The Fall of Highwatch

by Mark Sehestedt

  She stepped as close to him as she could without actually touching and whispered, “If this place is so dangerous and your queen wishes to see me, why has she not provided an escort?” Her words came out in a plume of frost that coated Menduarthis’s shoulder.

  He smiled, but taut anger lay behind it. “What do you think I am?”

  She opened her mouth to reply, but he placed his hand over her mouth and shushed her. His skin was shockingly cool—far colder than any man’s ought to be. She wondered how he could stand being outside without gloves.

  They continued on. The tree thing across the canyon followed them for a while, keeping pace and watching them from the opposite side. But the rift grew no narrower, and the thing made no effort to cross. Finally it gave up but stood there watching them as they continued. When they were almost out of sight, the thing threw back its head and let out a long, mournful sound that seemed part howl and part trumpet. It sent a chill down Hweilan’s spine—and when other calls answered, in the distance, her chill grew into a full-fledged shudder. The sounds stopped them all in their tracks.

  “How many of those things are out there?” she said.

  Menduarthis turned and said, “We might just find out if you don’t keep quiet. If I have to tell you again, I’m going to have Nikle gag you.”

  They walked on, always downslope, and at a much faster pace.

  The rift widened the farther they went. The slope on which they trod grew steeper, the trees sparser, and more rocks began to peek through the snow. But Menduarthis seemed to know his way, and Hweilan followed his footsteps almost exactly.

  Walking near the cliff’s edge, Hweilan looked down and was surprised to see something: the bottom of the canyon. Its flatness made her suspect it was a river or lake where the water flowed right up to the cliff’s edge, for there were no trees or brush of any sort. Just a flawless sheet of snow, blue and sparkling in the faint light.

  “What—“

  “Best not to talk just yet,’ Menduarthis interrupted, and he motioned to the path in front of them. “The walls have ears.”

  Looking where Menduarthis had pointed, Hweilan saw that the woods were coming to an end, and they were nearing a wall.

  As their little company passed out of the shelter of the wood, they walked into snowfall. Large heavy flakes that seemed to whisper as they fell. They came to the wall, and Hweilan saw that it was not a wall at all, but a huge hedge, comprising many thousands of dark-green-leafed branches, each armored in an array of thorns. No frost of ice covered it, and there was movement within the branches. Furtive shapes that must have been very small to work their way through the tangle. Hweilan saw tiny pairs of eyes glowing from the shadows, but if they caught her watching, one blink and they were gone.

  “Menduarthis,” Hweilan whispered, “what is in the hedge?”

  “Locals. Don’t worry. They know you’re with me.”

  “That last local didn’t seem to like you much,” she said, thinking of the tree things.

  He shrugged. “Most of the locals don’t. But they know I’m here at the queen’s behest. No one will interfere with that. Now be quiet.”

  Hweilan scowled, but the place seemed to call for quiet, almost as if the sound of snowfall was a constant shush. She turned to look at the uldra. The little hunters, all of whom seemed perfectly at ease around tundra tigers, were as wary as she’d ever seen them. They kept looking around, their eyes wide and movements skittish as birds.

  She saw no more eyes in the depths of the hedge, but she did notice that even the snowflakes would not settle upon it. Most flew away at the last instant, as if stirred by a puff of air. But a few did manage to hit an outstretched branch or leaf, whereupon the flake sizzled away into a tiny mist that fell to the ground.

  Menduarthis walked a few paces left, then back to the right, leaning in close and passing one hand over the hedge. The leaves and branches rasped and rattled as his hand passed over them.

  “What are you looking for?” she asked.

  He stopped and stood ramrod straight, heels together, head back, arms outstretched slightly. Almost exactly the same pose he’d taken that night on the mountain before—

  Hweilan gasped and stepped back. She could feel the power building.

  Menduarthis leaned his head back, his eyes closed, but his nostrils flaring as he took in deep draughts of air.

  The ground shook. Just a trembling at first, like the feeling in the air during thunder. But then everything underfoot shuddered with such force that Hweilan fell forward into the snow. She looked up.

