Battlesong--Book Three of the Icebreaker Trilogy Read online

  Petrel, Fin, Rain and Sharkey had immediately set out after Brother Poosk and his men, leaving behind them a ship abustle with preparations for an attack on the Citadel.

  But the farther they’d come, the quieter Fin had grown. And so, as they set off along the lane to meet up with Rain and Sharkey, Petrel said, “What’s the matter, Fin?”

  “Nothing.”

  Petrel snorted. “Course it’s not nothing! You might as well tell me.”

  Fin looked away. “I have been … wondering.”

  “Wondering what?”

  “Nothing important.”

  “Sometimes,” said Petrel, “you’re as hard to get answers out of as an albatross. Wondering what?”

  “About Mama. What if—” Fin stopped. Ahead of them, a small bird with a crimson chest dived into the hedge.

  “Keep going or I’ll pinch you.”

  The boy half smiled, then grew serious again. “I was only three when she gave me away, too young to remember her name or where she came from. What if she does not want me?”

  “Not want you?” cried Petrel. “Of course she’ll want you. She’s your mam!”

  “But she gave me to the Devouts.”

  “That was to save your life, and you know it. All those villages we’ve been through, with all those little graves, and the bratlings that do survive are bandy-legged from hunger—that’s what your mam was thinking of when she gave you away. Don’t you dare doubt her!”

  That seemed to cheer Fin up, though Petrel suspected it wouldn’t last. And she could hardly blame him. Because if they kept to their current pace, they’d soon catch up with Brother Poosk and his men.

  And there was an important question to which Petrel hadn’t yet found an answer.

  What the blizzards do we do then?

  * * *

  Spindle tore along the muddy road with the cart swaying and rattling so violently behind him that Gwin had to cling to her seat to keep from being thrown off. Beside her the village woman was trembling with shock, and Gwin wasn’t much better.

  They’ll be after us, she thought. We won’t be safe till we’re off the road.

  She scanned the hedgerows, trying to work out how many bends they’d passed and how far behind them the Devouts might be. And all the while her memory replayed Mama’s terrible fall, over and over.

  Beside her, Papa’s face was white and set, and although he said nothing, Gwin knew that he was thinking about Mama too and reliving the events of two months ago.

  We have to get off the road!

  Except they couldn’t, not with a stranger in the cart. If Papa had been in his right mind he would have set the village woman down already, to hide in the hedgerow until the Devouts were gone.

  Now Gwin must do it, before it was too late.

  “Lady—” she began.

  “Hilde. My name’s Hilde.” The woman raised her voice over the rattling of the cart, and words poured out of her. “That was Piddock who tried to hold me. Piddock, of all people! I cared for his wife when she was dying, and he said at the time he’d be grateful for ever after. Well ‘ever after’ didn’t last long, did it? He would’ve handed me over to the Masters just because I warned you. Nasty sod he is.”

  Gwin glanced over her shoulder at Nat, who would’ve helped her once. But not anymore.

  She turned back to the woman. “Hilde, you’ll have to—”

  “You want to be rid of me, I suppose, and I don’t blame you. But I daren’t go home. Piddock’ll turn me in, I know he will. If he doesn’t do it today, he’ll do it tomorrow or next week, and then the Masters’ll hang me. Can’t I go with you, just for a little while?”

  “No!” said Gwin, horrified at the thought. No one traveled with Fetchers except other Fetchers.

  But before she could say so, Spindle galloped around the next bend, and the road turned from mud to stone. The wheels rumbled over the hard surface like a warning.

  Dismayed, Gwin realized she’d miscalculated. This is the last bend. If we set her down now, she’ll see where we go!

  There was no time to turn back, not with the Devouts on their heels. Gwin could think of only one way of averting disaster. She ripped the rabbit-fur band from her right arm and held it out to Hilde. “Tie that across your eyes. Quick! And don’t take it off until I say so.”

  Hilde stared uncertainly at the strip of fur.

  “Do you want to come with us or not?” demanded Gwin.

  Hilde nodded and tied the band over her eyes. Mere seconds later, Papa cried, “Brooms!”

