"I will take the risk, Inardle. Can I trust you?"
"Of course." Inardle held his eyes with that, but it took all her willpower to do it. Could he trust her? No.
No. Never.
"You will do well enough," he said. "It will be a duty you will ease into. I think you will enjoy it, and be challenged by it. I would never have offered it to you otherwise."
"You didn't offer it to me. You simply told everyone."
"True enough. Inardle, there's another reason I want you to take on this duty for me. It isn't the main reason, but it is significant. You're my bridge to the Lealfast, my bridge to understanding them, and them me, and each of us learning to trust each other. Somehow, whether they like it or not, the Lealfast are going to have to work with me, and with the Icarii, and with the Isembaardians and whatever forces Georgdi can summon. You and I are going to have to make that happen, Inardle."
Inardle needed more than anything to turn this conversation away from the subject of trust. "Axis, why didn't you say good-bye to me at the camp?"
He gave a short, uncomfortable laugh. "I wish you wouldn't keep asking me that question."
He took a deep breath, then looked her straight in the eye. "I am sure that Yysell has arranged something for you, but to be utterly frank I don't want you sleeping anywhere else other than in this tent. Will you stay with me, Inardle?"
"Is this why you want me to be your second-in--"
"No, damn it. But it is why I didn't say good-bye to you at the camp. I hadn't expected to want you this badly, Inardle. I hadn't expected to want you at all."
"You're not what I expected. I've said that to you."
Axis waited, his heart thudding uncomfortably, certain she would say no. She was so direct sometimes, and at other times so very reticent.
Inardle lifted her eyes and looked at him directly. "Am I a novelty, Axis? Is that why you want me to stay?"
"No. No novelty could make me feel as anxious as I feel right now."
Axis didn't know what to do. He wondered if Inardle was waiting for something, some words said, or some action.
Very hesitantly, he leaned over and kissed her. Just gently.
She didn't react for a moment, then she moved closer to him and kissed him more warmly.
"Very well," she murmured against his mouth. "I will stay, and we shall see."
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
On the Road to Serpent's Nest
Armat sat at the table, tapping his fingers slowly, pretending to read once again the report he'd just received from Kezial. He'd ingested its contents at first glance, but now he spent his time feigning deep interest in the report, simply to annoy (and hopefully worry) Ravenna and Lister, who sat silent and watchful.
They were also cold. Armat had set the table in the open air, just beyond his tent. He sat nonchalant in leather body armor over a sleeveless linen shirt and heavy breeches. Ravenna and Lister were both wrapped in cloaks and regarded him with stony, white faces.
Armat didn't trust them. He was certain one or both of them (and he suspected Ravenna before Lister)
had been involved in Axis' escape and the debacle which followed. He had pretended to accept both their denials, but privately Armat wouldn't have trusted them with the breaking of a single egg, let alone his inner thoughts.
"What does Kezial report?" Lister said finally, and Armat dampened his smile. He'd known it would be Lister who would break first.
"He is well on his way," Armat said, carefully folding the single-page communication before laying it on the table to one side of the oil lamp. "He has consolidated all the troops from the central part of these godforsaken Outlands. Sixty-five thousand. They have made Margalit, and should now be well north of the city, marching on this Elcho Falling."
Armat paused, sighing theatrically and looking up, as if he sought salvation from the stars.
"There's more," Ravenna said, her breath frosting in the night air.
"Unfortunately, yes, there is more," Armat said, lacing his hands across his belly and allowing himself one more large sigh. "Kezial has heard word from Lamiah."
"Lamiah was at the Salamaan Pass, was he not?" Lister said.
"Aye," Armat said, "he was supposed to be guarding it. Well...apparently Lamiah has made the unilateral and singularly stupid decision to march back through the Pass and save what he can of Isembaard."
"No!" Lister said. "By the gods, has he no sense?"
"He has, from what Kezial reports," Armat said, tapping the folded report on the table, "fallen victim to his soldiers' delusions that somehow they can make a difference." He paused. "Lamiah is a fool.