  Before Menduarthis, a shard of ice came up from the ground, splitting the hedge like shears through cloth. The shard was knife thin at first, but as it rose it thickened. By the time it stopped some ten feet or more above them, its base was wider than she was tall.

  Still holding his pose, Menduarthis flicked his fingers forward, and the ice shard split with a crack! that sent a gout of frigid air and frost spewing over him. He brought his palms together with a flourish, then waved them apart. The split shard molded outward into an arch, then melted away into a heavy frost, much like the snowflakes had on the leaves. When it was gone, all that remained was a tunnel through the hedge, blue-silver mist falling down the sides and swirling along the bottom.

  Hweilan pushed herself to her feet and brushed herself off. “What are you?” she said.

  Menduarthis dropped his pose and turned to her. The frost that had coated him melted before her eyes, falling away in that same strange mist that the snowflakes had. He looked down on her with the strangest expression. Curiosity? Bewilderment? A little of both, and something else. Something that bordered on affection. That made her more uncomfortable than all the rest.

  “You behave yourself, you survive your meeting with the queen, and I’ll tell you all about me.”

  “Survive?”

  “Too late to worry about that now,” he said. He turned and walked into the tunnel. “Come along!”

  Hweilan followed. Looking over her shoulder, she saw that the uldra did not. Nikle motioned at her—it seemed more of a benediction than a wave—then he and his companions turned and fled.

  CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

  WHEN THEY EMERGED FROM THE TUNNEL, HWEILAN and Menduarthis were in a field that sloped gently downward, filled with trees that she could not name. Their branches sprouted not needles but thick and vibrant leaves—some larger than her hand. Whether it was their true color or simply a trick of the dim light, the leaves had a bluish tint, the color of evening clouds, thick with snow. Among them were waist-high bushes, their small, waxy leaves dark green and sprouting tiny flowers that seemed black against the falling snow that would soon hide them. The brush had a tangled look, but paths wound between them. The only sound was the falling of the snow and their own footsteps.

  Many side trails branched off their path. Hweilan stopped counting them after thirty. Theirs were the only prints in the snow. Occasionally their path took them beneath the boughs of the strange trees, and the ground was more frost than snow. Still, the ground sloped ever downward, as if the garden were set on a shallow hill.

  The woods ended on the lip of a steep bank. The snow was falling too fast and thick for her to see more than thirty or forty feet, but beyond the bank was a flat field of white. A lake or river, then.

  Menduarthis stopped in the shadow of the last tree. Hweilan stopped beside him and was about to ask why when she sensed it. Nothing tangible that touched her five senses. This tickled an older, more primal sense in the very core of her mind. Something was different here. The sense of the entire land being not only alive but aware. That awareness seemed focused, like the summer sunlight through the window glass of her grandmother’s shrine.

  Menduarthis didn’t turn but looked at her sidelong. “Are you ready?”

  “I’ve never met a queen before,” said Hweilan, and she realized that her heart was beating twice as fast.

  “It wouldn’t help you if you had. There are no queens
like Kunin Qatar.”

  “Is that good or bad?”

  “She is what she is,” said Menduarthis. “If you’re the praying sort, now is the time.”

  He stepped forward and slid sidelong down the bank.

  Hweilan did the same, though as she hit the soft snow at the bottom, she wondered why. The part of Hweilan that loved the wild seemed to have gone numb out of sheer bewilderment. But the very small part of her that was still the pampered castle girl was wide-eyed awake, and she was screaming at Hweilan to run.

  She followed Menduarthis over the snow-covered ice, and the storm swallowed them. The trees behind them became indistinct, soft blue shadows watching over them from above. The last look over her shoulder showed them as little more than fading shapes in the snowfall. Then they were gone.

  But there were other shadows.

  Hweilan saw them out of the corners of her eyes—shapes watching them from the storm. But when she turned to face them, she saw only snow, heard only a whisper of footfalls that might have been the snow settling all around them. She couldn’t smell anything over the halbdol paint on her face.

  A terrible power emanated from some place in front of her, like an invisible sun. It touched the very marrow of her bones, but not with warmth. This sun burned cold.

  Still she followed Menduarthis.