  Without a word, Nat reached under his seat and brought out four bundles of heather, each fastened to a stout pole. He strapped them to the back of the cart, and they rat-tat-tated along the road, brushing away the marks of hoof and wheel.

  Gwin watched the hedgerow. “Papa, there!”

  Her father flicked the whip in the pattern that meant “stop.” As the old ox wheezed to a halt, Gwin leapt from the cart, ran up the bank on the right-hand side of the road and began to unweave the branches of the graythorn hedge.

  Hilde sat very still. “What’s happening? Where are we going?”

  No one answered her. Fetchers didn’t share their secrets with anyone, and besides, they had to get off the road and out of sight before the Devouts came chasing around that last bend.

  Papa clicked his tongue, and Spindle began to turn. The bank was steep, so Gwin got behind the cart and pushed, and Papa climbed down and put his shoulder next to hers. The cart rolled up the bank and through the gap in the hedgerow, with Hilde crouched on the narrow seat like a flustered bird.

  While Gwin wove the branches back together, and Papa swept away the last of the wheel marks, Nat felt his way into the driver’s seat and flicked the whip over Spindle’s head.

  “Wait for us at the quarry,” said Papa.

  Nat drove off. Gwin checked to make sure that road and bank were completely clear of giveaway marks, then she and Papa scrambled through the hedge, fastened the last few branches back into place and raced after the cart, which had stopped in a disused quarry a few hundred yards off the road.

  And there they sat in breathless silence, hoping they had covered their tracks as well as they thought they had.

  CHAPTER 3

  ARIEL’S WAY

  Gwin couldn’t hear a thing, which made the waiting extra hard. In her imagination, the Devouts spotted something she’d missed—a clumsily woven branch, half a footprint. She pictured them crashing through the graythorn hedge and running toward the quarry. Her fingernails dug into the palms of her hands—

  “They’re gone,” muttered Nat.

  Papa heaved a sigh of relief, and the energy that had carried him away from Swettle seemed to seep out of him.

  With an effort, Gwin loosened her fists. She made sure that Hilde’s blindfold was secure and that they hadn’t dropped anything in the quarry. Then, very slowly, they set off again.

  But this time they took Ariel’s Way.

  Three hundred years ago, the very first Fetcher established a network of secret pathways across West Norn. These narrow tracks—wide enough for an oxcart, with not an inch to spare—teetered along cliff faces and over rocky moors; they crawled under waterfalls, into limestone caves and out the other end; they crossed bogs that could have swallowed a hundred pursuers, where the only solid path was marked with a few specks of white clay.

  Gwin and her family knew every one of those tracks. They knew the difference between the slightly dangerous spots and the hair-raising ones; they knew where a sure-footed ox like Spindle could trot and where he must inch along while the Fetchers crept behind him, holding their breath for fear of tumbling to their deaths.

  When Gwin was very small, there had been other Fetcher families traveling the secret ways, with their carts and oxen and beaded hair. Occasionally they’d all meet up for a night of songs and stories, far from villages and Devouts. But that hadn’t happened for a long time. West Norn was a dangerous place for Fetchers, and not many of them
reached middle age.

  By the time night fell, however, they were far enough from Swettle to feel more or less safe. “Whoa, Spindle,” said Gwin.

  The old ox snorted and stopped. Wretched trotted over to the nearest tree and cocked his leg.

  “Where are we?” asked Hilde.

  Once it would have been Nat who answered her. He would’ve said something like, “No idea. Unless that water I can hear in the distance is Grump Gurgle. And the way the wind is whistling—sounds like we’re near those old iron trees on the moor. In which case we’re ten and a half miles east of Upper Meech.”

  Then Papa would have thrown back his head and guffawed, and Mama would’ve …

  “We’re east of Upper Meech,” Gwin said quietly.

  “But that’s the Forbidden Lands,” whispered Hilde. She turned her face from side to side, as if trying to see through the blindfold. “You’ve brought us to the haunted lands.”

  Because, of course, that was the other place Ariel’s Way took them—through the old abandoned cities, where huge rusty structures loomed out of the ground like giant trees and where ancient buildings rotted in silence.

