go first.”
This she could not allow. Keeping her tone light, she replied gaily, “I’m a very good climber! Here, you’ll see it’s no trouble at all.”
With a smooth gesture she pulled away, smiling down to see the king glowering upward. “When you are my wife, you will learn to curb that rebellious nature!” he snapped, though he let her climb. Quickly she made fifteen feet to the top of the ravine.
She turned and took the trunk in her hands. With a sudden gesture she pushed it to the side, watching as Strongwind leaped out of the way when it crashed to the ground. “May you find a wife with such little backbone as you require!” she snapped. “Know that she will
She raced through the woods, hearing the cries of shock and outrage from the Highlanders gathered in the ravine.
She didn’t have much time, but she knew where she was going. Branches slapped her face, and she twisted and turned, making for the beach. Soon she heard shouts and footsteps pounding behind her, branches breaking, but straight ahead was the cove. Even in the dark light the cove shimmered, lashed by wind and snow.
There it was! That beautiful boat with her warriors, and the elven sailor, aboard, looking toward shore and the sounds of commotion. Moreen broke from the woods at a full sprint, hearing the snapping and cracking of branches behind her, the roars of enraged Highlanders lumbering in pursuit.
“Push off!” she shouted, racing toward the rock. “Get away!”
Immediately Hilgrid, Little Mouse, and the elf responded, shoving against the boulder. The floating hull drifted away, two, six, nine feet. Moreen jumped onto the rock and leaped through the air, tumbling into the arms of the tribeswomen on the deck. Somehow the elf had hoisted the sail, and the offshore breeze instantly took hold, nudging
In moments the shore was lined with cursing Highlanders, brutal men shaking their weapons and shouting at her. For a moment she feared a volley of spears but saw the boat was moving too fast and was already safely out of range. She saw Strongwind Whalebone, arms crossed again, standing impassively in the midst of his agitated men.
For a moment she met his cold blue eyes with a sensation both elated and terrified. Unable to help herself, she sent him a jaunty wave and turned to watch the sailboat make for the open sea.
15
Cutter emerged from Tall Cedar Bay onto ocean waters that were surprisingly, ominously calm. The band of enraged men-Moreen had called them Highlanders-had mercifully been swallowed by the darkness and the weather. A light snow was falling, and there was just enough breeze to keep the boat moving west, across the dark strait. Checking his astrolabe, Kerrick aligned the boat toward the Signpost rock and the bay where he had debarked the rest of the Arktos on his three previous crossings. He went forward to set the jib and made sure his passengers were safely arrayed on deck.
Making his way back to the cockpit, Kerrick finally sat on the bench beside Moreen, who clung to the tiller with the ferocity she had shown when she threatened him with death. Her teeth were clenched, and snowflakes speckled her bronzed skin and collected in the thick tangle of her black hair. There was no trace of fear in her expression, just that grim determination to meet and vanquish the challenge raised by the ocean.
The elf was content for the moment to let her steer while he stood and studied the lines of his boat. Tildey still sat atop the cabin. Bruni crouched with several other Arktos amidships, while Little Mouse stood in the bow, clinging to the forward line and shouting gleefully at the snowflakes-at least, until one of the women shouted something, and he reluctantly joined the huddle before the cabin.
“It will be another long night,” Kerrick said, returning to the bench. “I haven’t used my hourglass, but I swear the sun hasn’t stayed up for two hours these past few days-that is, if we could have seen it behind the clouds.”
“In a few more days we’ll bid it farewell, for three months,” Moreen noted.
“Really?” In fact, Kerrick had wondered if the days could keep getting so short that they vanished altogether, but he had discarded the notion as ludicrous.
“You didn’t know?” Moreen looked at him curiously. “That doesn’t happen in your part of the world?” She blinked in astonishment, then asked, “Do you know about the Sturmfrost?”
“What’s that?”
“It comes every year, right after we have seen the last of the sun. From the south, like a wall of wind and ice and freezing cold, it washes over land and sea. It will not be long now-a matter of a few days.”
The elf felt a premonition of that awful chill as he considered this. “How long does it last?”
She shrugged. “A month. Five or six weeks, some years. When it passes, the world is frozen, buried under snow piled higher than your-or even Bruni’s-head. It’s still dark for another month or two, though after the Sturmfrost is gone you can see stars like Chislev Wilder, the goddess of my people.”
“Even the ocean freezes, is covered by snow?” That possibility had never occurred to him, though the lapse in imagination now made him feel a little foolish.
“You can’t see where the water ends and the land begins,” she confirmed. “The gulf is like a flat plain, with great drifts of snow everywhere.”
“Sometimes in Silvanesti the winter gets cold enough to freeze fresh water,” he said, “though I’ve never known it to happen on the ocean, or the coastal harbors.” His mind was racing faster than his words. He knew that boats had to be pulled out of lakes and streams before the pressure of the ice would inevitably snap wooden hulls into kindling.
“You say this Sturmfrost is coming in a few days. Do you know exactly when?”
“Dinekki will know. I could only tell you if I had seen the sun, and, well, the clouds haven’t broken in weeks.”
Kerrick made up his mind on the spot. He had enough gold in his cabin to make him a rich man, but it seemed that his boat faced certain doom if he remained here. As soon as he dropped off his passengers, he would set a course for the north, relying on seamanship and good fortune to outrun the imminent storm. Since there was nothing like the Sturmfrost known in Silvanesti or Ansalon, he had to assume that it dissipated over the Courrain Ocean. It would just be a matter of sailing far enough to get out of its path.
“You know, we owe you our freedom-our very survival,” Moreen said. “By carrying us across the strait, you’ve given us the chance for a new life.”
Kerrick thought of the chest of gold, felt an uncomfortable flush at her words. “The crossing wasn’t without cost … I still feel terrible about Kestra.”
Moreen sighed and suddenly looked smaller as she huddled on the bench. Then she looked at him, then put a hand on his arm. “I’m sure you did everything you could. Again, we can only thank you.”
“I … I hope things are good for you on the western shore,” he said. “Your tribe has found shelter in a cave, with a lot of firewood nearby.”
Moreen was silent for a long time, and Kerrick fell into the easy routine of steering his boat. “What do you know of dragons?” she asked suddenly. “Are there such creatures in your world?”
He shook his head with fervent conviction. “They were banished from the world when my father was but a lad, some four hundred years ago. It was after a great dragon war, the third such conflict, when the serpents of good and evil battled and came close to destroying all Krynn.”
“That’s what I thought,” she said. “There was a great hero, a man called Huma, was there not?”
Kerrick was surprised that Moreen knew of this conflict, isolated as her people were from the rest of Krynn, but he nodded. “Yes, the humans played some role, but it was mainly the elves and the good dragons who won the victory.”
“Good. I am glad the dragons are gone,” she said with relief.