Isembaard is lost, from what you tell me."
Armat stopped, and looked keenly at Lister. "Isembaard is lost, yes?"
"I have told you all I know," Lister said. "I cannot know precisely the details, but I know that whatever has happened in Isembaard has destroyed Isaiah, and every single life within the nation. Armat, whatever was in that pyramid, whatever made it live, has now escaped and--"
"Yes, yes," Armat said, "you've told me all this before. I shall choose to believe you for the time being, and I suppose that I might as well assume Lamiah and the men he commands, all one hundred odd thousand of them, by the gods, are as good as dead?"
"They're dead the instant they set foot in Isembaard," Lister said.
"Well...at the least they won't be about to bother me," said Armat. "Lamiah was ever the fool."
"At least he'll die trying to save his own land," Ravenna said softly.
Armat shot her a sharp look. "Stupidity should never be admired, my lady."
"Loyalty is always--"
Armat guffawed loudly. "You are a fine one to talk so pretentiously of loyalty!" he said. "I assume that one day you will show me the same kind of loyalty you have shown your lover, and father of that child you carry?" He gestured at her belly.
Ravenna pulled the cloak even more tightly about herself. "I will not betray you, Armat."
"Of course you won't," he said, holding Ravenna's eyes with such a malevolent stare that she had to drop her own gaze away from his.
"So here we are," Armat said after an uncomfortable silence, "trailing after a ragtag army of about twenty thousand pitiful soldiers, with command of over three hundred thousand. I must tell you, my friends, the urge to order my massive force forward is almost overwhelming. We don't even need to fight. My army will simply trample whatever pathetic force Maximilian has into the gravel of the roadway. Even the Strike Force cannot dent three hundred thousand, surely."
"We can't--" Ravenna began.
"After all," said Armat, "what do I want with a mountain? Shall I mine it for gold? No, for I have no miners among my men. Should I till its soil? No, for its slopes shall be too steep. What on earth does a conqueror want with a mountain, Ravenna? I might as well--"
"It contains power and mystery beyond knowing," she said.
"I have power," Armat said, his voice low but infinitely powerful. "With Kezial's force I have almost four hundred thousand men under my command. This land is mine. I cannot think why I have not already declared myself Tyrant. And mystery? I have no use for mystery. It bores me."
"You need Elcho Falling's power to live," Lister said. "For all the gods' sakes, man--"
"Of which you continually inform me you are one," Armat said with a dismissive air.
"--whatever is in Isembaard is not going to stay there! It is going to see the north and it will eat everything--"
"Such melodrama," Armat said, now investigating the fingernails of one hand.
"Armat," said Ravenna, "stop playing the fool. If nothing else, there are a million Skraelings there.
They're going to want to go home, eventually, and everything between Isembaard and the northern wastes is going to be--"
"I'm no fool," Armat said, leaning forward and abandoning the indifferent air, "but I don't trust you. I
think you want the mountain for yourself and that baby," he nodded at her
belly, "you carry. And I
wouldn't be surprised if you want Maximilian as well. I think you're using me to get what you want from your pretty Maxel."
"Maximilian is set on the path to destruction," Lister said. "He cleaves to Ishbel, who will ruin him."
Armat had not taken his eyes from Ravenna. "Is that what you think?"
She nodded.
"Speak it!" Armat said.
"Maximilian is set on the path to destruction if he cleaves to Ishbel," Ravenna said, her voice steady.
"She will ruin him."
"You're jealous," said Armat.
"For gods' sakes!" Ravenna said. "Stop toying with us, Armat. All we need is for Maximilian to resurrect Elcho Falling, and then...then..."
"Then we can kill him," Armat said.
"Indeed," said Lister.
"Yes?" said Armat, still looking at Ravenna.
"Then we can kill him," she said, her voice low.
"You're a nasty enough piece for any man to take to his bed, eh?" said Armat.
