“If we had a boat, we could sail across Ice Mountain Bay to the Plains of Dust,” Raegel said.
Mixun said, “That won’t do.”
“What’s wrong with that? The gnomes must have gotten here by boat. We could borrow one of theirs, I’m certain.”
“I’m not against taking a boat. I just can’t go to the desert country.”
“Eh? Why’s that?”
“Because I can’t, that’s why. Why don’t you want to return to Throt?”
Raegel cleared his throat. “I get your meaning. Hmm. Ergoth is a possibility.”
“Are we still wanted in Silvamori?” Mixun said.
“Um, dead or alive. I told you we shouldn’t have gulled Lady Riva’s factotum out of all that steel.”
Mixun snorted. “Fool. He deserved what he got.”
“Tdarnk still rules in Daltigoth,” Raegel said. “Plenty of opportunity there for men of wit and daring.”
Yes, opportunity to get drawn and quartered, Mixun thought. Raegel went on, listing cities and lands of the west, weighing the possible pickings they might find. Mixun stopped listening in the midst of his companion’s dissection of Zhea Harbor and lapsed into a deep, untroubled sleep.
Somewhere far away, a great bell tolled. The pealing was dirge-like and vastly deep. Mixun, who could sleep through most disturbances, opened his eyes. He and Raegel had rigged a hide tarp over their pallets to keep water from dripping on them as they slept. With each toll of the bell, a cascade of chill droplets ran off each corner of the tarp.
“Raegel? You awake?”
“Uh-huh.”
“What’s that sound?”
“Gnomes.” Raegel turned over, away from his friend. “Just gnomes.”
That wasn’t good enough for Mixun. He threw back his fur blanket and made his way out of the storehouse. It was an oddly warm morning for Icewall- still below freezing, but just barely. Heavy, low clouds reached down from the sky, gripping the stark landscape.
The note was held a very long time. It seemed to come from all directions at once. Mixun would have asked the nearest gnome what was going on, but there were none in sight. Nevermind South was empty.
The wind was still for the first time since their arrival at Icewall, and the sound carried with great clarity. It seemed to be coming from both east and west. Mixun drew his cloak tight and made his way through the snowdrifts toward a ridge of ice that ringed the landward side of Nevermind South. As he topped the rise, he heard the ringing sound again, followed by high, cheering voices. The gnomes were excited about something.
Mixun walked toward the cheering, and gradually he saw a tall tower in the clouds. It was a spindly construction of logs, with long ropes attached to it. As Mixun watched, a huge, wedge-shaped object rose inside the tower, drawn up by ropes. The gleam of metal meant it was sheathed in steel, and the iron box above it was filled with loose gravel. When the wedge reached the top of the tower, the tackle released, and it fell heavily to the ground.
“So that’s it,” Mixun mused aloud. The gray sky echoed the massed cheers of the gnomes.
On closer inspection, he found the little people had carved out an amphitheater in the ice facing the tower, and they sat raptly watching as the great weighted blade rose and fell. The tower straddled a deep trench that ran as far as the eye could see east and west. From the piles of frozen slush on either side of the pit, Mixun guessed this was the cut plowed into the ice by the gnomes’ digging machines. The trench was so deep he couldn’t see the bottom, just glassy blue ice as far down as the eye could see.
He spotted Slipper in the crowd and hailed him. The tiny gnome waved back, never taking his eyes off the rising weight.
“Slipper-”
“Shh!” hissed two hundred gnomes at once. Mixun snapped his jaw shut, quelled by their unanimity. With a screech, the shackle opened, and the wedge plunged into the ravine. The gnomes cheered wildly.
“Slipper,” he said again, once the noise died down.
“What is it?”
“What are you doing?”
“Watching.”
“No. I mean, what are you doing there, with that tower?”
“This is the Splitting,” said the gnome beside Slipper. He had a fantastic snowsuit on, all covered with small, mirrored glass panels. Mixun asked what the Splitting was.
“The next phase of the Excellent Continental Ice Project,” said Slipper. Mixun had to wait until the wedge dropped again, then with strained patience he asked what the Excellent Continental Ice Project really was.
“We are separating a quantity of ice from the glacier, to take back home to Sancrist,” said the mirror-clad gnome.
“What for?” asked the amused human.
“Fresh water,” said Slipper.
“No, for our Low Temperature Laboratory!” said Mirror Suit.
A tubby gnome seated behind these two thrust his head between theirs and boomed, “Yer both wrong! The ice will be used to fight the red dragon, Pyrothraxus, who occupies our ancestral home, Mt. Nevermind! We’ll freeze ‘im in his lair!’”
This time the blow sounded different. A prolonged cracking sound rose, like cloth being torn asunder. Every gnome in the theater rose on stubby legs and gazed rapturously at the tower.
“Slipper?” The little gnome did not answer Mixun until he tugged on the gnome’s down-stuffed sleeve. “How much ice are you taking?”
“One point six-eight cubic miles.”
“Hurrah!” cried the gnomes. “Now the Splitting! Next the Splash!”
The ground heaved beneath Mixun’s feet. Before he could question or exclaim, the tower over the ravine snapped apart with a loud crack. Rope and timbers whipped into the deep gap, and the gnomes began spilling off their icy seats with commendable rapidity. Mixun found himself being borne along with the flow of white-haired folk. The glacier canted, first a little, then more and more. Gnomes went down like leaves in a fall wind, skidding into hummocks of snow or into Mixun’s legs. As little men piled up around him, Mixun lost his balance and fell too.
“Eight degrees! Fifteen degrees! Twenty-one degrees!” shouted a gnome gripping a surveyor’s quadrant. Mixun had the horrifying thought that “the Splash” would come when he and all the gnomes were dumped into the frigid sea.
The glacier shivered like a living thing, wracked from end to end by powerful forces. What was left of the derrick vanished into the widening ravine. Mixun rolled over, clawing at the snow for support. To his amazement, green seawater gushed skyward from the gap the gnomes had cut in the ice. So it was true. The little men had carved off a massive piece of the Icewall glacier!
For a fleeting, thrilling moment, Mixun felt himself falling. The ice dropped away from him and, in the next heartbeat, slammed into the yielding sea. Mixun flattened on the ice, spun around, and found himself buried under a squirming mass of frantic, excited gnomes.
By the time he extricated himself, Mixun felt a very slight rolling motion in the ice. He stood easily and surveyed the scene. Where once had been an expanse of ice all the way to the horizon, there was now a widening channel of swirling green water. Mixun dashed to the edge and looked left and right. There was nothing but ocean between them and shore. Cold wind was driving them out to sea at a notable pace.
The gnomes had sorted themselves out and were busily scribbling notes on any surface available-thick pads of paper, scraps of parchment, even their sleeves and the backs of their colleagues.
“What have you done?” Mixun asked, incredulous.
“Splash successfully survived,” noted Slipper on his foolscap. “The Splitting was more extreme than
