The Windsingers Series: The Complete 4-Book Collection

‘I had almost forgotten how pleasant it could be to ride instead of walk. I shall hate to see the deep snow. You will know then, as I do, that it makes the way impassable for a wagon. You will decide to turn back then.’

‘I am going through,’ Ki asserted quietly. ‘And the wagon goes under me.’ Vandien gave a snort of what might have been amusement. Ki did not deign to reply.

The wagon-trail ground upward, twisting and dodging among stands of spruce and snaggles of alder that grew in the shelter of rocky outcroppings. Where the bare outcroppings of rock thrust tall, the trail detoured around them. Often it seemed to pass on the far side of hummocks of land instead of winding closer to the pass. Ki wondered who had made such a roundabout trail to go through the mountains. The grade was easier on the pulling team, true, but sometimes the detours of the path made little sense to her. Ki had used passes that followed the bed of a river, or sought the lowest place in a range of mountains to cross. This trail seemed to do nothing but sneak and slink across the face of the mountains. Sometimes the path seemed to run out entirely, and the team pulled the wagon over flat, lichened rocks and mossy places. Ki saw little sign of game, other than an occasional school of lichen mantas. They were only distinguishable from the gray-green lichen they consumed by their comic flutters as they moved hastily from the wagon path. In places, they coated the earth, hiding the trail.

Once, Ki thought she had lost the trail entirely. But just then Vandien raised a gaunt hand, jabbing a finger between a stand of trees and an outcropping of gray rock.

‘There are the Sisters! First glimpse you get of them.’

Ki followed the direction of his point. She had expected the Sisters to be the two tallest mountains in the range, or at least the two they would pass between. They were not. White snow shone on the mountain’s face. Their trail ran clearly across it and around. They would have a drop-off on one side of the wagon and a sheer wall of rock on the other. The mountain rose straight up from the trail’s edge, smooth and white. Where the mountain rose straightest and the drop-off on the other side was most extreme, the Sisters stood. Ki now understood the sign back at the inn.

The Sisters were a strange outcropping of black stone, jutting in relief from the smooth plane of the otherwise gray rock of the mountain. They shone smooth and dark, free of any traces of snow. They looked like the stylized, symmetrical silhouette of two long-haired Humans. The faces were patrician, royal in outline, the noses and lips of the two faces lightly touching: Sisters, greeting one another.

‘Did you see them!’ Vandien exclaimed as another stand of trees veiled them from Ki’s eyes.

Ki nodded, strangely moved at the sight. Vandien seemed to understand the rise of emotions in her. ‘Devotion. To me, they always seem to sing of selfless love. This is the only place on the trail that gives you a full view of them. Up close, they lose the resemblance and turn into plain outcroppings of black rock. But from here it’s a sight to make a minstrel weep. The first time I saw them I longed to be an artist, to capture them in some way. Then I realized they were already captured, for all time, in the best possible form. No mere Human could improve on that!’

His dark eyes snapped and glowed with intense pleasure. He flung himself back against the cuddy door. Ki could find no further words to add to his. But she had caught his spirit of admiration for the Sisters. He seemed pleased that she shared it.

By midmorning they were into shallow snow. It went from a wet layer that the horses’ hooves churned up into mud to a deeper layer that made the wagon wheels stick and slide. The team heaved at the traces, sweat showing on their gray, dappled coats as steam rose from them. Their progress slowed. There was no broken trail ahead of them. Snow blanketed it smoothly. No encouraging footprints or wagon tracks led the way. When Ki stopped the team briefly at noon, Vandien shrugged knowingly and looked at her from the corner of his eyes. She ignored him. Climbing from the wagon, she waded forward through the calf-deep snow to the team. She dried their coats with firm strokes of a piece of sheepskin. Patient Sigmund nuzzled her thankfully, but Sigurd only rolled his eyes dolorously.

‘Time to turn back?’ Vandien asked lightly as she climbed back onto the seat.

