She stopped and looked down at the patch where she had been sitting. The tarpaulin had evidently been placed deliberately to protect something, a carving in the solid stone – a set of chiselled ridges that seemed to resolve into a knot-like shape, three triangles linked and overlapping. She knew it well, an Odin-sign; one of her first computer jobs had been to record the temple carvings. They must be cleaning this one up for the public. Well, her weight wouldn’t have hurt it any. She lugged the terminal back onto her shoulder, where it immediately chafed, twitched the tarp back and with a last glance round at the watchful woods she set out uphill, with the setting sun at her back.
At leg-aching last, there was the familiar rickety fence and unkempt hedge, huddled and deformed now under its snowcap. The wind came howling down to greet her, whipping snaky lines of powder snow across the smooth curves of the drifts to cake on her front and sting her face. The way it felt she’d only just be home in time. Another of those nights, then, when the caravan shook in a soughing gale, when the thin walls thrummed and pressed inward under giant fingers. Not so good. Better when you had company, even fun when you could huddle together and find ways of sharing warmth. But alone you’d find yourself awake and doing interesting calculations, such as the exact weight of you and the van, the exact wind force it would take to just scoop you up and over that neat little hedge and over the handy-dandy cliff back there. About three in the morning you could come up with some odd answers …
Jess pulled herself together. The hell with that, and with company. If your independence was worth a damn you had to keep it in hard times as well as easy. Sleeping-bag, Scotch-and-hot-water and, say, The Sword In Anglo-Saxon England to chase the bogeys away –
She stopped in her tracks, so abruptly the terminal dug a corner into her thigh. She didn’t notice. There was her trailer, squat and grey under its snowcap like a lump of fallen cloud. But across the gusts of wind a sharp repeated thumping came to her, as if someone was knocking loudly, urgently, or … A few paces more, and she could see its door flapping in the wind, open and closed again like a slow hollow handclap. The door she knew damn well she’d locked.
She remembered to leap the snow-hidden ditch before the fence, but the terminal’s swinging weight almost yanked her back into it. Swearing, she clambered over the wire fence, but in manoeuvring the terminal she snagged her jeans on the barbs. With an impatient yelp of rage she ripped free, grabbed the terminal strap and looped it carefully over the stoutest fencepost. No throwing that carelessly aside, even if all her books and money and letters and all the decent clothes she had along were in that thing, that sardine-can on wheels that she might’ve known wouldn’t keep out the local gooks for five minutes and if whoever it was were still in there he was due one very big surprise indeed –
The wind came howling in off the sea, sweeping across the Oddsness road in great gusts. The suddenness of it almost made Hal swerve off the road: he had to fight the heavy car back in line as it slithered over the caked surface of the old snow. He thought of Jackson and Latimer, and cursed himself for ever involving them. If they had got caught in this … At least his Range Rover had four-wheel drive. They could get stranded, with more to worry about than the cold. And Neville and Harry, chasing after that idiot of a girl – that obstinate, posturing, pig-headed girl, and all her Satans half-measures. Finished with Jay but still trying to mother him, sleeping with Hal but refusing to commit herself, making a big deal of her independence while expecting him to be unquestioningly loyal and patient …
Something rattled across the windscreen like a fusillade of bullets, and suddenly he was driving head-on into a white wall. He almost reached for the brake – but it was a wall of snow, hurtling towards him across the bare moorland as fast as the sea wind could throw it at him. Even with the wipers at double speed he could barely keep his windscreen clear, and the Range Rover’s powerful foglights were almost useless. For a moment he thought of turning back, but with two miles to go it hardly seemed worth it. Had he really gotten through worse than this back home? He must have. All the same, it was strange. Both wind and snow he had expected – but neither so sudden, a curtain flung savagely across the sky. Already the road ahead was covered, and the car was sliding as fresh snow packed down into ice under the tyres. He changed down and slowed again. Too much of a hurry on this road and he’d go over the cliff. Besides, a storm like this would soon blow itself out – September was hardly a month for blizzards, even in Yorkshire. Even so, reaching Oddsness now would be a matter of luck – if the storm broke, or passed, if the snowfall eased a little, if it didn’t drift too high.