  If you were going to believe in haunts, this was the place to find them. And because no one else ever dared go there, it was also the place to find wild mangels, thistles, cankerwort roots, rabbits and squabs. If things were working the way they were supposed to, the Fetchers would have stopped there for several days, replenishing their supplies.

  But for all Gwin’s efforts, nothing was the way it was supposed to be. What’s more, they had a blindfolded stranger with them, and the sooner they got rid of her, the better. And so at daybreak they set off again.

  Their journey was slow. Hilde sat on the front seat, occasionally licking her dry lips or fumbling for the water pot. Nat walked on one side of Spindle with his face closed against the world and everyone in it, and Gwin cast back and forth on the other, pulling up wild mangels and tossing them into the cart. Wretched disappeared for a bit and came back with a dead rabbit.

  Papa sagged along behind them, looking as if his thoughts were miles away. Midafternoon, he climbed into the back of the cart, wrapped himself in a couple of old sacks and fell asleep next to the rabbit. It wasn’t long before Nat followed him. Neither of them had said anything to Gwin about her miscalculation or commented on the fact that she had brought a stranger onto Ariel’s Way.

  Gwin sighed.

  Hilde turned toward the sound and said, “You’re still there, Fetcher girl?”

  “Yes.”

  “You’re not afraid of haunts?”

  “No.”

  “Don’t suppose you can be, traveling all over the way you do. I’ve heard there are haunts everywhere in West Norn, not just here. Too many dead, that’s the trouble.”

  Gwin scratched Spindle’s neck with the handle of the whip. She wanted Mama back so badly that she could hardly breathe. She wanted Nat and Papa back too, instead of spinning away from her into their own little worlds of anger and sadness. She wanted—

  “You still there?” called Hilde.

  “Yes,” said Gwin. And she smiled a wide Fetcher smile, even though the woman couldn’t see her.

  Evening found them in the bottom of a shallow ravine, with Wretched leading the way, and just enough of a moon for Gwin to see where they were going.

  Sometimes, on nights like this, she felt as if she could walk right back into the distant past. She’d turn a corner, and there would be Ariel striding toward her, tall and beautiful. She’d take Gwin’s hand, and something in her touch would transform Gwin, would make her strong enough and clever enough to hold what was left of her family together—

  “When can I take this off?” asked Hilde, rubbing at the rabbit fur.

  “What? Oh, soon,” said Gwin.

  “How soon?”

  Gwin was in no mood for talking. “We’ll be back on the common road in another quarter mile or so. We’ll leave you at the bottom of the lane that goes to Lumming.”

  “Lumming?” Hilde looked startled. “That’s no good. I don’t know anyone in Lumming.”

  “Well, you have to go somewhere. You said you just wanted to come with us for a little way—”

  “Not that little! I thought you might be heading for the coast; I’ve got cousins there. But I’ve got no one in Lumming, and I can’t just walk into a village full of strangers and expect them to take me in. Can’t I stay with you? I could make myself useful if I had this blindfold off. I can cook, and I know the best cure for eye blight, and how to get rid of fleas and bed bugs—”

  “No!” said Gwin. “And be quiet—here’s where we join the road.”

  There was no hedgerow here, just a narrow path that didn’t look like a path. As Spindle jolted down one final slope onto the Northern Road, Gwin walked behind the cart, sweeping away their tracks. Then she swung herself into the driver’s seat next to Hilde, and Wretched leapt up beside her, smelly and comforting. Behind them, in the body of the cart, Papa and Nat snored in unison.

  There were four miles of the Northern Road before the lane that led to Lumming, and another two miles after that before the secret ways started up again. Gwin said, “You can take that blindfold off now. And tell me if you hear anyone coming.” Then she bent over the dog and whispered, “You too, Wretched. Keep your ears pricked.”

  Hilde untied the rabbit-fur band and blinked at the moonlight. “No offense to your brother, but I wouldn’t like to be blind, not one bit. I like to see where I’m going, don’t you?”

  Gwin nibbled the worn leather of the whip handle. She was always nervous when they had to take one of the common roads. The Devouts had a nasty habit of turning up where they weren’t expected.

