by Garth Nix
Milla snorted, a sound that Tal knew meant she didn't think much of his local knowledge. He continued to look out at the sky, trying to remember everything he'd been taught about storms in Aenir. Dim memories of the Lectorium came into his head, mostly of Lector Norval droning on.
All he could remember was a story about Storm Shepherds, strange creatures that looked like human-shaped clouds, ten or twelve stretches tall, which were thought to be harmless if left alone. This didn't seem very useful.
Neither did Tal's memories of previous visits to Aenir with his family. They had always stayed close to the Chosen Enclave, though his father had traveled farther afield.
The trees continued to move away, and before long Tal and Milla could see a continuous line of dark clouds on the horizon. Flashes of lightning also became visible, forking down from the black sky. Tal looked at Milla, and saw her staring at the lightning, totally entranced. Then she shook her head and said, "It is not dishonorable to seek shelter from a storm. We should follow the trees."
"I'm not sure," replied Tal nervously. He looked at the rapidly retreating forest heading toward what he thought was probably south, then at the low line of barren, rocky hills to the east and west, and then at the clouds again. "Maybe we should go that way."
He pointed at the closer hills.
"Why?" asked Milla.
Tal gulped and said, "Because I think that storm is going to turn this whole place into a lake." "A what?" asked Milla.
"Look at the darkness under the clouds!" Tal said urgently. "Look around! We're in a basin, and the clouds are dumping rain. This whole area's going to fill up. It's going to flood, turn into a lake. A small sea!"
Milla needed no further explanation. She took one calculating look at the encroaching clouds and then started to run to the closest hill. Tal was right behind her.
CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN
They were barely halfway to the hill when Tal had to stop to regain his breath. Milla stopped, too. Even though she wasn't breathing hard, Tal noticed she held two fingers to her side, where she'd been wounded by the Merwin. It must be hurting.
Tal looked back at the storm front, and saw that not only was it much closer, it had already dumped so much rain that a small flood was running ahead of the clouds. Muddy water was rushing over the ground where the forest had stood, eddying into the tree root holes before flowing ever onward.
The thunder and lightning were fading, much to Tal's relief. Though it was probably only because the clouds were so full of rain. So the chance of being struck by lightning had decreased, but they were still in imminent danger of drowning.
"We'll make it," said Milla, as they started to run again. There was water under their feet now, and the first raindrops were falling around them. But the hill was close.
They made it with a few minutes to spare. Panting, they watched the front of the floodwater strike the high ground and be turned back in a flurry of ripples. The hill wasn't very large, only a hundred or so stretches tall, but Tal hoped the water would not rise that high.
"It is strange," said Milla, holding out her palm to catch several heavy raindrops that splashed off her fingers. "Like snow, but warmer and… more free."
"Not that much warmer," grumbled Tal. "We'd better find some shelter."
The hillside was rapidly turning into mud, but they managed to clamber up to the crest. Tal stopped to look back down, but Milla started down the other side.
Tal couldn't see very far because of the rain, but where the forest had been was now just a swirling mass of dirty water. If he hadn't seen the trees there before, he would never have believed it wasn't a muddy lake.
"Tal."
Tal looked away and hurried down after Milla. She sounded like she'd found shelter.
She had. She was standing outside the mouth of a cave, with her Merwin-horn sword in her hand, holding it up so its light shone in the entrance.
Something reflected back, something red and shiny, deep inside. Tal saw it and instantly an image flashed into his head. A Beastmaker card, with two red eyes that were not eyes shining in a cave entrance.
The Cavernmouth card.
"Milla! Trap!" he screamed, thrusting out his hand with the Sunstone ring, thoughts focusing on its power.
Milla reacted instantly to his warning, throwing herself to one side. She felt the rush of air but didn't see the two enormous jaws that shot out from the cave long jaws of dark bone and still darker teeth hundreds and hundreds of teeth, crooked and shambling, like helter-skelter rows of thorns.