‘No. As we go higher, the snow should be drier. The wheels will stop their cursed slipping. The horses will not be working as hard. Though,’ she added, suddenly frank, ‘I will admit we are not making as good time as I had hoped for. I may not have figured correctly the amount of time we will need. The trail snakes about.’

‘Powder snow will not be as wet, but it will be deeper,’ Vandien commented sourly. ‘And, past the tree line, you will find the snow deeper than you might expect. Soil and brush give way to rock and lichen there. Nothing grows to break the drifts. But let us go on. We may as well ride in comfort as far as we can before we abandon the wagon.’

Ki glared at him. Then she unfastened the cuddy door and slid it open. When she came out she passed Vandien several sticks of smoked meat. She settled beside him once more and took up the reins. With a shake, she started the team. The twisted tough sticks of meat filled their mouths and kept Vandien from any more speech.

The broken trail fell away behind them as they wound their way up the mountain. The tall trees they had traveled between in the morning grew shorter as the day progressed. The air became colder, making the skin of Ki’s face feel stiff and strange to her. She gave the team their heads, shaking her own head at Vandien when he wanted to take the reins for her. She moved back into the cuddy. She returned shortly wearing a heavy wool cloak and fur-skinned gloves. She pulled the thick hood up about her face as she sat down. From under one arm she produced a thick shawl of undyed gray sheep’s wool. Vandien wrapped it about himself gratefully, but without comment. His own garments were worn to thinness from his sojourn in the hills. Though he had not complained, Ki had noticed his shivering. She wondered what small demon in herself made her want him to admit to feeling cold. Grudgingly, she admired the way he handled himself. He made no demands, nor offered humble thanks. For Ki, it made her giving easier. Bad enough that he had dog eyes without him dog-fawning on her.

Only stunted and twisted spruce was left of the forest now. Scrubby brush poked up hopelessly from the snow and helped to show Ki, by its absence, where the trail was supposed to run. Above them the mountains glared down whitely upon the gaily painted wagon and straining gray horses. Ki looked in vain for another glimpse of the Sisters. The twisting trail had put another hummock of earth between the wagon and its goal. Ki’s eyes watered from the brightness. When she bowed her head to rest her eyes, the cold froze the tears and stiffened her lashes. She wiped a gloved hand across them and shook the reins lightly.

Once, against the clear blue sky, she caught sight of the falling speck that was a distant hawk. She raised a furred glove to point at it. ‘I didn’t think they would hunt this high,’ she commented.

‘He seems to be an outcast,’ Vandien shrugged. ‘He’s been seen before, by other folk crossing this way. They say he hunts the pass and higher hills. The moon alone knows what he finds to hunt. Poor bastard. I doubt if he’s ever warm.’

The horses toiled on steadily. The snow was growing deeper about the wheels, but still the wheels turned and the grays pulled. Except for an occasional sigh of wind, the creak of the wagon and the blowing of the horses were the only sound and movement on the trail. Ki saw no sign of game. She pitied the lone hawk. She moved her toes inside her driving boots. A tingle of warmth came back to them. Her lips were dry, but she knew that if she licked them they would crack and bleed. Vandien gestured at the trail ahead of them. ‘We’ll have a pretty time getting your precious wagon over that!’

‘That’ was a ribbon of silver cutting across their path. The blue-shaded white of the snow was cut by its shining. It wove down from a rocky cleft to cut across their path and then twisted off until it was lost over a rise. Ki stood up on the seat, straining her eyes to see what it was. It was like a winding silver pathway that intersected their trail. She sat down again, brow wrinkled and mouth tight in puzzlement.

‘Snow-serpent track,’ Vandien answered her unspoken question. ‘Surely you’ve seen one before.’

‘I’ve heard of them,’ Ki conceded. ‘But mostly around Romni fires at night, when one could discount one half of all one hears. I put them down as a fable, or a great rarity. What will it be like when we come up on it?’

