Raif walked to the far side of the tent and urinated. From what he could make out the Want looked flat here, with only dunes and boulders casting shadows against the moon. On impulse he bent down and scooped up a fistful of earth. The soil was pulverized pumice, and it poured through his fingers like cool, dry sand. Watching it he was struck with the idea that the Want had allowed him closer. Closer to what he could barely put into words. Something had happened long ago in this place. Sadaluk, the Listener of the Ice Trappers, had told how the Want had once been like any other land. It had a North and South and stars that could be relied on. Water flowed, trees grew, animals grazed and others hunted. People had lived here; if not Men, then perhaps another, older race. Raif had stood in one of their cities: Kahl Barranon, the Fortress of Grey Ice.
He shivered. Placing a hand on his left shoulder, he worked away at the pain.
A doom had been laid upon this place. Life had been destroyed. Time had been broken and now leaked. Space and distance had been stretched and folded, worn so thin in parts that you could see things on the horizon-mountains, hills, cities-that were thousands of leagues away, and so thickly gathered in others that you could spend all day walking and then turn to see your starting point less than a hundred feet behind you. Raif could not begin to imagine the magnitude of catastrophe that could break the bones of a continent, crush it so com-pletely that its relation to nature and the heavens changed.
not imagine it, but standing here, bare feet sinking into soft pumice as he watched the wind carve the dunes, he had the sense that its after-math could be seen. Forces of heat and pressure had left scars Angus had once told him that pumice was formed when mountains exploded and molten rock gushed up from the center of the earth. Was that what had happened here? Or something worse?
Raif headed back to the tent. The hooded men had finished eating and were now sipping hot liquid from glass cups. One man held the cup beneath his chin and let the steam roll over his face. No one spoke. Raif guessed the temperature to be just below freezing, yet they did not appear to feel it. Again, they noted him as he passed but did not halt him. They knew the Want then. Knew that the phrases "free to go" and "you cannot leave" had no meaning here.
As soon as he was inside the tent, Raif felt his strength drain away. His body was tired and achy, and it seemed difficult to think. Turning, he spied a copper jug filled with ice melt. A hot stone from the fire had been dropped in the jug to thaw the ice, and the water tasted burned. After he had drunk his fill, Raif lay on the bed and slept.
He did not dream. At some point during the night he awoke. The lamps had burned out and it was wholly dark. A strange note, low and plaintive, rose outside the tent. At first Raif thought it was the moan of the wind over the dunes, but then other notes sounded. Slow and mournful, they joined the first note in harmony before glancing away. The song created was like nothing Raif had ever heard before, hollow and deeply resonant, and he was reminded of a story Angus had once told him about the great blue whales that swam beneath the frozen ledges of Endsea. "They travel the coldest, deepest currents where the water is heavy enough to crush men. Alone, they call out in the darkness, searching for more of their kind,"
That was what the song of the hooded men sounded like to Raif: a cry in the dark. Who is there?
The song continued, solemn and questing. Raif listened for a while and then slept. When he awoke in the morning the memory of the hooded men's song had gone.
Dawn light, silvery and diffused by mist, shone through the tent's clarified hide walls. Inside all was cold and still. Raif lay and watched his breath crystallize in the frigid air. His body felt better. Rested. The pain in his shoulder was still there, but other things seemed more important. He was thirsty and hungry, and he wanted some answers.
Finding his belongings piled against the tent wall, he dressed himself against the cold. The Orrl cloak had been treated with some care brushed and properly folded. No one in the clanholds could made cloaks like Orrl, cloaks that shifted color along with the landscape. They took months to prepare, the master furrier laying down countless layers of light-reflecting varnish on specially softened hides. Only white winter warriors were allowed to wear them, and Raif imagined the hooded men had never seen such a cloak before He thought a moment and then drew his on. Unarmed, he went outside.
A shallow sea of mist washed across the dunes. The sky was pale and featureless, filled with haze. Two of the four hooded men were standing by the cookfire, gazing out through the tent circle toward the Want. They turned to watch as he approached. When he could see their eyes clearly, Raif greeted them.
"I am Raif Sevrance. Tell me who is owed my thanks."
Two pairs of brown eyes regarded him. Neither man spoke. After a moment the younger of the two turned to the elder, who nodded. The younger man headed away toward the tents.
Raif waited. The older man crouched by the cookfire and began turning over embers with a stick. From the little Raif could see of the skin around his eyes, Raif decided he was not the one who had first tended him in the tent Over the bridge of his nose, he had five black dots, not three. Hooking the kettle handle with his stick, the man pulled the copper vessel from the fire. Flames crackled in the mist as he poured hot liquid into a cup and offered it to Raif.
Steam pungent with licorice and wormwood condensed on Raif's face as he accepted the glass cup. He did not drink. Wormwood was considered poison in the clanholds, yet he did not think this man meant to harm him.
A third man emerged from the farthest tent and made his way toward the fire. The ewe bleated as he passed the corral, begging for a milking. Raif set the cup on the ground. Within seconds it was swallowed by the mist. Coming to a halt before the fire, the third man nodded once to the elder. A dismissal. The elder rose with the aid of his stick and walked toward the corral.
Watching the third man Raif decided two things. One, it was the same man who had waited in the tent as he feigned sleep. And two, he, Raif Sevrance, would not be the first to speak.
The third man's gaze pierced Raif, passed through the holes in his eyes and saw inside. Raif felt known. There was a moment where something hung in the balance, as if a cup standing on a table had been knocked over and was rolling toward the edge. The cup might stop before it reached the edge or fall and break. Raif did not breathe. The brown-black gaze held him. And then withdrew.
"Sit." The man spoke softly, long brown fingers uncurling to indicate the mist.
One word, yet Raif knew instantly several things. Common was not the man's first language. His accent was long and lilting, filled with smoke. Raif had the sense that he rarely used any language, that he was speaking solely for the stranger's benefit. Finally Raif knew that he had not been judged by this man. The cup had come to rest on the edge.
Raif sank to the ground. It was like diving into water; the coldness of the mist.
The man touched his chest. "Men once called me Tallal." Holding the back of his robe against the back of his knees, he dropped into a crouch. "If it pleases, you may use that name." "And the others?"
"They are my lamb brothers. Their names are not mine to give." Absently, he made a slight stirring motion with his index fingers, rousing the mist.
"I owe you thanks. For saving me." Tallal thought for a moment and then nodded. "Perhaps." The word troubled Raif. He felt out of his depth, and wished he could see the whole of the man's face not just the slit containing his eyes. "How many are you?" "Eleven."