The jaws closed with a clash, exactly where Milla had been standing a split second before. As they opened again for another snatch, Tal sent a wide spray of white-hot sparks straight down the open gullet of the beast.
A hideous bellow echoed from inside the hill, and the jaws snapped back inside. Then the whole Cavernmouth retreated deeper into its burrow, dragging earth and stone down behind it as a last-ditch defense.
Tal lowered his hand, his whole arm shaking. The Sunstone on his finger still shone brightly, small sparks fizzing out to blacken his knuckles. Tal looked at the stone and brought it back under control.
Milla had crawled away, circling back up and around the crest, ready to counterattack. She came down the hill and looked at the pile of raw earth where the Cavernmouth's decoy hole had been.
"What was that?" she asked. Tal didn't notice that she had to moisten her mouth before she could speak.
"Cavernmouth," said Tal. "All jaws and stomach. I should have told you about them before."
Milla shrugged. "I did not tell you about everything that lives on the Ice. But I will be more careful. I must live to bring a Sunstone back to the Far Raiders."
"Well, we need to find the Codex before we can go back," Tal muttered. He raised his arm and watched the water run off it. "Though finding somewhere dry would do for now."
Milla gazed into the distance, then shook her head in disbelief. "You can see so far here! But the forest is already out of sight, and look! That hill is moving, too, like a dying Selski of earth and stone. I know it is not a dream, and yet I doubt my senses. It is too light. Soon it will be dark, like home. The sun is falling down."
She pointed at the red light that was spreading over the hills. Sure enough, the sun was beginning to set.
"It'll come up again," said Tal, as much to reassure himself as anything. "I guess we'll have to camp here, somehow."
It wasn't an attractive option. They only had their dirty, disheveled furs and Milla's stinking armor. No sleeping furs, or cooking stove, or anything. Just a muddy hillside and continuous, beating rain.
They sat down together and glumly looked down on the rising waters of the new lake. It was still filling up, or flowing elsewhere, because there was quite a strong current heading south, carrying all the debris left by the fleeing forest.
Tal looked at one particularly large leaf floating past. It had curled up in the middle, and its stalk was like the prow of a proud ship. That started him thinking. If only they had a ship themselves, or at least a raft, they could let the current take them somewhere. Anywhere had to be better than this.
But they didn't have anything to make a raft with.
Except light, Tal suddenly thought. He could use the solid light spell, the one he'd learned in order to make the stairway leading out of the pit. If he could make a stairway, he could make a raft. With two of them to concentrate on it, it would be easier to maintain as well.
"We can make a boat!" he exclaimed, jumping up. "A boat of light."
Then he sighed and sat down again, even as Milla got up.
"I forgot you aren't a Chosen," he said. "I wouldn't be able to keep it going by myself, and you don't know how to use your Sunstone properly."
"Teach me," Milla said. It almost came out as an order, but there was a faint question there, too, a hopefulness that Tal wouldn't have noticed if he hadn't spent so much time with Milla.
Tal looked up at her. Could he teach her? The basics of
concentration and reinforcement weren't that hard. He would make the boat, and Milla would only need to concentrate on color and intensity to reinforce his Sunstone with her own.
But should he teach her? She was an Icecarl. Maybe an enemy. He still thought she might try to kill him once she was free of the Crone's Quest. She might regret killing him, but she'd do it because she'd said she would.
If Tal taught her Light magic, he'd be handing her a weapon.
On the other hand, there were plenty more dangers in Aenir, and he might be the one who needed help next time.
"All right," he said finally. "I'll teach you about Sunstones. What you need to know, anyway."
"And I will teach you to fight," replied Milla.
She held out her hand and turned her wrist up, pushing back her wet and now even worse-smelling Selski-hide armor. Before Tal could groan, she'd reopened the triple cuts on her wrist.
The rain washed the blood away almost instantly, but Milla clenched her fist and waited till Tal hesitantly held out his wrist.