‘Like a wall of ice cutting our path. They may be a rarity elsewhere, but they are common enough in the Sisters’ pass. That one was made by a small serpent, by the look of it. The big ones seldom come down this low. Sometimes they travel across the top of the snow, writhing along like a snake. Sometimes they travel beneath it, squirming along like a worm. The friction of their long bodies melts the snow, making a trough if they travel on top, or a ridge if they travel below. The snow receives the dampness of their passage and, as often as not, turns to ice. A big serpent can leave one as thick across as this wagon is long. But this one does not look that large. We’ll see.’

The creaking of the wagon filled in where their voices left off. Sigurd snorted once, and Sigmund echoed him. They had caught the scent of the serpent’s passage. Stale as it was, it still disturbed them. They shook their heads and thick necks, making their long manes fly. Ki slapped the reins firmly on the wide, gray backs.

When they reached the serpent track, they found it only a stride wide. The team halted at Ki’s command. Their nostrils blowing wide, the great heads tossed uneasily. Ki and Vandien both leaped lightly from the wagon and moved forward to investigate. Ki moved through the snow gingerly, with a catlike distaste for its cold and wetness. But Vandien went as one to whom its cold kiss was familiar and, if not relished, at least not to be disdained.

It was, as Vandien had described it, a low trough of solid ice that cut across the smooth snow before them. It could not be circumvented. To try to drive the wagon over it would be like taking the team and wagon over a log of equal size. Ki kicked at the low wall of ice, and a chunk flew off.

‘Not as bad as it might be,’ commented Vandien. ‘We’ll get through this one. The wagon will take us further than I had thought.’

‘It will take us down the other side of these mountains,’ Ki asserted quietly. She trudged back to the wagon. Vandien remained by the ice trough, blowing on his hands and trying in vain to keep the shawl from slipping down from the back of his neck. Ki returned with the firewood axe. She broke chunks of the serpent track away. Vandien tossed them to one side. Slivers and small hunks of ice flew whenever the axe bit, to sometimes sting the face or strike glancingly off their bodies. Vandien’s ears peeked red from his dark hair. His hands, red at first, soon grew nearly white with cold. Ki found herself sweating inside her cloak, but knew the perils of loosening it to cool herself. They both worked rapidly, without pause, but Ki still cursed to herself at the time lost. The sun was beginning to slide from the winter skies. Already the tallest peaks of the range were casting their shadows down upon the incongruously gay wagon in the snow. The chill of night would drop soon. Vandien grinned to hear Ki curse. He made no comments himself.

When the way was finally clear, Ki found herself trembling from the exertion. The cold had sapped her energy more than she had realized. It seemed a heavy task to take a moment to stroke the frost from the muzzles of the horses, a burden to return the axe to its proper place. She scaled the wagon, sat down heavily on the seat. Vandien was already there waiting on her. They dusted the snow from their leggings before it could melt and chill them more. Ki took up the reins. A creak and a jolt, and the wagon lumbered through the gap they had cleared.

The grays’ heads were drooping as they threw their weight steadily against the traces. The wagon moved more slowly than before. The wind here had been free to sculpt the snow into uneven drifts. The team faced them doggedly, already spent with the day’s labors. The sweat dried on Ki’s body. She began to shiver in spite of her woolen cloak. She chewed at her lower lip, then hastily wiped the moisture away on her glove. She looked across at Vandien. He had tucked his numbed hands between his thighs in an effort to warm them. His tired eyes were fixed bleakly on the trail before them. As far as Ki could tell, it led on endlessly into deeper snow.

‘Where, damn it!’ Ki surrendered suddenly. ‘Where is the shelter you hoped we would reach by nightfall? You said you knew a stopping place when you urged me to an early start this morning. At least give me a goal to make for. I need a marking point to measure our progress against.’

Vandien’s face was too cold to permit him a smile. It showed in his dark eyes instead. He lifted a pale hand made bloodless by the cold.

‘Do you see that line, a sort of dark place like a crack in that ridge? There is a narrow, steep-sided little canyon there, as if long ago some god had riven the mountain at that spot. The canyon itself will be shallower in snow, and within is a place, not quite a cave, but a dent in the wall. Between that dent and the wagon, folk and horses could shelter for a night and not come out of it too badly. It has been used before. There is even a supply of wood there for one who knows where to look for it.’

