Ice Burns Read online

  Again she marked him as a fool. Late visitors, such as him, would have been given a room off the main entry near where the guards had bunks. Likely, he was someone's messenger who was anxious to hear that the favor had been given and had commanded an immediate return.

  He was one of many who sought the favor of the lady for a master or himself. It wasn't often a baby in such a powerful family was born. Anyone who looked to gain favor would need to make the lady happy or best the Lord in a way that didn't injure his honor. It had been like that for weeks, though she had thought that the snow would slow the visits down.

  She frowned. The guard woman noted he held a bundle. For someone seeking favor, it was odd that he left holding something. It was as if he had changed his mind. Who would bother to make such a journey just to change their mind and depart?

  No one. She frowned and tugged at one ear as she considered the slow-moving figure.

  It was more likely the Lady had refused the gift as not lavish enough, and caused the traveler to depart in shame. Lady Ice Wrath, as she was called in furtive whispers, was never satisfied.

  Still, she could not help but be sad for the baby. What child needed to be raised by an evil mother in a stark, loveless environment. The child may have been destined to power, but power was not the only reward to be had in life.

  If only the child would have the opportunity to learn such a lesson.

  She hoped that life would create someone who could be better than the woman that raised her and returned to her musings of the traveler. Shame should not be enough to risk one's life.

  "Idiot," she whispered.

  The figure paused in the world of white. Snow swirled, filling in footsteps behind him, yet he turned and looked in the foggy window the guardswoman occupied. Despite the darkness and snow curtain, she met the darkest eyes she had ever seen in her life. She felt fear slide under her skin just before her throat closed. She was hit with a sudden sense of vertigo as her body lifted. It was as if a giant hand grasped her and threw her across the room. Her body and various kitchen items crashed down from the wall to the stone floor.

  Despite feeling that her consciousness was leaking out the back of her head, she pushed to her feet. Training took control of her body before she could even shake the pain away. Pans and tools clattered as her booted feet made a stomping battle cry as she ran to the door, knives grasped in her hands. Her mind began to work through the miasma of pain. Such an attack was not natural and did not bode well.

  The snow only slowed her slightly. Her lithe grace would make a snow fox envious as she stalked Dark Eyes. Her feet dipped in the wake of his filling tracks and barely touched down before they moved to the next. She cut through the snow like water. When the guard got close enough to see him through snowflaked eyelashes, she paused. Even training couldn't push her forward as her mind made sense of what she saw.

  The bundle in Dark Eyes’ arms moved; a tiny limb swung free from the swaddling.

  He had the baby!

  Dark Eyes turned and saw her as he adjusted the bundle. His arm lifted like a herald, and she rolled to the side. She felt the pressure of something brushing past her and let her weight carry her further than she had initially intended. She popped her body up from the roll, breaking the snow like a fish in water. With the upward momentum, she threw both knives, intending to take throat and groin. The knife meant for his throat went past, but the second knife found a mark on his side.

  Dark Eyes howled. She bent her knees and moved, her hands already holding new blades. She stared down the face of dark fury and pain, her teeth bared. She danced through the snow, knowing that movement and focus were her only defenses against him.

  The man reached down with one hand and ripped the knife out of his ribcage. The blade crumbled in his gloved hand, and she let surprise slow her for one moment too long. The weapons left her hands as the world shook around her and she was falling into heat instead of snow. The image of hot, wavering wind in front of a massive fire was imprinted into her mind before it liquesced her right eye and most of the right side of her face. A cracking noise came with the pain that fired within her veins and she knew that if she didn't move, she would be a pile of broken bones and viscera. Without any sound more than a gasp, she compressed the pain into a final bit of energy and flung herself sideways. She needed to stop the burning and move out of range.

  Either the attack disorientated her, or Dark Eyes moved faster than she thought possible. Through the frozen fog of pain and immobility, she heard him. She pushed her broken body into a roll to defend herself with the knife clenched in her broken claw hand.

