Fortress of Ice

Hehad to be, now. It was his needto have what was buried here; it was his rightto have it, when fate and his mother’s spite had taken every other thing away from him. If he and Paisi were to find their way in the world, he had to know all the truths people kept from him, and he had to protect them both, the way Paisi had protected Gran as long as he could. Now it was his mother’s sorcery that threatened their lives, and he had to have this thing to protect them all, before his mother’s spite could do worse to them than it had already done…

He reached stone, and where mortar should have been, found only more soft plaster binding the stones together. He dug out one ill-set stone, and opened a hole where light failed to reach, and a small glow within. It died like a fading coal. He extended the poker into the darkness, and disturbed something hard and light, that lifted a little and slipped back in. The poker felt only cold to the touch when he drew it out.

He reached into the gap blindly, fearing to touch he knew not what noxious thing, but feeling he must. His fingers found a little flat and very dusty packet.

Carefully he worked it about and drew it and his hand out of the narrow gap undamaged.

He turned around, sat angling his prize toward the starlight from tall, uncurtained windows. It was a codex, scarcely bigger than his palm.

He clambered back to his feet and opened the little book in the middle, but there was not enough light on this side of the room to read what was in it. He took it to the fireside, where the stick he had thrown in had taken light.

The letters crawled in front of his eyes, refusing to take shape, as if tears blinded him, or as if his eyes had grown as dim as Gran’s.

He felt the burning of his mother’s attention, felt it bearing down his back, as if she were standing there right at his back.

Get it! she seemed to say to him, as fiercely as she had ever spoken. You’ve gone this far. Now bring it to me.

“Boy,” another voice seemed to say to him—a faint, far voice, that for all the world was Gran’s.

He looked up. He saw Gran, standing right there, like a figure in smoke. “Boy, don’t dare let her have it.”

He felt as if he were smothering, as if he could not get his next breath. The fire crackled and snapped, and part of the stick fell, flaring bright flame as it did.

Fear became horrid and acute, choking him. He shut the little book in fear, and at his next blink, Gran wasn’t there. She never had been there, he thought. It was his mother who had put this shameful theft into his head, this fever like the grip of a nightmare, that he now knew wasn’t right—it was his mother that had come whispering into his ear, encouraging his fears, telling him the truth could be had, and that the truth would save him and all he loved… it was a lie. It was all a lie, and he had looked at the book, and the letters wouldn’t take shape for him.

Vision was the word; had not Tristen said that? Vision.

Knowledge. Answers held from him all his life. Dark places. The more he tried to see, frantic with fear, the more he couldn’t remember the other word, and couldn’t think what he ought to do with this thing he had brought into the light, except something that looked and sounded like Gran had said not to obey his mother.

A book, a book, for the gods’ sweet sake, exactly what one would expect in a library, a little codex that could be hidden so easily among all these books and stacks, but for some reason, and by some one, it had been hidden in a wall instead. And for all the years of his life, his mother had made no requests for any material thing, but she wanted this—this, after a decade and more without a request.

Just holding it now made his hand tingle, and made the ring on his finger glow soft, safe blue, not the baleful red of the glow he had followed. It seemed safer, by that, in his hand, than it had been where he had found it. When he had touched Tristen’s wards, it had felt like that, the tingling, and his heart had raced, had it not? It was only fear.

He felt a prickling at his nape. His mother still watched him. His mother wantedhim, suddenly raged at him, like a silent shriek… but Gran had said, still quietly, as she did all things—no.

His mother should not have it. There was nothing good his mother wanted in the world, and if her desire had driven him to such behavior—and if she wanted this little book now, then he had to prevent it getting to her. He could put it back where he had found it. But shoving it back into the wall would never serve, not after all the damage he had done, and the plaster tracked about. The librarian would go to Lord Crissand, and Lord Crissand would want to see the object of his mad search, and once it was in the open, it was apt to theft by anybody else his mother might move, like a precious jewel left lying undefended in the street.

Footsteps sounded in the hall, in such great stillness, more than one footfall. His pounding heart leapt with a second fright, and he froze where he stood, then realized that the firelight he had roused might show through the seam of the doors and in those tall, uncurtained windows. Someone might wonder. Someone might open that door.

He had the key. He fumbled after it, and moved stealthily to the door and locked it from the inside. The lock clicked like the crack of doom, and he froze, scarcely daring breathe.

But what was he doing? He had the key. The librarian had allowed him to be here. He could face Lord Crissand’s guards and tell them—tell them he had come down to borrow a book.

And say what, about the plaster?

The footsteps reached the door. He heard muffled voices, and his heartbeat thumped in his ears, so that he hadn’t good sense. The latch moved.

And stopped, against the lock.

“We better get the captain,” someone said outside.

And the footsteps went away.

He had been a complete fool. He had dug this thing out, and now there was no concealing it, no time to hide his work, or the white plaster tracked across the floor. He wanted only to get this thing away and hide it until Lord Tristen arrived, or, failing that, he wanted to think it through before he confessed to Duke Crissand.

And things could go wrong. His mother could make things go wrong. He felt her attention, and her anger on him, burning and furious, and seeking some way to set everything on end and get her hands on what he had. She might have gotten him here—with the guards out and about on a search he might even get to her stairs. She could arrange that.

But she could not make him bring it to her. No.

The footsteps were gone. She could make them turn back. She’d already reached out of the wards to harm Gran, and he might be the only soul in the Zeide keep aware enough to defy her…

He unlocked the door, ducked out into the dim hallway, and had the presence of mind to lock it back to delay pursuit. His heart pounded against his ribs. At any moment the guards could come back, and lies and misdirection were his only cover if they did catch him. With a trembling hand he extracted the key from the grip of the lock, then turned and ran down the hall, up the dark servants’ stairs, breathless. His mother wanted him, wanted the book, all the while his mother knew exactly where he was—knew, and directed things awry.

He raced down the upper hall as stealthily as he could. He reached his own door, dashed in, closed the door, and shot the bar.

“What ha’ ye done?” Paisi asked, from out of the shadows, and he spun against the door.

“I don’t know,” he said in despair, pressing the tiny book to his chest. “I don’t know.”

“What ha’ ye got there?”

“I don’t know that, either.”

“Lad, lad—ha’ ye completely lost your senses?”

“I may have,” he said, overwhelmed. “The guards are in the library by now, and my mother—my mother—wants this. She’ll get it, Paisi. And she mustn’t have it. I don’t know anything else, but she mustn’t have it.”