Fortress of Ice

Elfwyn he might snatch, might. But Aewyn was lost if he did that. Aewyn resisted. Aewyn clung to the world, and the result slung the brothers no knowing where, a leaf’s mad course through a windstorm.

The gale narrowed, however. A gap appeared in a wall of shards that baffled him: such a wall had never existed, within his ken. Winds wailed through that keyhole of a gap, and if the boys went that way, they might be swept through and lost.

Those were wards, he thought. Wards of unprecedented strength, veiling a power that might suck the boys right through: to him it appeared as an impenetrable wall, when most were gossamer, and shredded when he casually reached through them.

He was dismayed—helpless to prevent the boys’ sweeping course toward that narrow gap, and not knowing, if he passed through that one necessary breach, whether he could rescue the boys, or even save himself.

Two swordlike spires of ice thrust up, blocking his path. One cut his reaching hand. Blood fell, and streamed away like smoke. More shards rose.

“Aewyn Marhanen!” he called out, attempting to enlist that recalcitrant mote. But he had not seen the Guelen brother in years, and had nothing to hold to, no inkling how to compel the one resisting element of that retreating image. “Elfwyn Aswydd!”

Suddenly the track of both boys curled away and vanished, more smoke than substance, streaming among shards of ice, bristling precursors of that wall.

The gray space curled up and stretched out again, and all the shards revised themselves. They became part of the barrier.

He might risk it. For two such lives, even so, he might risk that barrier.

“M’lord,” Uwen said, or he thought Uwen said.

Solid as the mortal earth, Uwen was, and long ago, he had given Uwen the command of him. He began to retreat without deciding.

Overheated air met him, like fire, burning his wounded hand. Blood dripped, Uwen seized him, face-to-face as he caught his balance on solid stone. Cefwyn and Crissand, with Master Emuin, turned in alarm.

“I lost them, too,” he said in despair, and Uwen caught his wounded hand and held on to him, warmth, like the room, and Crissand seized a heavy chair and shoved it under him.

Rest and warmth came welcome. His body was exhausted. And from where he sat, he could look across to Master Emuin, whose face was still u

“A book, lad,” Emuin said hoarsely. “We thought it burned… and ’twas hidden in the library wall. It’s come loose in the world now.”

“There was something…” A chill came through his flesh, a memory of that place, and of that blue trail through the winds. He recalled of the Zeide library, a pile of ash, and a basket of burned fragments that resisted every effort to put them back together—fallen to dust, now.

But the boys had fought their fate. Some sort of magic was with them. Magic drew them along the winds, but in their determination—or the determination of one of them—they fought being drawn. That, and at least the one thing of power in the possession of one of them, was how they still held on to the world.

“One book survived,” Emuin said faintly. “One book someone most wanted, time meaning very little to him. Mauryl’s notebook, if I’m a wizard, and Elfwyn has it. He carries it with him.”

Cold settled about his heart, deep suspicion what power would have had the deftness to hide such a thing from Emuin and from him all this time, despite their searching, the deftness to hide it and the patience to wait for years to lay hands on it. Men were born and died, but that ancient soul had maintained a key in the world to get at it. It was not an immortal creature: nor was he, brought into the world for one purpose—to oppose it.

So a book of Mauryl Gestaurien’s had survived, as they had thought— Mauryl, who had taught Hasufin Heltain, but nottaught him all he wanted.

Mauryl, in his battle with Hasufin Heltain, had called himinto being at the last. Tristen’s own making might be in such a book. He had looked for that in the ashes they had found in the library, a burning that had not been complete, and in books they had gotten back at the riverside… to no avail. Now there was a book, which no one could find before.

Now, now the key emerged—the boy with the hollow at his heart, the book that was not burned, the burst tomb, and the sister vanished from her tower…

Hasufin had no pity, nor any desire but one: life and power to hold on to it. He knew his enemy, having reached to the depth of him. And Hasufin knew him: if there was one thing Hasufin wanted most in all the world it was to see him out of it… because Hasufin would not have life until he took and destroyed Mauryl’s own key in the world—his greatest spell, his Shaping clothed in flesh, that walked and breathed and held lordship over Ynefel, where, until Tristen was gone, Hasufin could not be.

The blood dripped down from his hand and puddled on the stones. Uwen was attempting to staunch it with a piece of cloth, but it was cut to the bone. Once he thought of it, he healed himself, only because it distressed Uwen. He was trying to think what else in recent days might be the enemy’s working, the gathering of pieces, the arrangement of items that suited his working.

His and Uwen’s confusion in coming here—oh, that was beyond doubt part and parcel of it: they were not meant to have come here too early. Once things moved, then they could move like lightning. Emuin could reach this place. Tristan had arrived, alas, just a little later than Emuin, having come farther, he suspected.

“Are they lost?” Cefwyn asked him… the dread in his eyes was hard to bear.

“No,” he said quickly and, for Cefwyn, he took a risk: he cast out into the world of Men, sure of a location, at least, now that he knew whatthe boy was carrying, and hoping only not to dislodge them again in the mere attempt to locate them. North, he thought. North of Henas’amef, at the bridge. “I know where they are,” he said. “They’re well enough for the moment.”

“What can we do?”

“I’ve lost Owl somewhere,” he said, not at all extraneously. It was part and parcel of the difficulty they were all in, part of his being lost, part of his immediate helplessness to reach the boys, and that Owl had strayed from him in Marna and not come back was all of a piece with the rest of it, this sudden abstraction of resources that belonged to Ynefel and Mauryl, and to him. Their enemy was pouring a great deal of effort into this working, a very great deal, and moving quickly. “They are north of us, not all the way into Elwynor. If I should reach for them, I fear they would move out of reach.”

“Tristen,” Cefwyn said, laying a hand on his arm. “Tristen, Ninévrisëis in Elwynor. With the baby. Could they be going toward her?”

It was not good news. He shook his head. “The two boys are inthis world. I believe they are. I ca

“Is it that damned woman? Is it Tarien Aswydd?”

“She hasn’t done this alone,” Emuin said.

“Hasufin,” Tristen said quietly. And: “Get horses. We must go in this world, as quickly as we can. If I am nearer to them than he is, I believe I can hold them.”

“The book,” Emuin said. “The book evaded her when he took it; in his hands it is not compliant, and the boy’s will is not inconsiderable. He defied me—and I dared not take it in my own hands—I doubt I could have held on to it, or survived the attempt. He’s done quite well at holding on to it, thus far. But I fear that book is still dragging him bit by bit where he ought not to go, and dragging your other son along with him.”