  To her horror, she felt the metal crumble. She tried to scream an alarm, but her blood gurgled in her throat like a parody of water.

  “I accept your death as a necessary black mark on my soul,” Dark Eyes whispered through the howling wind. The woman watched in horror as the man lifted his arm and the world around her rose up as a wave to crash over her.

  The old woman woke. Memories of pain lapped phantom pulls at the skin and bones of her old, bent body. She would have liked to stay seated there, but the heat was suddenly too much. Her body needed movement despite the ache. She rose and stepped into the world of the present.

  Outside, she raised a ladle of water. Fresh and clean, it became like new breath in her body, and she drank long draughts for several moments. The cobwebs of sleep and remnants of fear and horror left her for the moment. The wind stirred, and the woman paused with the water at her lips.

  A whisper danced through the grass and across the limbs of young trees. It danced as though it were a child with a secret. Secrets, though, are more fun once told, and the whisper was lifted and brought to her ears by a breeze. It was a primal call she knew better than her life as a young woman. She cocked her head to the side, as the sound ran through her and settled. Had another person seen her, she might have looked mad, listening to something no one could see or hear. She nodded. The wind brought her news.

  She was needed. It was time to get to work.

  16

  The slap came hard to her injured cheek, making Chandra hiss out an oath. She reached up to push the next tree branch away before it could do the same. The pain quickly warmed her cheek under the layer of sweat and grime. She realized that she wasn't just miserably inept at traveling; she was a danger to herself. It wasn’t a surprising revelation. She had never learned any skills with the outdoors unless one counted her several failed attempts to manipulate seeds and plants with magic. It was possible they were using this time to get back at her.

  Chandra's foot caught on another hidden hole or possibly a root, and she mostly righted herself. Under her trousers, welts and torn skin caused the fabric to stick more than sweat. Her body was scraped pink from the abuse of branches, rock outcroppings, holes, and coarse ground cover. At some point, she noticed the skin under her nails had turned a burnished red color. It was as though she had dipped the tips of her fingers in blood instead of nature.

  Pfft, nature. Why in the world would anyone choose to be out in this instead of inside with a cool breeze or warm fire?

  Chandra leaned against a tree for a moment as she tried to catch her breath. Her mind split time between panic at what had happened, pain in her body, and thirst. Pausing made her realize more that her shoes would likely fall apart within a day from the rough terrain.

  “Stupid and ill-equipped,” she muttered as she pushed on through the dense foliage. Even if she had planned it out, Chandra doubted she would have known what to take. She tried to keep to the soft, mossy spots of ground, but it was like puddle jumping, they were so spread out. She even tried stepping tree root to tree root to relieve the pain in her feet but found it brought new pain to her legs.

  Each breath dragged along her dry, cracked lips like sandpaper. Chandra had been gone barely half a day. The light from the sun was waning, but not enough to stop it from roasting her as she walked. Her body and its desire for water made her feel like the journey had b
een at least a fortnight of walking. A drink of water would be heaven right now.

  Quiet trickles of sound rose out of the forest from somewhere off to her right. Since she hadn't heard a single bird since entering the woods, she knew it had to be something else she was hearing. Over her breathing, she listened to a tapping sort of pop and realized what it was.

  She pushed through the trees, scraping and bruising more skin as she went. She moved with such mindless intent that she almost stepped over and missed the small, shallow stream. It looked like a moving puddle except that it was so clean and quick.

  Chandra fell to her knees, raising water to her lips and slurped between heaving pants. Her body fought between the need for water and air to fill her lungs. When her breathing slowed to just less than panting, she lowered her body back onto her heels. Her thirst sated, though not completely gone.

  She scooped water to rub on her arms and face, easing the painfully heated tree slappings the forest had given her. Most of the scrapes left only a tiny line of blood that washed away, but her nails were a burnt color. She scraped under the nails and looked to see if she had cut into the nail bed but didn't see any damage. The red remained like a sunset.