  Thinking on it, it came down to simple choices. Her family was dead. Murdered. Her friends too. Even people she hadn’t much liked. Slaughtered. And what she would have given to see them now. Lendri … Dead? Alive? Did it matter? He wasn’t here. It all boiled down to one simple fact:

  “I have nowhere else to go.”

  “Ah, now that’s not true, little flower,” said Menduarthis, and it wasn’t until he did that she realized she’d spoken her thoughts aloud. “We always have a choice.”

  Another shadow loomed to her left. She turned with a gasp, but it was gone.

  “Don’t mind them,’ said Menduarthis. He stopped for a moment, until she was beside him, then he put an arm around her shoulder and led her on. “Hmm. Choices, choices. Everyone has choices.” He chewed on his lip, made a clicking sound in his cheek, then said, “Not always good ones, though. Damned on left or right. Story of my life.”

  “Are you saying I can choose to turn around? “said Hweilan. “Go back? Not face your queen?”

  Menduarthis chuckled, though there was no humor in it. “Afraid not.”

  “You said—”

  “I said there are always choices. I didn’t say there are always good ones. And that one, I’m afraid, is beyond you. You’ve been summoned. You will answer to Kunin Gatar.”

  “So I have no choice, then?”

  His voice dropped to a whisper. “Oh, but you do. You can go in there all weak-kneed and scared. Maybe even blubber a little. Fall on your knees and beg mercy. You won’t get it. Kunin Gatar’s heart is as cold as her … well, let’s just say I don’t recommend that choice. Or you can go in there and face her. Tell the truth. Don’t lie, I warn you. She’ll know if you do.’ He looked away, and she detected a slight trace of his mocking manner returning, though there was a sadness to it now. “I speak from experience.”

  “You’re saying I should—”

  “Don’t misunderstand me,” he said. “I’d say there’s a decent chance you’re about to die. But I’ve been wrong before. I would have bet my left eye Lendri would be dead by now, and I would have lost that bet. Though I can’t say he’s any better off. But you can do one thing. Face your fate standing up. Look her in the eye. Tell her the truth. If you die … well, at least do it without shame. No one likes a coward.”

  A great shadow loomed out of the storm before them. At first, Hweilan thought it was simply an errant breeze swirling the snow. But with each step, the shadow loomed larger and grew more distinct. It took up the entire sky before them.

  At first she thought it was the most magnificent sculpture she’d ever seen—taller than the outer wall of Highwatch by far, but elegant beyond anything she’d ever imagined. All curves and eddies, like …

  A waterfall. The largest she’d ever seen. A river falling off a precipice that had to be at least a thousand feet high. But the entire waterfall was frozen. Not slowly, like the usual winter grip of the Giantspires. This great cataract had been locked in ice in an instant of glory, thundering fall and tumbling waves and spray. The fall seemed a great multifaceted curtain, shaped in every shade of blue, white, and purple. The waves at the bottom large as houses, no two alike, all curves and swirls that melted into one another before freezing forever. All beautiful beyond description. But the frozen spray … it reached out at jagged angles, like thorns or curving blades. Sharp as razors.

  “The palace of Kunin Gatar,” said Menduarthis. “Ellestharn. Snowthorn.”

  Hweilan suddenly felt very small. She’d always taken great pride in Highwatch, even though in her heart of hearts she’d never really loved the place. Carved onto the mountain’s face, crafted from the bones of the earth, it rose above the steppe, the tallest dwelling for hundreds of miles. A great house of stone in a land where most people lived in hide tents. Shaped by the hands of master stoneworkers, it demanded awe. But this …

  The crude buildings of men, dwarves, their mightiest works … they seemed ugly, crude, the scratchings of petulant children in comparison to this. Ellestharn was a work of magnificent, terrible beauty.

  “How could … this”—she gestured at the frozen palace—” be?”

  “Kunin Gatar,” said Menduarthis. “The Queen.”

  Hweilan heard the raven before she saw it—a harsh caw! caw! that broke through the reverent silence of the storm. She turned and saw the bird circling them.

  Menduarthis kept walking, ignoring the bird. Hweilan followed, though she kept a wary eye on the newcomer. It faded in and out of the storm behind them.

