by the way they have arranged themselves all around us.”
Doroga snorted in dark amusement, and rumbled at the Icemen, evidently conveying her words.
Big Shoulders, apparently the leader of the group, narrowed his eyes to slits, staring at Doroga. Then he simply looked around the circle of Icemen.
Isana felt a sudden surge of emotion, a mixture of feelings so complex and tangled that she could not possibly have given it a name. There was no source to the feeling-just the sensation itself, as loud and as clear and as pure as the emotions of an infant suddenly finding itself hungry or uncomfortable. Had it been a physical sound, it would have left her ears ringing. Even so, the sensation was overwhelming. She shuddered and swayed in place.
The Icemen, meanwhile, moved as a group, careful to come no closer to the Alerans as they all gathered behind Big Shoulders, watching the Alerans from beneath heavy, shaggy brows. None of them spoke.
None of them
“Good,” Doroga said, nodding to Big Shoulders. He turned to Isana. “Your turn, Alerans. Put away your weapons.”
“Do it,” Isana said quietly.
“Isana-” Aria began, her eyes narrowed.
“That wasn’t a request, Your Grace,” Isana said in a quietly firm tone. “Weapons away, both of you.”
Isana fancied that she could hear Aria’s teeth grinding-but both she and Araris sheathed their swords.
“There,” Doroga said in satisfaction. “Now you are all acting like something more than honor-hungry whelps.” He gestured at Isana. “Tell him what you want.”
Isana lifted her eyebrows. “What do you mean?”
“Alerans like to make this kind of thing complicated,” Doroga said, shaking his head. “Should see all the papers some scribe of Sextus’s kept sending me to mark on. Couldn’t read them, even when I learned to read. What is the
Isana blinked at the Marat.
Doroga gestured impatiently. “Tell him what you want, Isana. It is not a complicated task.”
Isana turned to Big Shoulders. “We want peace,” she told the Iceman. “We wish our peoples to stop fighting one another.”
Doroga rumbled quietly. From Big Shoulders, Isana felt a surge of surprise, then confusion, then outrage. His heavy brows lowered even farther.
Doroga said something else, the thick-sounding words spilling out rapidly.
Big Shoulders pointed at the Shieldwall with his spear, speaking in a clear, anger-edged voice.
Doroga nodded and told Isana, “He wishes to know if your words will bind Fire Sword.”
Isana frowned at the Marat.
“The High Lord back there,” Doroga clarified.
“Yes,” Isana replied. “I speak with the voice of the First Lord himself. High Lord Antillus is obliged to honor my words as Sextus’s own.”
Doroga relayed her words to Big Shoulders, who grounded the butt of his spear upon hearing them, frowning at Isana. The Iceman stared at her for a silent minute.
On an impulse, Isana withdrew the control she normally used to restrain her emotions entirely. She turned toward Big Shoulders. Her words wouldn’t be important, she somehow knew. What was critical was the intention behind them.
“I know that much blood has been spilled. But we now face a threat that could prove deadly to both of our peoples. We wish to make peace, so that more of our folk will be able to fight this enemy. But this is also an opportunity to create a lasting peace between our peoples, the way we have begun to do with the Marat.”
Big Shoulders stared for another silent minute, as Doroga relayed her words. The Iceman glanced aside at Doroga when he was finished. They exchanged words several times, while Doroga nodded, his expression calm.
Big Shoulders grunted. There was another surge of that complex emotion, too fast and dense and thick for her to sort out, then as one the Icemen turned and shambled off into the snow. They entered the nearest copse of trees and vanished from sight.
Isana let out her breath slowly and realized that her hands were shaking-and not with the cold.
“And so,” Aria said. “They decline.”
“I’m not sure they do,” Isana replied. “Doroga?”
Doroga shrugged. “Big Shoulders believes you. But his word is not the word of all the Gadrim-ha. He is the youngest of his station, the least influential. He goes now to confer with the other war leaders.”
“They couldn’t be bothered to send a senior representative?” Aria asked.
“They assumed it was a trap,” Doroga replied with a shrug. “And acted accordingly.”
“How long?” Isana asked. “How long before he returns?”
“As long as it takes,” Doroga replied calmly. “Patience is important when dealing with the Gadrim-ha.”
“Time is critical,” Isana replied quietly.
Doroga grunted. “Then perhaps Sextus should have sent someone sooner than today.” He nodded to them, then went back to the gargant, Walker, and hauled himself swiftly up the saddle rope. He lifted his cudgel in salute, and said, “I will signal your
“Thank you,” Isana replied.
The Marat nodded to them and muttered something to Walker. The gargant turned and plodded calmly through the snow, following the footsteps of the Icemen.
Isana watched him go, then exhaled heavily and nodded. “Come on,” she said quietly to her companions.
Aria’s eyes lingered on the trees where the foreigners had disappeared. “Where are we going?”
“Back to the Wall,” Isana said. “There are questions that need answers.”
CHAPTER 22
Amara leaned close to her husband to whisper directly into his ear, and said, “We must talk.”
Bernard nodded. Then he put his hand on the ground, and Amara felt a faint tremor in the earth beneath their feet as he called upon his earth fury, Brutus, to create a hiding place. A few seconds later, the ground under them simply began to flow away, a slithery sensation in the soles of her feet, and they sank downward.
Amara shuddered as walls of earth reached up to surround them. The view, as the night sky with its sudden, horribly cold sleet receded, must have been almost exactly like that had by a corpse as it was lowered into a grave. A moment later, all view of the sky vanished as the earth above them flowed into the form of a roof to the small chamber Bernard had created, leaving them in complete, subterranean darkness.
“We can talk here,” he murmured. He spoke in little more than a whisper, but even so, after days of silence, it almost seemed like a shout to Amara.
She conveyed to him everything she had seen at the end of the battle.
Bernard exhaled heavily. “Lady Aquitaine. Taken?”
Amara shook her head, then realized that in the darkness he could not see the gesture. “I don’t think so. The people we’ve seen taken were just walking corpses. They never had any expressions on their faces. They weren’t…” She sighed in frustration. “They all looked like something was missing.”
“I know exactly what you mean,” Bernard rumbled.
“Lady Aquitaine looked… I’m not sure. Smug. Or excited. Or afraid. There was something underneath the surface. And she looked quite healthy. So did the Citizens I saw near her.”
“Bloody crows,” Bernard said. “Would even
“I don’t know,” Amara said. “Once, I wouldn’t have thought anyone would do such a thing.”
“No,” Bernard said. “It’s got to be some other kind of control. If you saw them taking prisoners, then it would appear that the Vord intend to place them under similar constraints.”