  Chandra shook her hands dry and tried not to think of what red had been absorbed to color her nails. She was loath to leave the tiny stream but forced herself up and moving again. The wilderness became a blurred haze of sensation in comparison to the pitiful pleas of her body. Sounds rubbed the inside of her ears raw and blood soaked her mind, dripping down the flat wall of her soul. She pushed it away like an angry child with their meal. The visions and emotion tried to choke her and drag her to a stop. She thought again how ill-prepared she was.

  A voice in her head acknowledged that fleeing for one’s life seldom left room for proper planning. A laugh ripped from her at the idea of her carefully packing a bag and gathering supplies from a suddenly-helpful cook before waving at the inhabitants of the estate and whistling her way down the road.

  The sound echoed through the trees, bouncing off of the foliage to fly back and laugh at her. Warm concern stretched across her mind as her companion heard the sound and checked on her. She acknowledged him with the frustration built from fear inside her. She wondered if he had ever needed to plan for a journey. Frostwhite responded with a mental shrug and hawk-vision showing various possible water sources from miles away.

  “Well, good, can you find me some, then? I’m going to need more if I expect to keep moving. I won’t last through tomorrow if I can’t find water and a place to hide.”

  Aches and pains were nothing compared to the bit of pink that taunted her at the horizon. Time had moved at a varying pace depending on if she thought of the pain with which she moved or that which she was trying to escape.

  She wiped at the sweat that caught around her chin and under her hair. A moment later she was rewarded with the image of a mossy well. She said a silent thank you. Her response was air that pushed down on her with weighted force and a scrabble of sound on a branch.

  Keek keek.

  In her mind, she saw an image of the hawk moving through the trees ahead of her as she followed. Frostwhite launched away and gracefully landed a little way ahead of her on another tree limb and then cocked his snowy head at her. She grunted at him and moved in his direction.

  "I'd read about tour guides in some regions showing travelers around to see the sights, but never thought I would have the opportunity," she told him. "Of course, I had always assumed the guide would be human, and I wouldn't be on the run."

  Frostwhite made a sound that was almost the same as a grunt before moving on. She smiled at his feathered back and felt as though he returned the smile.

  Frostwhite led her that way for an unaccountable amount of time. The sky continued to darken, though some of the absence of light was from trees that grew tall and close together further into the forest. When the line of trees seemed just to stop, it felt as though they were tossed out into a clearing to the world beyond.

  Chandra saw the well and rushed for it, dropping to her knees when she reached it. It was old and barely visible through the overgrowth. The stones barely formed a circle and looked as though they might turn to powder if touched. If there hadn't been a wooden arch above with rope and a bucket, she likely would have missed it. She closed her eyes and hoped for water. A dry well would be the worst sort of luck right then.

  She lowered the bucket into the well and heard a splash as it hit and almost shouted for joy. She wrapped the rope around the windlass and spun the broken crank handle. The bucket was heavy, and Chandra fought to pull it up. She was rewarded with a full bucket of cool, clear water. The rope handle on the bucket bit into her palms and some of the water leaked out as she drew it to the side so she could put it down on the hard-packed earth.

  Using the only water bowl she had, Chandra filled her hands and drank until she thought she might burst. She drew more water and doused herself with it. The cool water made her aches disappear for a few moments as it soothed her skin like a healing balm. On her knees, she leaned forward to press her head against one of the bricks that marked the well. It was old, but not crumbling as she had thought. The rough texture of the brick felt like crisp linen to her cheek, and she almost dozed off. For a few moments, with her eyes closed, Chandra just let herself breathe. They didn't have a lot of time, though. She felt a weight settle on her and gripping pressure wrapped around her aching calf.

  She didn't open her eyes but nodded her head still pressed against the brick.