One of the lamps was still burning, flickering madly on the last few drops of oil as Axis lay on the bed, staring up at the shadows chasing each other across the canted roof of the tent. Inardle lay at his side and half across his body, warm and heavy, her injured wing lying across them like a soft blanket.
She was awake as well, moving very slightly every few minutes, one of her hands stroking occasionally on his chest. They hadn't spoken for over an hour, content just to lie.
Axis didn't think either of them would sleep. It would be nice to ascribe a romantic reason to this, but the brutal reality was that the narrow camp bed was uncomfortable for two people to share with any ease, let alone when one of them had a heavy and very large pair of wings. He thought the fact they had lain relatively unmoving for this length of time was close to being a miracle.
One of his hips and legs was paining him, however, and he knew he'd have to readjust his position soon.
"I'll ask Yysell in the morning if he can find something more accommodating," Axis said quietly. He slid an arm about Inardle's waist, holding her still, and turned over on his side so that they lay belly to belly and face to face. He was glad Inardle made no comment about Yysell finding them a more commodious bed. It meant she was prepared to stay.
"Better?" she said.
"My hip was on fire," he said, then kissed her softly.
"Lealfast make love in the sky and on the wind," she said. "We don't generally put up with this degree of discomfort."
He chuckled. "No wonder Armat's arrows caught you so unprepared."
Inardle's face went carefully expressionless as she tried to decide if she needed to be offended.
"It was a jest, Inardle."
"Well, then," she said.
"Well, then," he echoed, kissing her again, then once again, more deeply now.
Stars in heaven, Axis thought, how had I left it so long before I made love to a woman again?
And how, in stars' name, would he ever be able to make love to any woman other than Inardle after this night?
It had been extraordinary. On the one hand Inardle was extremely reserved--to the point of prudery at times, which drove Axis to the heights of frustration--yet her body clearly revealed just how much his touch affected her. She could feign diffidence all she liked, yet when he trailed his fingers down her body rivers of frost traced in their path. When he ran his tongue about her breast, and caught gently at her nipple with his teeth, he could feel a starburst of frost explode deep inside her flesh.
When he entered her, he could sense the waves of frosted pleasure wash through her with every stroke.
Her hand was running up and down his back now, and he hoped very much that she wanted to make love again.
"No one else makes my frost rise like you," she said, and Axis wondered how much that admission had cost her.
"Thank you," he said, meaning to thank her for far more than just that acknowledgment, and she smiled and moved against him and frost rimed her jawline where he ran his mouth.
Ravenna sat at the camp table for hours after Armat and Lister went to bed. She was cold to the bone, shivering now and again in sudden, painful bouts, but she knew she could not sleep, and could not bear the idea of being confined under canvas until the sun finally rose.
You're a nasty enough little piece for any man to take to his bed, eh?
That had hurt so deeply she could barely breathe for the pain. The last thing Ravenna wanted was to betray Maximilian, and to think of him dead...but she knew it had to be done if he could not be persuaded from Ishbel. She hoped quite desperately that somehow Axis had managed to convince Maximilian to stay away from Ishbel, but knew within her heart that he would not have been able to do so.
Maximilian would eventually take Ishbel back to his bed, if he had not done so already, and then they would curse this world to extinction.
Ravenna could feel whatever it was south of the FarReach Mountains. It was cold--in spirit, rather than flesh--and it was angry, and it had plotted revenge for thousands of years. It knew its enemies, had taken flesh from them, and if Maximilian thought that the battle with the beast was in the future then he was infinitely wrong.
The battle had already been fought, and lost.
Maximilian would need to die.
Ravenna closed her eyes, a single tear sliding down one cheek.
Maximilian would need to die.
Her hand slid over her belly. "You are this land's only hope, now," she whispered.
Elsewhere in Armat's camp three men sat, equally sleepless. They did not "sit" so much as hunch nervously under the canvas of a small tent, hoping that their two fellows standing guard outside would warn them of any danger approaching.