Milla cut as swiftly as the Crone, and just as accurately. Tal flinched as the barest point of her knife cut the skin, imagining as always something worse. He didn't understand why the Icecarls cut at the wrist. Why not just prick their fingers with a flame-sterilized pin?
"Blood of the clan and bone of the ship," chanted Milla, wiping her wrist across Tal's, then placing the flat of the bone knife against both of them. She looked fiercely at Tal, till he repeated the words.
"Master and Student under the Sunstone," she continued, then she reversed the bone knife, still holding it between their wrists. "Student and Master under the Sword. By blood of the clan and bone of the ship. This we swear, with blood to the wind"
She flicked both their wrists out, sending blood flying, though there was very little wind to take it. "And bloodto the "
She hesitated and looked around, for here she would normally have said "Ice."
"Rain," said Tal, turning his wrist up to the sky. "Blood to the rain."
"Blood to the rain," confirmed Milla, following his gesture.
Two perfect, tear-shaped raindrops fell then, splashing on their cuts, completely removing the last traces of blood. No more welled up, as if the raindrops had miraculously healed the skin.
Tal and Milla stared down at their wrists, then looked up at the sky, blinking through further rain. Both jumped as thunder suddenly crashed above them, sending a shock through the air.
They continued to stare up in amazement as dark clouds shifted and roiled, and two clumps suddenly rolled down and out of the mass. Two vaguely man-shaped creatures of billowing black and gray formed out of the clumps. Their heads came first, then their arms grew out, and then their legs stretched down to the hilltop.
Small streaks of lightning played backward and forward in their eyes, which were the only patches of white on the cloud-creatures.
Milla and Tal backed away from the towering figures, which were easily three times their height. One of the creatures loomed forward and roared. "Who gives blood to the rain at sunfall on old Hrigga Hill?"
Then the second one bellowed:
"Who calls the Storm Shepherds?"
Then both shouted, the thunder of their voices knocking Tal and Milla to the ground.
"Who pays the blood price?"
Tal stared up at the huge figures, his mind racing. The blood price. In Aenir that meant a life. But he could trick them with his shadow, and use it to bind one of them to him as a Spiritshadow. A Storm Shepherd would be a great ally here and a very powerful Spiritshadow back in the Castle. But if he got any of the ritual wrong, his natural shadow would be lost and with it any chance of getting a Spiritshadow.
Should he take this chance, on the spur of the moment? Would there ever be a better opportunity? And what about Milla? There were two Storm Shepherds. The other one would demand her shadow as well, and Milla wouldn't give it up. He would have to make her…
Tal darted a look at her. Their eyes met. He saw trust there. Milla expected him to fight at her side, not to try to sell her shadow.
Milla saw Tal's eyes flicker and his right hand rose with its Sunstone ring. Suddenly she knew that some betrayal lurked there. For all their blood pacts, he was not an Icecarl. She could not predict what he would do, or count on it being the best for clan and ship. An anger grew in her, and she felt the Merwinhorn sword rise in her hand. She could hit him with the flat of the blade, and then run.
Tal saw Milla's eyes grow hard, saw the sword rise.
He had to decide. Try and trick one Storm
Shepherd with his shadow, and hope the other one would be able to take Milla's shadow, too?
The Storm Shepherds roared.
Chosen boy and Icecarl girl faced each other. Their gaze was locked. Both knew that their fragile alliance was on the verge of breaking forever. Whoever looked away, whoever moved first, everything that came from it would be their fault.
Seconds passed and still neither moved. The Storm Shepherds raged. Lightning flashed and thunder crashed around the hilltop.
A thousand moments flashed through Tal's mind. His first encounter with Milla in the snow. Climbing the mast of the iceship. Crossing the Living Sea of Selski. The feeling of relief as he saw Milla stabbing the Merwin through the eye. The jump across the chasm. The heatway tunnels. The crystal globe with Milla waiting patiently inside it, when a Chosen would be a gibbering wreck.