  “Oh great, wise guide, do you think you can find shelter for us?” She didn’t open her eyes until she felt a smooth beak and soft feathers pushing at the hand in her lap. She opened bleary eyes to look at Frostwhite, who hopped across the ground as she eyed him. A copse of trees wrapped around and grew through the ruin of a cottage a little over a yard ahead away from them.

  Keek kee kee.

  "Well played, mighty guide. Are you also going to make a dinner pop up for us?"

  Her mind flashed on a massive snake, pulled from the ground by her companion.

  "Eww. No thanks," she made a face at the hawk who, once again, was laughing at her. “It looks abandoned. Do you think we’ll be safe there?”

  Frostwhite gave her a one-eyed stare, and she chuckled.

  “I guess we’ll take a look and see, hmm?”

  The tiny hut looked dark in the late-day light. The forest had made Chandra think it was practically night, but the clearing showed that they had a bit more time, despite the streaks of red and pink drawing lines from the horizon. Despite the light, she couldn't see much of the broken home. It was as though the sunlight could not reach the tiny house. She stepped forward, assuming that distance was the culprit, but it remained almost blurred. Within the ruins, she could see it lacked a door and had jagged teeth evidence of previously being glass-paned windows. Overall, it looked unwelcome in a way that grew heavily in Chandra’s stomach.

  She swallowed hard as she looked at the abandoned hovel. She itched to turn away, and the fear welled in her mouth and balled in her throat. She would have thought she had left fear when she had set out on foot that morning, but the familiar tang heated her senses. She could smell moldy disrepair and felt her heart sink at its decrepit state.

  "Well, at least we don't have to worry about sleeping in someone's house and them calling the guards on us," Chandra told Frostwhite. It had been on her mind that they would need to choose their resting spot carefully so someone wouldn't see and report where they were. With unease in her mind, she walked forward. Decrepit the cottage may be, but it was a shelter. She squared her shoulders and stepped into the gloom. A few steps in and she almost crashed into an old hearth. It was hard to see with the scattered light that sparsely accompanied her through the doorway. She ran her hands along the rough, warm stone. It did not feel as though it was in the same neglectful state as the crumbling stones of the well. Her hands found no cracks and there seemed to be no broken or missin
g pieces around the hearth. She smiled and marveled at the joy a fireplace in a cottage that was mostly intact could bring. She inspected the area around it and found that none of the trees had broken through, and there were no nests or burrows. At least, when the evening got cold, she didn't have to worry about killing them by trying to get warm.

  Over the protests of her aching body, she hobbled slowly from the cottage to gather dry wood. She couldn't have a large fire, and she would have to wait for dark to light the fire. The tree growth around and through the ruins should block the light and night should hide the smoke. It wouldn't be much, but the nights grew cold when the wind rolled in from the grasslands to the east and off the unimpeded landscape of the desert. Any additional warmth would not just be welcome, but necessary.

  She paused gathering when she heard small sounds in the trees. Chandra remembered stories about great cats and other predators in the forests. She didn’t know how much was true but knew she was almost helpless in such a strange environment. For a moment, it was like being a child who needed light to comfort her. Though it would be smarter to go without a fire, she wasn’t sure after everything that had happened that she could abstain.

  She gathered as many dry twigs and chunks of wood she could find. Chandra was afraid if she wandered too far away she might never find her way back, or someone might find her before she could. Frostwhite nudged her mind and reminded that he was there to help.

  Chandra brought her bundle of kindling and wood back to the cottage. In the brick opening, she arranged wood as close as she could remember the kitchen workers doing for cook fires. After much shifting, she settled on the floor and pulled the bread from her bundle. Chandra felt like she could eat the entire thing, but tore off only a small bit. As she chewed the sweet bread, she tried to think and plan.

  She wondered how many guards had been sent to find her. Were they following her trail? How quickly they had set out would determine how near they were to finding her. Frostwhite comforted her with his view of the forest.