"Well, here's a fine thing," said Insharah, somewhat bitterly. "I remember someone saying to me, `What in all the gods' names are we doing trudging along this slushy trail toward some mountain called Elcho Falling when our families are dying down south?' So we deserted Maximilian Persimius, and now...what? Why, we're trudging along the very same sludgy trail toward some mountain called--"
"Enough," said Rimmert. "How were we to know that Armat was going to abandon any concern for Isembaard, and for our families, to trail after Maximilian?"
Insharah looked between Rimmert and Olam. "If I was set on a path to Elcho Falling no matter what," he said, "I know which among Maximilian and Armat I'd prefer to serve."
"We made a mistake," Olam said. "Is that what you wanted to hear?"
Insharah sighed. "I've heard that Kezial is driving north as well, meaning to meet with Armat at this mountain called Elcho Falling."
"Lamiah?" asked Olam.
"Heading down south through the Salamaan Pass," Insharah said. "One of Armat's guards heard him talking about it to Ravenna and this man Lister."
"Then he, at least, can hold his head high," Rimmert said.
"Until it gets lopped off by whatever waits at the other end of the pass," said Insharah.
They sat in silence for a little while.
"What are we going to do?" Olam asked, eventually.
Axis finally rose just before dawn, hating to leave Inardle, who was finally sleeping, but so stiff and sore from the camp bed that he needed to stretch his back and limbs.
Yysell was already up and had a mug of tea ready for him.
Axis sipped it gratefully, stamping his feet in the frosty air and thinking that he vastly preferred the frost of Inardle's body to this biting ground ice, and talked quietly with Yysell about procuring a slightly more commodious bed.
Then, as Yysell moved off, he sent a quiet call out into the dawn.
StarHeaven.
She was with him within half an hour, apologizing for the delay.
"StarHeaven, Maximilian and I need some eyes and ears down south. We have no idea what is happening. Listen to me, StarHeaven, anywhere south of the northern approaches of the Salamaan Pass is off limits. You are not to enter the pass--whatever is down there is too
dangerous--but if you could report to me directly from the northern exit of the pass, then you have no idea how grateful I will be. You have enough to power to reach me from that distance?"
"I think so, StarMan. I am growing better at filtering out the Star Dance from the ether every day."
Axis smiled. "Good. Take several companions--I've already discussed this with BroadWing."
Then, as StarHeaven was about to lift off, Axis added, "StarHeaven, do be careful. Good luck, and keep in touch."
Later that day, toward dusk, Isaiah and Hereward entered the Salamaan Pass from the south.
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
On the Road to Serpent's Nest
BroadWing?"
He turned about. "Inardle."
"BroadWing, I would like to learn about the Strike Force. What you did to save us when we were pursued by Armat's men...I have never seen anything like it. I would like to learn."
"I don't have much time, Inardle, and you can't fly. I can't afford to be earthbound right now."
"I'm sorry, I just wanted to learn something of tactics, and your history." And I need to use your dislike of me to cement my hold over Axis. "From the gossip about camp, I'd have to say that you are sleeping with the man who can teach you far more than I."
Inardle managed to pale with embarrassment, hoping BroadWing would not see through the ruse. He was going to be easier to manipulate than she had thought.
Her stomach knotted with self-hatred at what she was doing, but she tried to ignore it as best she could.
"Get on your horse, Inardle," BroadWing said, "and rejoin the column. Surely Axis can find you something to do."
Now Inardle allowed her face to flame with humiliation. "Where is the Strike Force training?" she asked.
"In the air to the north," BroadWing replied. "Where I need to rejoin them."
"BroadWing, I would like to learn, and I would like to learn from you."
BroadWing half turned as if he were about to launch into the air, then paused, and looked back at Inardle. "Do you have any archery skills?"
"Yes. All the Lealfast train with the bow."
BroadWing stood considering Inardle silently for a long moment, then gave a nod, as if arriving at a decision.