  They stopped just in front of the nearest walls of the ice palace—a great wave of ice shards that curved over them, almost like a reaching hand.

  The raven alighted on the nearest column of ice. It regarded them with one eye, then flapped its wings furiously. Feathers flew about it, mingling with the snow, and the bird’s form blurred, seeming to suffuse like a droplet of blood in clear water. Its black feathers became smokelike, spreading then swirling amid the snow. The swirls coalesced and reformed into a more human shape.

  At first Hweilan thought it was some sort of twisted elf child—small, thin, all loose angles connecting lanky limbs. Black eyes set in gray skin beneath an unruly shock of black hair that still had the look of feathers. His entire body, crouched on the ice, seemed to be letting off a faint black steam, but it fell around him rather than rising.

  “Govuled, Menduarthis,” he said, and Hweilan was shocked at the deep voice that emanated from such a small frame.

  “Well met, Roakh,” said Menduarthis. “You should speak so that our guest might understand.”

  Roakh cocked his head sideways and looked at Hweilan. A shiver went down her spine, and she felt suddenly very helpless. One of her Uncle Soran’s knights had once told her stories of great battles, how the corpses might lie for days under a sun broken by clouds of ravens. The dead were lucky. Those who were too wounded to move had to wait for one of the healers to find them—if there were any combing the battlefield, and many times, there weren’t. That, or the youngest squires whose job it was to wander the battlefield with a knife and slit the throat of any living too far gone to heal.

  Those who were found by neither waited for the ravens. As little Hweilan, no more than six or seven at the time, had listened, she had imagined lying there helpless, surrounding by corpses and buzzing flies, having only the strength to breathe and close her mouth to keep out the flies. A rustle of feathers, and she’d look up to see the pitiless black eye of a raven and the long beak the instant before it jabbed right into her eye.

  The raven, hopping among the corpses, looking for a tasty morsel … that was the look that this Roakh gave her now.

&nb
sp; “And what is our guest’s name?” he said.

  Hweilan stood there staring.

  “No one likes a coward,” Menduarthis whispered.

  “Hweilan,” she said. “Of Highwatch.”

  “Highwatch,” said Roakh. He closed his eyes, leaned his head back, and smiled. “Stone houses in the mountains. Damarans so far from home. Nar at their feet. Dwarves dig-dig-digging deeper at Damarans’ demands. Ahh … Hweilan. Hweilan is not a Damaran name.”

  Hweilan returned his stare. He hadn’t asked a question, and something about his manner was stirring Hweilan’s anger.

  “Haven’t brought us another liar, have you, Menduarthis?” said Roakh.

  Menduarthis gave the silence no chance to become uncomfortable. He looked down at Hweilan and said, “A nswer him.”

  Hweilan kept her gaze fixed on Roakh. “He didn’t ask me anything.”

  Roakh threw back his head and laughed—a raucous guffaw in which Hweilan heard the sound of a corpse-hungry raven. “Oh, I like this one! I can’t quite decide which way my hopes should go.”

  Hweilan gave him a quizzical look.

  “It is my honor to take you to our queen,” Roakh said. “If you please her, it will be my job to take you back out again. If not … well, Kunin Gatar is a most kind and benevolent ruler, and she usually allows me to eat unpleasant guests.” He smiled, and Hweilan saw that his tiny teeth were very sharp. “After she’s done with them, that is. But alas. I’ve just eaten, and I’m not at all hungry. So you see, I’m not quite sure whether I should be hoping you live or die.”

  “That’s enough, Roakh,” send Menduarthis.

  Roakh slipped off the shard of ice and stepped toward them. He had a hunched way of walking, his arms and head both thrust forward, but even standing up straight he would have had to look up at Hweilan’s shoulder.

  “True enough,” he said. “If things don’t go my way today, there’s always tomorrow. Let’s test fortune’s favor, shall we?”

  He held one hand toward the wall, and Hweilan saw a yawning passageway through the ice. It hadn’t been there a moment ago. It was higher than the main gates of Highwatch, and wide enough for four horsemen to have ridden in side by side. A few steps led upward—either ice or a pale marble, she couldn’t be sure. But beyond that, the light failed.