had spies all over.”
The kender looked at the throng of slaves who were gathering in astonishment. He wandered back and forth with casual glee, studying the humans who had entered the temple in the wake of Kerrick and Moreen. One of them, the gray-haired woman from Thraid Dimmarkull’s apartment, dropped her knife noisily and started sidling toward the door.
“Oh, do you know that lady over there, the one called Brinda … well, she told the ogres everything that was going on. She even told the queen that Strongwind Whalebone would be going to the market when he did, so that her guards could catch him there.” Coraltop looked at Kerrick. “She was supposed to kill you! Wouldn’t that have been something-to come all this way, only to get stabbed in the back by a human traitor?”
Brinda screamed and turned toward the door, pushing several slaves out of the way in her desperation to escape.
She didn’t get very far.
The Seagate was opened by the combined efforts of ogre and human volunteers, pulling together on the massive capstans, sliding the huge stone barriers to the side. The midnight sun was gone for the rest of the year, and true night had settled across Black Ice Bay. Stars twinkled in the expanse of sky, the tiny sparks reflecting like distant campfires in the smooth waters.
These faint sparkles were swiftly overwhelmed by the surge of yellow flames rising from the great funeral barge. Strongwind Whalebone lay in state at the center of the pyre, while Dinekki rested at his side. The raft slowly drifted out of Winterheim’s harbor, into the open waters of the bay, and for a long time those tongues of flame blazed toward the heavens, rising upward in a great column of sparks, flickering spots of light that seemed determined to join the distant specks twinkling in the sky.
Moreen stood on the wharf and watched. She found it easy to believe that the spirits of the two heroes were being borne skyward, toward a place of reward, rest, and peace. Bruni had told her that Strongwind’s final wish was that the sacrifice of these lives be more than just about him … and it was. Strongwind Whalebone had been the greatest king that the humans of the Icereach had ever known, for he had been the one who had freed them from their ancestral scourge.
“Goodbye, my friend,” she whispered. “I will miss you.”
She passed Mouse and Slyce, who were sharing a companionable mug-several mugs, actually-of warqat. Nearby, Barq One-Tooth and the slave girl Tookie were sharing a leg of lamb, the meat freshly roasted in the royal kitchen.
Moreen wasn’t hungry or thirsty. Slowly she made her way up the gangplank and onto the big galley.
The chiefwoman found Kerrick on the deck at the stern of the ship, leaning on the railing, watching the embers of the pyre rise into the cool night. She leaned there beside him for a few moments of companionable silence, feeling very tired.
She tilted her head back and saw Grimwar Bane and Bruni up at the edge of the Royal Level, looking down over the vast city. Across the marketplace square, ogres and humans together were picking through the rubble, tending the wounded, gathering the dead for burial.
“This ship the ogres call
“Yes,” the elf agreed. “She was called
“The king would give her to you, I think. You could sail back to Silvanesti in triumph.”
Kerrick smiled thinly and reached out to take her hand. “I think that I don’t want to go. I’ve found a new home,” he said. “I’ve made my life and my destiny here, and here I will remain.”
The Kingdom of Icereach existed for more than five hundred years, a unique arrangement of peaceful coexistence between ogres and men, unlike any other time in the history of Krynn. Winterheim was its capital, but great centers of the kingdom were to be found in Guilderglow and the bustling harbor city of Brackenrock, which came to be known as the “Tarsis of the South.”
The sons and grandsons of Grimwar Bane, proud half-ogres mingling their paternal heritage with the gentle influence of Queen Bruni, ruled Winterheim for many years, a dynasty that prospered through five centuries of freedom and riches. Through the auspices of the traders of Brackenrock, the ogres traded their gold with the empire of Istar and other realms of far-off Ansalon. In return, the Icereach imported foodstuffs and silks, wines and jewels, and magic aplenty, a steady stream of wonders that the frozen southland of Krynn had never before known.
In Brackenrock, it was the half-elf prince, Coraltop Redfist Bayguard Fallabrine, named for his grandfather and his adopted uncle, who established the rule that saw peace and prosperity among the Arktos for long centuries, long after his beloved mother had passed away in the limited time span granted to those of pure human blood. Her memory dwelled in the annals of history forever, and her husband, called Kerrick the Messenger, lived to a ripe old age of nearly six hundred years.
He might have even lived longer if not for the Cataclysm. That devastating event wracked the Icereach as it did so much of Krynn, bringing forth the glaciers that sealed away Winterheim and Brackenrock and all those other places remote in memory. The kingdom of Icereach vanished, and the glaciers and the Icewall were all that could be seen.
Those magical places remain beneath ice and snow, still warmed by Krynn’s internal fires. Perhaps, someday, their brightness will once again emerge to illuminate the world.