The ghost of a signpost loomed out of the night like the answer to a prayer. Inland, away from the coast – there, surely, the wind would be slowed, and he would have a chance to escape. The Range Rover skidded into the uphill turn, and he felt the force of the gale punching at the side of the car, struggling to turn it over, fingers of ice and snow scrabbling across the roof and windows, its voice howling in triumph. A picture flashed into his mind, a book from his childhood: the North Wind, a huge creature of spirals and swirls and outstretched arms, flattening all that lay in its path, driving all before it. Only now there was a car in its path, a toy car, so small as to be almost beneath contempt.
And then, suddenly, unbelievably, the wind had turned to face him, drowning the windscreen in snow, hammering, slowing, driving him back in a blind fury where it wanted him to go. He felt the wheels slipping, the car sliding backwards down the slope, out of control, saw a fencepost looming in the rear-view mirror, swung the wheel to escape it, and cursed as he found himself rolling back onto the coast road. At least if the wind had changed he might still get through that way. But as he wound down his side window and knocked the caked snow off the windscreen he felt the wind lash round again, and a chill grew within him deeper than anything merely physical. The spectre of Pru rose before him, two faces superimposed – one flushed, lovely, floating in the tense serenity of flooding passion, the other stark white, swollen, bruised and blood-caked, the face above the blanket on the stretcher.
The battle had already begun. He was being hunted – and already he was trapped here in the cold and the dark as surely as Pru had been trapped in the stone prison of Fern Farm. Could he believe that? He had to. His encounter with the woman had already taken him into the twilight, and now his invisible enemy was herding him like a helpless animal …
With an angry curse he shifted gear and swung the car into a violent U-turn, heading back the way he had come. He felt the back swinging, skidding out of control. Too fast. No matter. If the drive didn’t kill him, the wind would do it. No point in caution now. Fingers of ice and snow, lifting him, trying to hurl him down the cliff – and then, just as before, the wind was ahead of him, the snow driving into the windscreen like a hail of gravel …
A heavy impact, hurling him forward till the safety belt pulled bruisingly taut across his ribcage and his neck snapped back against the headrest. The engine whined and stalled.
Snow. A solid wall. As though the air itself had frozen into a barrier. For a moment, something like silence. And then the sounds that the engine had concealed – ice scrabbling around the car, searching for cracks, clawing to find him, hammering at the windows. The North Wind come to call, enfolding him in snowdrift arms. Caught in his enemy’s spell. What was the word? Sending. Caught in his enemy’s sending. They would be coming for him now, as they had for Pru. He smashed a hand down on the wheel in bitter frustration. ‘Well I won’t, d’you hear me? I will not sit here and die!’ The wind howled a mocking reply as he zipped up his parka, wound his scarf around his face, and sprang out of the car, feet crunching into the frozen surface crust of the snow. The clutch of tiny houses at Oddsness was less than two miles away, though in this weather it might as well be a hundred. Even so, there were many ways to die tonight, and snow might be the cleanest. He staggered forward, blinded, ice already crusting his beard and eyebrows. At least he knew the way to go – agains
t the wind, always against the wind, fighting the raw power of his enemy’s sending. Burning with fury he staggered into the darkness and gave himself to wind, and snow, and emptiness.
Jess ran towards the trailer in great bounds, kicking free of the clinging snow, aches and chills forgotten in a sudden blaze of adrenalin. She’d show the lousy bastard, she’d show the whole goddam crew of them – they weren’t so used to ladies fighting back around here – and Jesus, were they ever about to learn! The small wooden step lay splintered in the snow, but one leaping stride shot her through the opening, left fist bunched and ready. Then she stopped, staring, and all but fell back out.
He was still in there, all right. In fact he was calmly sitting at the far end of the trailer, sprawling among the tangle of rugs and cushions that was Jess’s bed, a shadow outline against the drawn curtains of the end window. Jess’s eyes narrowed. If the creep was actually waiting for her –
‘Hey!’ she bawled. ‘Hey you!’
