John Flanagan: The Icebound Land

Up and up they went, clawing at the face of the wave, the men heaving until their hearts might burst as they tried to drag Wolfwind up the wave against the combined force of wind and sea. This time, before the wave broke, Will felt the ship seem to lose the last moment of the battle. He opened his eyes in horror as she began to surge backward to certain disaster. Then the crest curled over and smashed down upon them, and again he was sent spinning and scrabbling on the deck, fetching up against the rope that secured him, feeling something slam painfully into his mouth and realizing that it was Evanlyn's elbow. Water thundered over him then the bow pitched down once more, and Wolfwind began another sliding, careering dive down the far side, rolling upright, shedding the seawater like a duck. This time, Will was too weak to scream. He moaned softly and crawled back to the mast.

He looked at Evanlyn and shook his head. There was no way they could survive this, he thought. He could see the same fear in her eyes.

In the stern, Erak and Svengal braced themselves as Wolfwind slammed into the trough, sending sheets of water high either side of the bow, the whole fabric of the ship vibrating to the impact. She rolled, shook, righted herself again.

"She's taking it well," Svengal shouted. Erak nodded grimly.

Terrifying as it might seem to Will and Evanlyn, the wolfship was designed to cope with massive seas like this. But even a wolfship had its limitations. And if they reached them, Erak knew, they would all be dead.

"That last one nearly had us," he replied. It was only a last-minute surge by the rowers that had dragged the ship through the crest as she had been about to slide backward into the trough.

"We're going to have to turn her and run before the storm," he concluded, and Svengal nodded agreement, staring ahead through eyes slitted against the wind and the salt spray. "After this one," he said. The next wave was a little smaller than the one that had nearly finished them. But smaller was a relative term. The two Skandians tightened their grip on the sweep oar.

"Heave, damn you! Heave!" Erak roared at the rowers as the mountain of water reared high above them and Wolfwind began another slow, precarious climb.

"Oh no. Please, please, let it end," Will moaned as he felt the bow cant upward once more. The terror was physically exhausting. He just wanted it to stop. If necessary, he thought, let the ship go under. Let it all go. Make an end of it. Just make this mind-numbing terror stop. He could hear Evanlyn beside him, sobbing with fear. He placed an arm around her but he couldn't bring himself to do anything more to comfort her. Up, up and up they went, then there was the familiar roar of the collapsing crest and the thunder of water crashing down upon them. Then the bow came through the crest, slamming against the back of the wave and plummeting down. Will tried to scream but his throat was raw and his energy exhausted. He managed only a low sob.

Wolfwind sliced into the sea at the base of the wave again. Erak bellowed instructions to the rowers. They would have a short time in the wind shadow of the next approaching wave, and that was the time to make their turn.

"To the steerboard side!" he bellowed, pointing his hand in the direction of the turn just in case his voice didn't carry to some of the forward rowers-although there was little fear of that.

The rowers set their feet against the wooden bracing boards. Those on the steerboard, or right-hand, side of the ship drew their oar handles back toward them. The left-hand-side rowers pushed theirs forward. As the ship leveled, Erak roared out his order.

"Now!"

The oar blades dipped into the sea, and as one side pushed and the other pulled, Erak and Svengal threw their weight on the sweep. The long, narrow ship pivoted neatly, almost in one spot, bringing the stern around to the wind and sea.

"Now pull together!" Erak roared, and the oarsmen went to it with a will. He had to keep the ship moving a little faster than the following sea or it would overwhelm them. He glanced once at the two young Araluen captives, huddled miserably by the mast, then forgot them as he went back to judging the ship's movements, keeping her stern to the following sea. Any error on his part and she'd broach sideways, and that would be the end of them. They were riding easier, he knew. But this was no time to be distracted. To Will and Evanlyn, the ship was still plunging and rearing in a terrifying fashion, traveling through a vertical distance of as much as fifteen meters as she went from crest to trough. But now the movement was more controlled. They were going with the sea, not fighting it. Will sensed a slight easing in the motion. Spray and solid water still slammed over them at regular intervals, but the terrifying, backsliding motion was a thing of the past. As the ship coped with each successive mountain of water sweeping under and around it, Will began to believe that they might have a slight chance of survival.

But it was a slim might. He still felt the same surge of bowel-gripping terror with every wave that overtook them. Each time, he felt that this could well be the last. He put both arms around Evanlyn, felt her arms go around his neck in return, her icy cheek pressed against his own. And so the two young people sought, and found, comfort and courage from each other. Evanlyn was whimpering with fear. And so was he, Will realized with some surprise-muttering meaningless words over and over, calling out to Halt, to Tug, to anyone who might listen and help. But as wave followed wave and Wolfwind survived, the blinding terror lessened and nervous exhaustion took its place and, eventually, he slept.

For seven more days, the ship was driven far to the south, out of the Narrow Sea and into the fringes of the Endless Ocean. And Will and Evanlyn huddled by the mast: sodden, exhausted, freezing. The numbing fear of disaster was always present in their minds but, gradually, they began to believe that they might survive.

On the eighth day, the sun broke through. It was weak and watery, to be sure, but it was the sun. The violent plunging motion ceased, and once again the ship rode smoothly across the face of the rollers.

Erak, his beard and hair rimed with salt, hauled tiredly on the sweep, bringing the ship around in a smooth curve to face north once more.

"Let's head for Cape Shelter," he told his crew.

H ALT STOOD MOTIONLESS AGAINST THE MASSIVE TRUNK OF an oak tree as the bandits swarmed out of the forest to surround the carriage. He was in full view but nobody saw him. In part this was due to the fact that the robbers were totally intent on their prey, a wealthy merchant and his wife. For their part, they were equally distracted, staring with horror at the armed men who now surrounded their carriage in the clearing.

But in the main, it was due to the camouflage cloak that Halt wore, its cowl pulled up over his head to leave his face in shadow, and the fact that he stood absolutely stock-still. Like all Rangers, Halt knew that the secret of merging into the background lay with the ability to remain unmoving, even when people seemed to be looking straight at him. Believe you are unseen, went the Ranger saying, and it will be so.

A burly figure, clad entirely in black, now emerged from the trees and approached the carriage. Halt's eyes narrowed for a second, then he sighed silently. Another wild-goose chase, he thought.

The figure bore a slight resemblance to Foldar, the man Halt had been pursuing since the end of the war with Morgarath. Foldar had been Morgarath's senior lieutenant. He had managed to escape capture when his leader died and his army of subhuman Wargals faded away.

But Foldar was no mindless beast. He was a thinking, planning human being-and a totally warped and evil one. The son of a noble Araluen family, he had murdered both his parents after an argument over a horse. He was barely a teenager at the time and he had escaped by fleeing into the Mountains of Rain and Night, where Morgarath recognized a kindred spirit and enlisted him. Now he was the sole surviving member of Morgarath's band and King Duncan had made his capture and imprisonment a number-one priority for the kingdom's armed forces.