David Drake - Godess of the Ice Realm

Neal sank into gloomy introspection, his eyes on his hands folded in his lap. He obviously didn't want to think about a doom he couldn't avoid. Sharina didn't have any better answers than Neal did-neither to his problems nor to the more complicated business of getting herself back to the worldshe knew; but she hadn't given up trying.

She smiled. She wasn't going to give up, but she didn't see even a path to an answer to anything. It was funny if you thought about it in the right way.

Men in the bow murmured, nudging one another and looking toward the southwest. Nobody spoke. Sharina turned, squinting to sharpen her vision.

Something was coming toward them, either on the sea or flying just above it. At first she thought it was a bird with long, sparkling wings, but when it changed course slightly she saw that it was a fish whose pectoral fins were each as long as its body. A figure rode on its back and waved a wand or spear. It wasn't human, though at first she'd thought it was.

Alfdan moved for the first time since they'd started south: he pointed his staff a few degrees to the right of its previous bearing. The great fish squirmed through the air in a desperate attempt to follow, but it fell inexorably behind. Finally it vanished in a haze of crimson wizardlight.

"What was that?" Sharina said to Neal. "Have you seen it before?"

Neal remained silent, lost in his bleak considerations.

"We've seen that sort of thing, sure," said another man. "They're not real, we figure. They're mirages, because lots of times they just scatter away after a while."

Beard laughed. "Oh, they're real," he said. "As real as you are when you're here on the Queen Ship. The ship doesn't sail in the world you're from, you know; and the place your great Alfdan has taken you has its own residents."

The man who'd told Sharina that what they'd seen was a mirage gaped. He must not have heard the axe speak before.

"Are those things dangerous, Beard?" Sharina asked. She turned back in the direction she'd last seen the fish and its rider. The sky was empty and the sea was its usual turgid gray. "The residents?"

"Not unless they catch you, mistress," the axe said with its usual enthusiasm. "If they catch you, they'll kill you all! Beard will be alone in this place with nothing, no blood to drink ever again."

Did the axe think he'd frighten her, or did he just have a wry sense of humor? Well, Sharina'd been places before where if you couldn't laugh at horrors you had nothing whatever to laugh at.

"We'll hope that they don't catch us, then," she said with a faint smile. "I'd hate to leave so good a friend as you, Beard, in such a terrible place."

The axe laughed merrily. His voice was a pleasant tenor when he was at ease, but when he saw the hope of slaughter his tones rose till they were indistinguishable from a small brass bell ringing a tocsin.

"Oh, yes, mistress," he said. "You'll treat Beard well, he's sure you will. Ah, Beard hasn't had a master like you in thousands of years, thousands."

Sharina continued to smile. It was always good to have friends; and in this world, Beard wasn't a bad friend to have.

"Look, mistress," Franca said. Instead of touching her shoulder, he extended his pointing finger past her face, then lowered it.

Sharina turned and saw trees on the horizon. "Are there islands here?" she said. There hadn't been-she hadn'tseen -islands in this portion of the Inner Sea when she'd crossed it in her own world, but if the sea level was dropping perhaps…

"They walk on water, mistress," Beard said. "They came down from where the Ice Capes were. Now it's all ice there for hundreds of miles south, so the trees have had to move."

"How do trees walk?" Scoggin demanded. "They can't! They never did before!"

"Did you think it was only wizards who gained power when She came?" the axe chuckled. "It wasn't. Some wizards, and some-other things. Perhaps they now call themselves Larch the Great, do you think?"

"Look, Layson," said Scoggin, leaning sideways so that he could see the man who'd been speaking. They must have exchanged names while Sharina was talking with the wizard. "What is it that that fellow-"

He waggled a finger toward the stern. Like many other people Sharina'd met, Scoggin didn't choose to name wizards-any more than they would demons-for fear of what they might be calling to them.

"-plans to do? Is it like the axe says, he's just sailing around till we all freeze?"

Neal turned, awakening from his state of detachment. "Do you have a better idea, Scoggin?" he said. His tone was questioning, not a sarcastic snarl. "Because he's keeping us alive, it seems to me."

"He didn't keep Tadli alive just now," Franca said unexpectedly. Because he was so quiet, it was easy to forget his presence-and the fact that he heard and understood things.

"He didn't keep any of you alive just now!" Beard said. "My mistress and I kept you alive!"

"What do you say, mistress?" Layson said. "What would you do?"

Alfdan had adjusted his wand again, returning them to their previous course. Did he have some tool of art to tell him where to steer? Sharina saw another grove of trees to the west, but they were too far away for her to make out any details before the Queen Ship left them behind.

Alfdan stood fixed by the strain of his art; everyone else was waiting for her reply. It didn't make sense except in human terms, but Sharina'd learned since she left home that the answer to the question, "Why me?" was always, "Because you will." These men wanted her to lead them, because they knew she was willing to lead.

"You talk about Her," Sharina said. "WhenShe came, whenShe made things change. Where is She?"

Men looked at one another or at their hands. She wasn't sure they'd have given her an answer even if they had one. "Maybe Alfdan knows," muttered someone seated behind her.

"She is in the north," said Beard, speaking in a precise, pedantic voice. "She is in the farthest north, from where everything is south. She is in a palace beneath the ice, and there She weaves the fate of the world. Ice and death and silence!"

"Then…," said Sharina. There was no other answer, after all, though her mouth had gone dry. "Then I think that's where we should be going, or at least I should."

"And Beard should go, mistress!" the axe caroled. "Oh, so very much blood to drink before they slay you, mistress, so many monsters and halfmen and so much blood!"

Alfdan's wand thumped against the shining deck before him. The Queen Ship slid to a silent halt at the base of a craggy headland. The narrow cliff beyond and that of the similar headland opposite were nearly vertical; they framed a narrow fjord. Here and there grasses sprouted from cracks in the rock.

They'd reached their destination without anyone except the wizard being aware they were approaching land.

Alfdan wavered with the effort of the task he'd just accomplished. He tried to sit but he was already collapsing when two of his men caught him with the skill of experience.

The deck was again as slick as the film over melting ice; men slid off, then scrambled out of the way of their fellows. Sharina let herself follow, holding Beard up in both hands to avoid an accident. The axe chuckled.

She landed on her heels, flexing her legs to take the shock. Even so she winced: her makeshift boots were thin protection against bare rock.

Sharina walked down to the narrow shoreline, looking into the fjord. The water was dark blue but clear; she could see the rock wall continue to slope jaggedly into an abyss.

"There's where you're going, mistress," Beard said happily. "There's where you and Beard are going soon!"

"Oh bye-bye good woman, I'm gone," Chalcus chanted, leading his six crewmen down the dock. As they walked, hauling on a hawser reeved over the top of a pair of shearlegs, theBird of the Tide 's new mast rose in tiny jerks toward vertical. Without the shearlegs to give them leverage, they wouldn't have been able to start the pole from the horizontal.