All this was clearer to him, easier to remember than his life in the Castle before he fell.
Memories rushed through Milla's mind, too. Tal helping her up in front of the Selski. Blinding the Merwin. His hand under her head when she lay dying, the Merwin horn shining behind him. The jump across the chasm. How he'd looked covered in green weed, when he'd dropped into the Hall of Nightmares.
He wasn't an Icecarl, but he had never failed her, not when it really mattered. If a saga was ever sung of Milla Merwin-Slayer, she realized, it would have a potential Sword Thane in it as well as a would-be Shield Maiden.
Milla lowered her sword. At exactly the same time Tal let his hand drop back to his side.
Milla tilted her head. Tal nodded.
Together, they turned to face the blustering Storm Shepherds.
"I am Milla of the Far Raiders!" called out Milla. "I am Tal of the Chosen," announced Tal. Together they shouted, "We shall pay no price!"
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Garth Nix was born in 1963 and grew up in Canberra, Australia. His book
Sabriel won Best Fantasy Novel in the Aurealis Awards for Excellence in Australian Science Fiction and was named an ALA Notable Book and a Best Book for Young Adults. His novel
Shade's Children was named an ALA Best Book for Young Adults and an ABA Pick of the Lists. He is also the author of
The Ragwitch and the forthcoming
Lirael: Daughter of the Clayr.
He currently lives in Sydney, Australia.
www.theseventhtower.com
Milla and Tal travel deeper into Aenir… and closer to peril in The Seventh Tower Book Three - Aenir
Milla fled through the darkness. But it was not the darkness she knew. There were tiny lights in the sky, stars as Tal called them. There were unfamiliar scents in the air. Strange sounds, the calls of creatures that she did not know.
Her duty was clear. Return to the Dark World, deliver the Sunstone ring for her clan, report to the Mother Crone and then give herself to the Ice.
Something rustled ahead of her, and Milla froze. She had no idea what it could be. She couldn't see anything, but she was sure she'd heard something. The starlight was bright enough to see a silhouette at least.
Milla drew her sword and advanced slowly. She halted every few steps to listen and look carefully ahead of her.
But there was nothing to see. The burned grassland had stopped twenty or thirty stretches behind her. Now there was just short, green and yellow grass ahead. Too short to hide a creature any bigger than Milla's foot.
&
nbsp; Milla took a few more steps forward. Something didn't feel quite right, but she wasn't sure what it was. There was a faint smell, something different from either the burned patches or the usual smell of grass.
She sniffed experimentally. It was the smell of faintly rotting meat, overlaid by the fresh scent of grass.
It smelled like she was very close to the source of the odor. Milla looked at the Sunstone ring on her hand. She didn't really know how to use it, but she thought she could probably raise some sort of light. Tal and Ebbitt had shown her how to concentrate on the stone.
The grass rippled slightly under her feet, but there was no wind. Milla frowned. She still couldn't see anything in this starlight, and she didn't know what she was smelling.
It was time to risk a light.
She raised her hand so she could look directly at the Sunstone. It reflected the starlight, but there was also the faintest hint of yellow fire at its center. Milla stared at it, willing it to grow brighter.
It did start to grow brighter. Milla smiled. She could feel it in the middle of her forehead. A strange warmth in her mind. She knew she could think it brighter. So she did.
The stone grew brighter still, until she couldn't see her hand, only the glare and fuzz of the light. It was at least the equivalent of several of the Icecarl's moth-lamps.
Milla raised her hand above her head and looked around. She still couldn't see anything, threatening, The only oddity was that she was standing on a large, irregular square of grass that was greener than all the rest.
Even as she saw that, Milla realized this was more than odd.
She leaped forward, just as the Hugthing writhed up from the ground, wrapping its flat, mossy body all around her legs like a blanket.
Milla fell hard.
