Winterheim

possibly the only man in all the Icereach who could understand the depths of his attachment to the boat that had been left to him by his father.

“She sank,” he explained, trying to hold back the anguish. “We accidentally rammed the same metal boat that brought us so close to Brackenrock. Staved in the bow, and she went down like a stone.”

“All your gold … it was on board?” Mouse said, remembering.

“Aye. Eight years’ work-and I would let it go without regret, if I could only have my Cutter back.”

“She was a beauty,” the man agreed. “Like a swan, while poor Marlin is at best a duckling.”

Kerrick closed his eyes again. He didn’t have the energy to think about his future-and now, without his boat, the course of his life seemed destined to be guided by forces, powers, beyond his control. He was in a land where the sun disappeared for three months at a time, where icebergs the size of mountains loomed in foggy ocean mists, where he had grown accustomed to surviving on hard bread and fiery, intoxicating warqat, on meat and fish and little more.

If he had been in a mood of fairness, he would have acknowledged that there was in fact much more to the Icereach than this. He had great friends among these loyal people, the Arktos-and among the Highlanders as well. There were summer days of literally endless sunlight, vistas of sea and fjord to explore, places where neither elf nor human nor ogre had ever ventured. Above all things Kerrick Fallabrine was a sailor, and the Icereach, notably the coastlines of the White Bear and Dracoheim Seas, made as thrilling a nautical life as anywhere upon the world.

At least, they did when those waters weren’t frozen solid, layered in mast-high snowdrifts and scoured by winds so bitter they threatened to tear flesh from bone. That was the side of the Icereach he pictured looming now, ahead of him a lifetime of such winters. Moreen would be gone after fifty or sixty of them-

He stopped short. This was a dangerous line of thought, and he had schooled himself never to go there. With his own elf blood likely to grant him five or more centuries of life, it would be foolish to nurture an attachment to any human. He had proven a useful companion, even ally, to the chiefwoman of the Arktos, and she in turn had been an ally and a friend to him. That was as far as it went, as far as it could ever go.

It did not occur to him to blame her for the loss of his boat or his gold. True, he had been bearing her upon a mission of her own devise-a mission that never would have been undertaken if not for her determination, the force of her will, and her courage, but he had gone willingly enough. At least, that’s the way he chose to remember it now.

“What about Moreen? Is she all right?”

Mouse grimaced, and Kerrick felt a stab of fear. “What? Is she injured?”

“No, not yet anyway.”

“What’s wrong, then?”

“Maybe you remember those two men on my boat? They were Highlander thanes-I was bringing them here by sea, to join a dozen of their fellows who marched here overland. They wanted to talk to Moreen.”

“And?”

“She told them that Strongwind Whalebone has been captured by the ogres that he’s been taken to Winterheim as a slave.”

“Yes-I’m sure they were unhappy to hear that their king has been taken by the enemy, but surely they don’t blame Moreen for that?”

“Well, maybe not in so many words, but Moreen seems to blame herself.”

“What do you mean?” asked the elf in growing alarm.

“Just that she spoke to the thanes as soon as she landed. She told them that she intends to go to Winterheim, to enter the ogre fortress, and to bring Strongwind Whalebone out alive.”

Kerrick slumped back in the bed, staring up at the smoke-limned ceiling beams. He, like Moreen, had witnessed Strongwind’s capture, and like Moreen he regretted it deeply, but he never would have considered such a mad scheme of rescue. No human who had ever been hauled off to Winterheim had escaped the ogre clutches, not in the long history of the Icereach. He chuckled, soon laughing out loud.

“Are you all right?” Mouse asked, concerned.

“Of course,” the elf responded. “I wonder, has there ever been a leader like Moreen Bayguard?”

“I don’t think so,” the Arktos sailor replied, allowing a smile to cross his own features. “I’m going to go with her, of course,” he added.

“I know you are,” said Kerrick, “and Bruni, naturally, and all those Highlanders. Why, it will be a regular war party-a suicide march to glory!”

Mouse scowled. “I don’t know about that. You must stay here, of course, and get better-”

“Stay here?” Kerrick snorted, laughing again. “I wouldn’t miss this for the world!”

3

Halls of Winterheim

After his weeks in the hold of the ogre galley, the mere act of walking across the deck and down the gangplank hurt Strongwind. His muscles felt crippled, and the chains weighed him down even further. Like an old man in pain, he shuffled across the crowded dock, still aware of little beyond the clean air in this vast place.

He only vaguely noticed the attention falling upon this ship, the populace of Winterheim gathered to greet their returning king and queen. As a side curiosity, the crowd of ogres also examined this unkempt, bedraggled human prisoner-Strongwind heard murmurs of interest, a few snorts and chuckles of amusement, as he climbed the half dozen stone steps leading up from the wharf to the broad, flat expanse of the harbor square.

Something about the crowd infuriated him, and his first instinct was to raise his chained fists, to rail and curse at these ignorant brutes, yet he realized immediately that such a reaction would only entertain and amuse them. There was no way, at least not here and now, that he could frighten or even worry them.

For now he drew himself up straight, ignoring the pain that tried to twist his spine. He bent his arms into curls, showing them that the weight of the chains was not enough to drag him down. He stalked up the steps as if he were the homecoming king, his glare haughty and disdainful as he swept it around the vast, underground harbor.

Despite his facade, he could not help but be mightily impressed, even awed, by this place. The harbor consisted of an open circle of water connected by a wide channel that led out through the still-opened gates. Each of those massive slabs of stone was moved, he saw, by the labor of hundreds of human slaves hauling on cables that turned huge capstans. Those slaves were watching him now, and he acknowledged them with a slight nod of his head, all the while marveling at the engineering that allowed such unthinkable weight to be manipulated by such mundane means.

The sun, low in the northern sky, poured brilliant light across the placid water and broad waterfront. There were three great mooring slips in the harbor, each a gash in the dock wide enough to allow a large ship to slide in between a pair of bracketing wharves. Goldwing occupied the central of these berths, while those to the right and left were empty. Beyond the wharves a series of wide ramps and stairways led to the vast plaza, raised ten or twelve feet above the dock height. It was on this square that most of the ogres were gathered. They made a festive crowd, cheering loudly as the king and queen, who had been first off the boat, passed them by, then turning their attention to the crewman and their lone prisoner.

Strongwind heard a few jeers and catcalls but paid them no mind as he looked around, studying this place with a tactician’s eye. He watched the two monarchs enter a cagelike enclosure and was amazed to see this compartment start to move upward. Scrutinizing the scene, he saw another group of slaves, a score or more of them, laboring to pull the chains that controlled some sort of geared mechanism.

He saw that a circular atrium rose high above. Though the heights of that vertical shaft were lost in shadows far overhead, it was easy to imagine it extending nearly all the way to the mountain’s summit. The atrium was ringed by balconies, more of these than he could count, rising upward to form a vast chimney. The royal couple rose