing his words from earlier. She tested the air around her. Now that she knew what to look for her fingers easily found the elves’ threads in the storm. She gasped when her touch found one more surrounded by a cold, black power. Could it be? “I think Konowa is here,” she whispered, looking up at the fort.

“That means the regiment is here, too,” Hrem said, glancing around them before looking back to the top of the wall. “I thought I saw movement up there, but I figured it was just the wind. If the regiment is already inside the fort then Kritton is going to walk himself right into a trap. All we have to do is stay calm and let it happen.”

Visyna couldn’t believe their luck. Would it really be this easy? Kritton barked more orders and the elves and their prisoners began to move. In this weather it would be easy for one of the soldiers to slip away into the night unseen, but where would they run? With no shelter from the storm they would freeze to death out here. She looked at the huddled group of soldiers and realized none of them would be running anywhere. Zwitty, Scolly, and Inkermon were keeping each other upright in a swaying, stumbling fashion. Chayii walked with one hand firmly gripping Jir’s mane. The elf stopped and started to swoon, then caught herself and stood up straight.

“Hrem, I must help Chayii. If she collapses, her hold on Jir will, too, and he’ll attack. Keep the others together.”

Hrem nodded and slid over to steady the trio while Visyna matched her pace with Chayii and casually slipped her arm around her waist. The elf was shaking.

“You must keep your hands free to weave, my child,” Chayii said, turning to look at her. Chayii’s face was gray and her lips were turning blue.

“You’re turning to ice,” Visyna said, gripping the elf more tightly and hoping to get some warmth into her.

“Jir is becoming increasingly difficult to hold, and the weather is not helping. I don’t think I can make it to the fort.”

No. Visyna looked around to make sure no elves were close. “I think I felt Konowa up there. I’m certain I sensed him. We just have to make it inside and we’ll be fine. Everything will be fine.”

“My son is there?”

Visyna squeezed her waist. “You just have to hold on a bit longer.”

At these words Chayii stood up a little straighter. Jir looked up at them and purred, his ears pointing straight up and his muzzle to the wind, sniffing the air. Could he sense Konowa, too, she wondered? A moment later the bengar’s purr turned into a snarl.

Visyna took her hand from Chayii’s waist and sought out the threads again. There were more, hundreds more.

“Rakkes!”

“Where?” Chayii asked, coming to a halt. The elves around them heard her shout and stopped, too. Kritton was there in a flash, eyes boring in on her.

“I warned you, witch,” he said, raising the butt of his musket in preparation to strike her.

Before it could fall, the shrieking cry of a rakke sounded off in the distance. It was answered at once by dozens more. The sound grew to a fury far outstripping the storm. Kritton lowered his musket.

“Back to the tunnel. We need to go back there, now!”

“It’s too late for that,” Hrem said, walking up to place himself between the elf and Visyna. “Didn’t you hear those things? They’re behind us, too. Our only chance now is to make it to the fort. The rakkes will never get us in there.”

Mention of the fort snapped Kritton’s head around to look at the rocky hill. Visyna noticed the elves were watching the storm now and paying no attention to the rest of them.

One of the elves said something to Kritton in elvish and pointed toward the fort, but Kritton shook his head. “The plan was to meet at the foot of the path leading up to the main gate. The dwarf Griz Jahrfel will be there.”

“Kritton, if Griz Jahrfel is anywhere around here, he and the rest of his band of thieves are probably rakke meat by now,” Hrem said. “Listen to them. We have to get to the fort.”

Kritton raised his musket as if to fire. “You forget who’s in charge here! We will not go back in that fort!” Kritton shouted.

By now all the elves had formed a small square facing outward. This was exactly the chance Visyna had been looking for, but now that there were rakkes nearby she wasn’t certain if she should take it. She believed in her heart that Konowa was in that fort, and wanted nothing more than for him to charge out with the regiment to save them, but she already knew that was impossible. A regiment can’t move that fast, and it would be suicide to bring them out of the security of the fort.

She made up her mind.

While Hrem and Kritton continued to argue she moved over to stand in front of Zwitty, Scolly, and Inkermon. She turned to them as if offering them aid.

“Tell me if Kritton comes this way,” she said.

“What are you up to?” Zwitty asked, his weaselly face a scowl of suspicion.

“Saving your lives,” she said.

Ignoring the threads of life around her, Visyna focused instead on the weather. She closed her eyes and focused her attention skyward, picking out a single snowflake fluttering in the air several hundred feet up. Using it as her focal point, she began to draw more flakes to it, hoping to create a microstorm that would blind Kritton and the elves long enough to cover their escape.