  Maybe I should have stayed on Ariel’s Way till moonset—

  But that would’ve meant they had no light at all, which was a danger in itself. And besides, it was too late to go back. They were already descending into one of the hollow ways, where centuries of feet, wheels and weather had beaten the road down so deep and narrow between its banks that it’d take ten minutes of maneuvring to turn the cart around, and in that time they’d be completely helpless.

  Gwin flicked the whip over Spindle’s head. “Gee-up, beastie,” she whispered, and the ox broke into a slow, rocking trot.

  The cart swayed from side to side, but neither Papa nor Nat woke. Fetchers caught sleep wherever they could, and a noisy, swaying cart was as good a bed as any. The high banks on either side slid past. The moon flickered from light to dark and back again.

  They were only a couple of miles from the Lumming turnoff when Wretched suddenly pricked up his ears, stared back the way they’d come and whimpered.

  Gwin’s heart skipped a beat. She couldn’t hear a thing over the rattling of the cart, but the dog’s ears were even sharper than Nat’s. “There’s someone behind us,” she said.

  She forgot all about letting Hilde off. “Gee-up, Spindle!”

  They were coming up out of the hollow way now, into clear moonlight, and ahead of them was the turnoff to the mountains. No one ever took that rough track if they could help it, not even Fetchers. No one lived in the mountains except a few wild men, but stories drifted out all the same—stories of cannibalism and cruelty and of strangers who got lost and were never seen again.

  Hilde peered over her shoulder. “What if it’s the Masters coming after us?”

  Gwin gritted her teeth. “Gee-up, Spindle!”

  But instead of going faster, the ox began to slow down.

  “What’s the matter?” hissed Gwin. “Gee-up—”

  “There’s something on his head,” cried Hilde. “Look!”

  It was the rat with the silver eyes. It had appeared out of nowhere, just like last time, and was perched between Spindle’s ears.

  Gwin grabbed one of the mangels from the bottom of the cart and threw it. “Go away, stupid rat.”

  The rat ducked, and the mangel flew past it. Wretched whimpered again and tried to crawl under Gwi
n’s arm. Spindle slowed a little more.

  “I think I can hear hoofbeats,” said Hilde, her face ashen. “Behind us. It must be the Masters!”

  “They didn’t have horses.”

  “They had a mule—I’m sure I can hear them. Listen!”

  An owl swooped across their path, and Gwin flinched so violently that she nearly fell off the cart. They were right on top of the mountain turnoff now, and instead of continuing straight ahead, Spindle began to veer left.

  “No! What are you doing?” Gwin leapt down and ran alongside the old ox, dragging on his halter with all her strength. The rat skipped out of reach. Spindle kept going.

  “Spindle, no!” cried Gwin, but it made no difference.

  Papa sat up, rubbing his eyes. “What is it? Why are you shouting?”

  Gwin, still clinging to Spindle’s harness, gasped, “Hilde thinks someone’s after us, Papa, and—and Spindle wants to take the mountain track!”

  “Stop him!”

  “He won’t listen to me. I think it’s the rat.”

  “What rat?”

  Gwin pointed, but by then Spindle had set his hooves firmly on the mountain track and was beginning to pick up speed again.

  Just in time, Gwin let go of the halter and scrambled back onto her seat. The rat resumed its position between Spindle’s ears. Papa, Gwin and Hilde stared at each other in helpless disbelief.

  Whether they liked it or not, they were on their way to the mountains.

  CHAPTER 4

  LISTEN AND OBEY!

  As the new day dawned, Petrel, Fin, Sharkey and Rain found themselves on the outskirts of a village called Bale, a mile or so off the Northern Road. It was a grimy sort of morning, with clouds scudding low across the sky and not much sign of the sun.

  The four bratlings tucked themselves behind some trees, along with their sacks of food and the waterproof lantern, and Fin reluctantly donned the Initiate’s robe. But just as he was about to leave them, Rain whispered, “Wait! Look!”

  They crowded around her, staring between the tree trunks. A big, rough-looking man in the dark brown robes of a Devout was tiptoeing past one of Bale’s chicken coops.