Terry Brooks - The Elves of Cintra

She grinned, tossing back her blond hair. "Tragen doesn't think it so funny, but he lacks a good sense of humor. If he didn't make up for it in other ways, I expect I would have to rethink our relationship."

Kirisin gave his sister a pointed look. "Tragen's all right," he said, re–peating her words back to her. "For now."

They resumed their climb shortly after, leaving behind the last of the trees and proceeding onto bare rock and gravel. The trail disap–peared altogether, and the slope steepened. Kirisin was finding it in–creasingly hard to breathe, but he knew the air was thin and that after a time his lungs would get used to it. At least, that was what Sim had told him. In any case, he soldiered on, working his way behind her as they wound through the mountain's rocky debris, advancing toward the snowpack.

When they reached the edge, Simralin walked them forward far–ther still until they were atop the glacier, high on the mountain now, the wind blowing harder, dry and biting cold. Amid a shelter of massive boulders, she had them lock on the crampons, pull on the gloves, slip the visors over their eyes, and unsling the ice axes. Moving more slowly now, but still climbing, they passed out of the boulders and onto the ice. All around them, the glacier glimmered dully in the pale sunlight. The gray of earlier had dissipated at these heights, the clouds below them now, a roiling dark mass encircling the rock. But the day was pass–ing, the light failing as the sun gave way to an advancing darkness. The western horizon, refracting the change in the light's intensity, was al–ready starting to color.

"Not much farther!" Simralin called by way of encouragement. She had stopped a dozen yards ahead and was looking back at them.

Kirisin slowed, Angel coming up beside him. He hoped she was right. He was getting cold, even through his all–weather gear, and a tiredness he could barely fight off was settling in. He shifted his pack to a new position and began moving ahead again, then realized that Angel wasn't following. He glanced around. The Knight of the Word was standing where he had left her, staring back down the mountain.

He stopped again. "Angel?"

She looked at him, her gaze vague and distant, focused on some–thing beyond what he was seeing. It was almost as if she were in an–other place entirely. "Go on ahead, Kirisin," she said. "I'll be along in a moment. I want to check on something. Don't worry. I can find my way."

"I'll wait with you," he offered quickly. "We both will."

She held up her hand at once as he started toward her. "No, Kirisin. I have to do this alone. Do as I say. You and your sister go on without me. Do what you came to do."

He started to object, but saw something in her eyes that stopped him. There was a hard determination reflected that told him she was decided on this. Whatever she intended, she didn't want anyone to in–terfere. He hesitated, still uncertain, his fears deepening. "Don't be too long. It's starting to get dark."

She nodded and turned back down the mountainside toward the clump of boulders they had left earlier. "Adios, mi amigo," she called to him. "Lo siento."

He had no idea what she was saying. By the way she said it–almost to herself, rather than to him–he wasn't even sure she was aware of what language she was using. It was as if by speaking the words, she had dismissed him from her mind. He watched her walk away and wondered if he ought to go after her. He didn't like the idea of them split–ting up like this, not staying together when they were so close to find–ing what they had come all this way to discover.

But mostly he didn't like what he had heard in her voice. It sounded as if she was leaving.

It felt as if she was saying good–bye.

ANGEL PEREZ WAS AT PEACE. A deep, pervasive calm had settled inside, an infusion of a sort that she hadn't experienced in years. She couldn't explain it. Nothing justified it. If anything, she should have been riddled with fear, terrified of what waited in the rocks below. Her nerves should have been all sharp–edged and raw.

After all, she was probably going to die.

She walked toward the cluster of huge boulders, the mass of dark stone like the jaws of the earth amid the whiteness of the snow, wait–ing to devour her. The runes carved in the gleaming surface of her black staff glowed brightly. She knew what was hiding in the rocks. The demons. The spiky–haired female that had transformed into a four–legged horror and tracked her north from her home, and the compan–ion it had found in the Cintra. Somehow the pair had discovered their destination and caught up to them. It shouldn't have come as a sur–prise, and in truth it didn't. She had suspected all along that the demons were one step ahead of them, ever since Ailie and Erisha had been killed in Ashenell. She had known it for sure when they had reached the hiding place for the hot–air balloons and found one of them missing. She had known right away who had taken it. There was no way of determining the truth of it, yet she had known.

She had been waiting ever since for them to surface, knowing that they would in the same way she had known that the struggle between them would end here. Standing on the hillside as Simralin assured them they were almost to their goal, she had felt the demon presence and known it was time. She had been anticipating it ever since she had escaped the last attack, deep in the ruined forests of California, where only Ailie's warning had saved her. She had said nothing to her com–panions, but she had been waiting for it. Now it was here. The con–frontation she had always believed to be inevitable had arrived.

Still, she was at peace.

She did not want Kirisin or Simralin to know what was happening. If they found out, they would want to stand with her. They could not help. She would worry for them, seek to protect them, and thereby lessen her own chances of surviving. Those chances were small enough as it was. If she faced only one of the two, she might be able to kill or disable it. If both were waiting for her, the best she could hope for was a quick death. She had no illusions. In all likelihood, she was not com–ing out of this.

She thought it very odd that she wasn't frightened. She had been terrified after her last encounter with the female demon, so afraid that she could barely think clearly when she and Ailie fled its attack on the Mercury 5 for the Oregon border. She had known then–had known— that the next time she was forced into a confrontation with this partic–ular demon, she was going to die. Twice she had escaped it, but only barely. The third time would be the end of her. She was tough and skilled, but this creature was more than she could handle. She had been extremely lucky before. She could not expect to be so lucky again.

It almost made her smile. Perhaps the inevitability of what waited had leached all the fear out of her. Perhaps by knowing that she must stand and fight, she had become resigned to what that meant. She was not afraid of dying or even of what dying meant. She was not afraid to face this monster, even though she might suffer in ways she had never imagined possible. If this was the death that had stalked her since birth–as some form of death stalked everyone–if this was where it was meant to end for her, she could accept it. She could not explain this willingness to embrace her fate, but she found comfort in it. She had found grace.

She reached the cluster of rocks and stopped. At least one of them waited within, just out of sight. The wolfish one, the one that served the old man. It had made no effort to disguise its coming. It had re–vealed itself openly, knowing she would respond as she had. Or per–haps it had hoped she would try to flee so that it could give pursuit and take her down from behind, a rabbit caught by a predator. Whatever the case, it wanted her to know before she died that it had found her and she could not escape. It took pleasure in forcing her to anticipate her own death, to know there was no escape.