Cold Magic

“That’s really all you know? Aren’t you curious to know more?”

“No. Should I be?”

“Do I wear a spirit mantle?”

He narrowed his eyes to look at me, then closed one eye to peer at me, opened it and closed the other, and looked, then opened it and, with both eyes on my face, made a gesture of defeat. “I can smell it, but I see only your human flesh.”

Before I could reply, he lifted his chin, tilted his head, blinked, and brought me to a halt with a hand on my arm. “Listen.” One moment he had been a relaxed and genial companion; now he was a predator alert to danger. “Horses and men behind us. I smell iron and cold steel.”

I did not for one instant doubt him, although I could not sense anything amiss. The sky was flawless, its blue made brilliant by the clarity of the winter air. A breeze had been blowing out of the south all morning, just enough to set the tops of bushes swaying and to send fluttering kisses of movement across fields of uncut grass. Beyond the open ground rose yew woods, screened at their edge with bare-branched sapling beech and straggling bushes. Not more than a mile away rose the ridge where the ancient Celts had built Cold Fort and the Romans later raised a temple to claim the stronghold for their own gods.

“It’s best if we leave the path,” I said hoarsely.

The wind died as the words left my lips. Died was not the right word. It was as if a vast bellows had been turned inside out and sucked the wind back into the lofty caverns where the tempest is born. The temperature dropped from cold to frigid; my lips tasted the fall as though I pressed ice to my mouth.

“There’s a cold mage with them,” I said, barely able to voice the words because I could not find enough heat in my lungs. “They’re tracking us.”

I saw no sign of pursuit. They might not yet have come into view. But strangely, although the wind had utterly failed, an odd motion drew ripples across the clearing behind us.

Something was wrong with the light on the grass.

In Southbridge, Andevai had woven an illusion.

“They’re in the field,” I gasped, heart racing so hard I heard its hammering as hooves thudding on the ground. “Magic conceals them.”

I started to bolt, blindly, down the path, but Rory tugged me to a halt. “Is there a crossroads?”

“I don’t know.” I was becoming frantic. They would kill me if they caught me. To force its prey into a panic is exactly what the predator desires. I had to think. “The ancient forts are built where lines of power intersect. Cold Fort lies on the highest point at the southwesternmost sweep of the ridge.”

Perhaps our stillness made our pursuers bold. Or perhaps the magister riding with them wasn’t very strong or simply became tired of holding the illusion, now that we were so close. From the field behind us, a bolt came sailing over our heads. Suddenly I saw seven horsemen pounding toward us, six in soldier’s livery carrying crossbows, with sheathed cavalry swords dangling along their flanks.

Rory said, “Into the trees. Now.” He pushed me.

Terror grew wings on my back, and I ran, wishing I was an eru with wings that might fly me into the safety of the spirit world, if you could call that place safe.

I heard a man shout, “I knew that jo-ba was lying. He’s in league with her.”

I heard the hammer release, the sing of a bolt.

A sharp sudden scream of warning.

As I reached the edge of the underbrush, I cast a look over my shoulder to see a saber-toothed cat hurtling in among the horsemen, muscles bunching as it sprang to topple the lead horseman from the saddle. Confusion reigned as the horses bucked and sidestepped, trying to get their heads out from under the reins so they could flee the deadly beast’s massive claws. Two horsemen had pulled out of the fray and were racing toward me. Branches scraped my arms as I shoved through the tangle of bushes. The fabric of my cloaks caught, dragging me to a halt, and I twisted, yanking at the cloth to free myself. Branches snapped as a rider drove his mount into the undergrowth. I plunged farther in, but once beyond the leafless fringe of deciduous trees, I entered the yew forest whose dense canopy sheltered no concealing undergrowth.

I spun as the soldier broke out of the bushes, crossbow raised as he sighted in the gloom. A bolt hissed past me; he dropped the crossbow on its leash as I untied my outer cloak. Closing, he drew his sword. I swept the cloak open and flung it over the head of his mount. Ducking to my right, I threw myself behind a tree trunk. He grappled with the cloak, cursing as the horse shook itself into a halt under a low-lying tree limb. His head slammed hard into the branch, but I was already running. My riding habit was cut for practicality, not fashion; the Barahals took their riding seriously. The fabric did not hinder me as I dashed deeper into the woods. The trees had a brooding majesty, but all I could truly discern were the possibilities these gnarled boles offered for dodging armed riders. Another was gaining on me. This young man had a fashionable coat rather than a soldier’s kit. He had a sword, and he rode well, and by the way he shouted a command over his shoulder to a soldier spurring his horse to follow, I guessed he must be the magister who had woven the illusion.