And something else. A saying? A proverb? A poem? Words she associated with her mother—Paola Apicella, not some mythical aristocrat far away on another Face.
She was going to be drenched. Water would do her no harm and a wet towel or two in her room would raise no unspoken questions in the morning, but a sopping-wet robe must provoke speculation. She slid the fine linen off her shoulders and let it fall. Yes, that felt right. Mother-naked, she stepped through the arch, out onto wet paving. The rain was warm and heavy enough that in moments she was as wet as she could be, wet as the moment of her birth. She hurried along the path, splashing in puddles, feeling her hair settle into clammy ropes on her back, feeling the caress of leaves as somehow friendly, as if plants were happy in the deluge.
Across the grass. Here. Here was where she had found her mother. This far Paola had crawled, shedding bandages and splints. She had not managed to remove them all, but when she reached this point she had been almost as naked as her daughter was now. And here she had died, on the bare earth. Bare earth? No, cold earth!
Frena crouched down and peered into the shrubbery. The bushes were grown larger, like small trees, and now the site was marked by the five stones that traditionally outlined a grave. Leaves dancing in the rain tapped her shoulders as she wriggled in under the branches.
Yes! That was it: Blood and birth; death and the cold earth.
She rubbed fingers on the cut-made-by-stone, then laid her blood-smeared hand on the black loam. It felt soft, strangely comforting. Comfort swelled into joy. There was love there, and warmth, and a presence. She sensed a murmur of welcome that was not heard, an embrace that was not felt, a familiar scent not smelled.
'Mother?' she whispered.
The answer was still just love. Endure! it whispered.
She grew cold. Eventually she tired of waiting and retreated to the cloister. She was playing a dangerous game, how. Solitary rituals in the dead of night were enough to condemn anyone. Even wet footmarks in the cloisters might be deadly evidence. She made a grotesquely long step through the arch to put herself on her discarded robe, then dried her feet and legs before replacing her sandals. She hurried through the darkness to her room.
There she stretched out on the platform and said a final prayer. The Ancient One was the Lady of Dreams. Send me a dream, Frena prayed. Not that one about the flood and the door. I got that. Something new! Show me something helpful!
¦
The Woman was taking her turn in the front rank around the fire, eight anonymous people huddled up tight for warmth, cowering down in vain effort to stay inside the windbreak of the next row out. The wind was sharp bronze, cutting through all her wrappings of wool and fur, and the cold of the ground seeped upward into her flesh. Her neighbor coughed; other coughs replied. There was not enough air, and what there was burned throats and lungs, cracked lips and nostrils. The men's beards were caked with ice.
Camp had been pitched in a hollow that offered no shelter from the killer wind, and even the hulking Werists lacked energy to pitch tents. That sputtering fire would die out long before dawn. The caravan had not passed even a twiggy shrub in days, but tonight they had found a mummy, some ancient traveler who had died there and just dried up, lying by the wayside. The Heroes had broken the husk in pieces and tipped the last of the oil on it. Thanks to the wind, it burned.
Against the black velvet of the heavens, the stars were beyond belief, webs and gauze of diamond dust. Very far to the west, a conical peak showed over the horizon, gleaming like a ghost. That was Varakats, the ice devils said, the sign that they had crossed over the Edge. But the long descent still lay ahead; everyone understood now that some of them were not going to make it. Perhaps none would, and future travelers would use them as tinder.
The wind was a razor up close; farther away it was a carnivore whining amid the rocks. The worst burden of all was lack of sleep. To lie down was to suffocate in the thin air. From now on, without fuel to melt snow, there would be no drinking water, making thirst a greater torment than hunger or fatigue.
Massive hands grabbed her and dragged her bodily over the people behind her, who ducked and raised arms to defend themselves. She was dumped outside the outer circle, sprawling backward, trying to defend the precious burden inside her parka. The Werist who had done this stepped over the sitters to take her place next the fire.
'You are supposed to protect us, pig!' she cried hoarsely.
He ignored her, either not understanding her tongue or just knowing she lacked strength to cause trouble. The ice devils made no aggressive display of brawny bare limbs up hen as they did on the plains; they wore cocoons of wool and fur like everyone else and then wrapped their palls around on the outside, but they still saw violence as the solution to all problems.
The tiny bundle inside her furs was torpid and cold. She had known since the hostleader called for camp to be pitched that the time had come, but lethargy had stayed her hand. If she did not do the thing now, it would be too late. She crept away from the camp unseen, or if she was seen, no one now cared enough to call her back. No one cared if she lived or died, or if her charge lived or died. Soon they would stop caring if they died themselves, and that would be the end. Then they would all die together from lack of will.
Beyond the first high boulders she located a patch of rock blown clear of dust. What she was to do must be done very quickly. There was no light other than starlight, but darkness was her friend. She could see quite well enough for her purposes, the Mother's purposes.
She threw down her mitts. Her fingers were icy inside them already and would swiftly freeze without them. The cold earth here had been frozen solid for untold ages. She laid a hand on a polished rocky surface and opened her mind to the deep tide of the world, the comforting presence of the Mother. It came instantly, an exigent upwelling of power that startled her, dazzled her, and almost made her pull away. She realized that she had never communicated through raw bedrock before. Always she had known the power as a nourishing force filtered through gentle, living loam. Here the underlying elemental strength was undiluted, undisguised, and all its darker facets shone with terrifying brilliance, as if in this immemorial frozen waste the life force had been frustrated and sought release through her flesh.
Was what she planned even possible? What would such intensity do to the babe? The child might easily be consumed and die, but it could certainly not last another pot-boiling without a blessing, so the risk must be taken.
She selected an angular flake of rock, dragged up a sleeve, and made a cut on the back of her