Slowly, unhurriedly the head turned towards her, and for an instant the profile stood out sharply. She sucked in her breath with sheer disbelief, and then smashed a fist down on the flimsy worktop in a frenzy of exasperation. ‘Jay, you utter asshole! That does it, this is the goddam limit! You get mixed up in some crazy goddam riot, you screw off Christ knows where for days, then you just mooch ’long back and think you can smash into my damn trailer – well, that’s it, you hear? To hell with covering for you, you drunken jack-off, I’ve had my bellyful! There’s a cop wants a word with you, you know that? And we’re going to go call him right now, both of us, got that? But first I’m gonna settle with you for about one hundred things I never should’ve let pass, I owe myself that and I’m gonna enjoy it, you hear, enjoy it! So just kindly shift your ass right out of my bed and –’
The bed creaked loudly, the figure moved, rose, and Jess’s fist clenched tight in a transport of rage. Then it froze in midair, crept up to her mouth and jammed hard against her teeth. Something had plucked at her nerves an instant before he shifted, a faint musty scent that bristled the hair on the back of her neck. Now it grew stronger, a reek like ancient parchment and mouldering fruit and the taste of blood from an abscessed tooth, an essence of corruption that tainted the clean sea air from the door.
The door! Suddenly she couldn’t think of rage or pity, of helping Colby or hammering him or both. Nothing but getting out, out, away –
The huge left hand seemed to move with her thought, and her leap almost carried her straight into its grip. Off balance, she landed on one heel and toppled sideways. The fingers closed on the inner edge of the flapping door and yanked it shut with such force that it bent and wedged into the frame. Jess slumped against the narrow washroom door, staring aghast at that hand. It was visibly coarser, thicker, and the nails on it were long and blackened. The skin was dead white and waxy, with nothing of Colby’s tan, and mottled with patches of sickly colour, yellow and brown and bluish black, that spread like fungus right up the arm. But beneath the skin the muscles were swollen to tautness, rippling and bulging with life, and even the hairs that bristled over it seemed thicker and coarser in their turn, full of fearful vigour.
The shadow seemed to keep on rising, like some monstrous snake uncoiling, until it loomed over her. The caravan’s peaked roof was low: Colby had always had to bow his head. But now his shoulders crashed into the flimsy ceiling, rattling the orange plastic skylight, before he was even standing straight.
Somehow he had become more solid, till he looked like some ancient weathered statue, cast in dark metal and larger than life. His clothes fell in rags about him, his massive arms bare. They hung apelike, fingers twitching restlessly, eagerly. His long blond hair, lustreless now, fell lank over his forehead, but Jess could see the gleam of his eyes. The steady, unblinking gaze of concentration jarred horribly with the eagerness in those twitching fingers. Its calmness was maddening, as if nothing beyond that even gaze was worth an instant’s attention.
She had no more time to think. The hand swept out towards her again, the other rose to meet it, to encircle her when she made a panicky leap for the door. Only she didn’t, but stood her ground and chopped down viciously with a blade-stiff hand. It was like hitting a stone wrapped in leather, cold stone, but the arm jumped, bent back, lost its impetus. Ducking under the other hand, she fumbled at the little door behind her. The washroom had a little window, the only one he wasn’t blocking –
The arms flicked out again, she dropped – then gasped with pain as they closed on her shoulders. But she used the grip as she’d been taught – steadying herself on the attacker’s arm, balancing on one foot and unleashing a terrible kick with the other, aimed right below Colby’s breastbone. The heavy Bean boot connected with a force that should have ruptured Colby’s diaphragm and possibly stopped his heart. All it did was rock him back slightly off balance, unable to tighten his grip.
Jess gave a single desperate twist. She felt the long nails rip through her thick parka and wool shirt and tear into the flesh beneath, claws of edged ice that left fire in their track. Then the parka ripped around her and she was twisting free, leaving it and half the shirt in Colby’s grasp. The air chilled her bared side, but the little door swung free, she ducked desperately through, stumbled over the crude shower fitment, breaking it, and slammed and bolted the door behind her in a ridiculous moment of relief. Ridiculous, because a child could break it down. Then she grabbed for the window catch – and tripped over the broken shower tube, lost her balance and tumbled onto the water-sprinkled floor.