Ki folded her lips in vexation. In the morning turmoil she had forgotten to take firewood. No doubt, to Vandien it looked as if he rode with an utter fool. No firewood, unfamiliar with her trail, and not even aware of the beasts she might encounter. She was abashed, but to speak in her own defense would only make her appear a greater fool. She silently followed his pointing finger.

All day they had been wending their way across the mountain’s tumbled and ridged skirts. Ki made out the dark area he pointed to. It was yet far away, and off the main trail, but they would make it. She looked up at the mountain peaks that rose before them in time to see the sun slip behind them. Ki had not reckoned that, within the reach of the range’s outstretched arms, her daylight hours would be shortened. The silver of the mountains went to blackness, and the shadows reached out for the wagon with greedy hands. The colors went out of the landscape; they moved in a world of grays.

Ki cursed, then acted. She wrapped the reins loosely around the brake handle so that they would not be pulled off to drag. Then she leaped off the side of the wagon into the unbroken snow and ran up ahead of the straining beasts. At their present pace, it was only too easy. She fell in ahead of Sigmund and began to trudge along, breaking him a trail through the snow. It would be small help, she knew, but in the thickening darkness every minute would be a help. Besides, the motion warmed her and drove off the shivering she had been prey to since they chopped through the snow-serpent’s path. She started when Vandien moved suddenly up beside her, breaking a way for Sigurd. Behind them, the horses’ heads came up a notch, encouraged both by the company and the broken trail.

‘Do your people never speak before they act?’ asked Vandien sourly. ‘Sometimes a man feels a fool in your company.’

Ki raised her eyebrows. ‘Do your people never act before they speak?’ she asked acidly.

‘But, of course. When we go to steal horses.’

Ki glared across at him in the dimness. His face was solemn, but his eyes were laughing at her. Bested, Ki grinned back. It cracked her cold lower lip. She dabbed blood with the back of her glove.

A low hissing noise rose behind them, building to a crescendo and then slowly dying away. Ki pulled her hood closer about her face.

‘The wind rises. We may be caught in it before we reach shelter.’

‘No wind that,’ Vandien replied calmly. ‘Snow serpent. A larger one than made our wall today, if my ears can still judge.’

Ki quickened her pace. Her logic told her that to try to flee before such a beast in the deep snow would be purest foolishness. What chance would they have against a beast whose natural milieu was snow? Her mind raced through a catalog of her possessions, seeking an appropriate weapon. Vandien had lengthened his stride to match hers. He panted with the strain and glanced, annoyed, to see why Ki had increased their pace. Ki’s eyes met his. The whites showed all around her eyes as she returned his gaze.

He laughed lightly, without malice. ‘No need for alarm, Ki. That serpent came upon us, caught our scent, and fled. They have no interest in us. They feed only on the snow itself, gathering the nutrients it offers before they return it to the earth as an icy wall to thwart travelers. Some say that in summer they burrow into the earth itself. They need be of no more concern to us than large earthworms would be to a gardener. Their only threat is in the trails they leave behind them.’

Ki expelled a long, ragged sigh. Her pace slowed. Anger edged her voice. ‘You might have mentioned that when we were chopping through the trail back there. Or when the subject of snow serpents first arose. It would have saved me much worry.’

‘And you might have asked. It would have cost you only a small bit of pride. Of that abundance you carry, you can afford to part with a little. You have never been through this pass before, have you?’

Ki clamped her jaw, not trusting herself to reply. The sudden blaze of anger she felt for this arrogant little man warmed her. She resumed her swifter pace. Vandien matched her, refusing to show how it strained him.

‘Fools. By the Hawk, I am under a plague of fools and cowards,’ Vandien said conversationally. ‘The cowards that turn their wagons back, and the fool that forces hers through. You know nothing, then, of the Sisters and their ways?’