It cost her the split-second she had. Sprawled helpless, she saw the panel above her bulge and splinter – then, with a tearing screech, the whole front of the partition was ripped away. Colby held it poised for a moment, as if uncertain what to do with it, then placed it carefully to one side. It was so like his normal finicky habits that Jess almost shrieked with laughter. She tried to scramble up, but the tube tore free in her fingers and Colby’s long hand was on her. But it lingered an instant before it closed, rough cold fingertips brushing the bare skin of shoulder and breast. It was her mindless animal reaction that jerked the broken tube forward, a sudden upsurge of violent revulsion, but it had all her weight behind it. The jagged rim tore deep into the palm and went slashing up the arm, ploughing up the flesh like soil.
Colby bellowed and wrenched back his arm, almost taking the tube with it. Then he simply stood there an instant, looking at the wound. He looked down at her, and smiled, livid lips revealing teeth set in dark, shrunken gums. ‘You fight well,’ he said suddenly, and his voice was a dry parody, a rasping, dead-leaf rustle. ‘I’m real glad about that.’
‘Why, Jay?’ she managed. ‘Why’re you … glad?’
‘Stands to reason. Go out fightin’, that’s always the best way, anytime. But ’specially for Him.’ There was no mistaking the emphasis in the barren voice. ‘Proves you’re brave – proves you worthy. No matter you’re a woman … Hell, he doesn’t mind. Long as you’re no quitter, no candy-ass. An’ I know you wouldn’t be, Jess, wouldn’t let me down. You’d fight.’
Jess shook her head as if webs entangled it. ‘Jay … Why … what happened to you … why’d you – come back?’
‘Oh hey, Jess, haven’t I always told you?’ The papery voice was soft, cajoling. ‘I love you, honey, I love you. No life nor death’s gonna change that –’
It was almost too much for her. ‘Same old Jay,’ she gasped, half-laughing through clenched teeth. ‘Same old naked ego! Just fuck around anyone you care for, however you like, and it’s all just peachy ’cause deep deep down you really love them – what are you doing to me now?’
The stained lips settled into something like a tolerant smile. ‘Could say I was draftin’ you, baby …’
‘What for?’ she spat. ‘More games with little boys? You want us taking turns at them or somethin’?’
‘Jess! Jess-i-ca!’ Under all the pleading tones lay something else, a dark pool of mockery. ‘You don’t know wha
t you’re sayin’! This’s life I’m offerin’ you! And strength! Limitless, both of them – Age shall not weary them nor custom stale … Tread the road just once, with honour, and then there’s no more dyin’! Never fade, never age – just growin’ stronger – growin’ – and followin’ Him –’
The mocking note was gone, the whisper almost rapt, trancelike. Jess whispered in her turn, ‘F-following who, Jay?’
He swung his head around sharply. ‘The High One. The Ruler of Battles. The Lord of the Slain – oh, He’s got a whole heap of names. Some of them you better be damn careful how you use, too. Some’s for the summonin’, some’s for the sacrifice, some … Well, they don’t mean a thing till the time and place are right. Then they’re runes, real runes of power.’ He chuckled harshly. ‘Me, I didn’t know that. I’d always felt it, though – felt I was born to somethin’, never sure what, never belonging … But drawn to the old tales, the old knowledge, always, but always too far away, trying to make them live again but I was in the wrong time … And then I came here to excavate the temple, and I saw the Dance. Just a shadow, near a skeleton, livin’ on in the shadow lives of shadow men and no true heroes to answer the call. It could’ve come to guys like Hal, who’d only turn it into dry print – but it came to me. Then I knew what I’d been born for, what I was – a hero, a berserker, the last of His servants living who could bring the old rite back. And so I did. And I knew, when we found the ship, that He had heard me – but I didn’t know what else. I didn’t know it brought Him other servants. He sent them, the King and Queen, to accept the sacrifice, cast out the unworthy into darkness and choose the worthy. And I alone fought well – I alone was chosen.’
The Ice King Page 18
