A Sword From Red Ice Read Free Page A

Sevrance had sworn his oath to
his clan; and here and now in the guidehouse at the hangman's hour
before dawn.
    The guide's swollen fingers sifted for a flint and
striker along the workbench. Ice growing in the heart of the
Hailstone made the guide-house colder by the day. Fires could not
warm it, and the dour and god-fearing masons of Blackhail had insured
sunlight never entered this place. As Inigar knelt before the firepit
and struck a light, he found himself wishing for a single window in
the south wall so that he could throw back its shutters and let in
the glow of the moon. The great bodies that circled the earth had
powers to combat darkness that no man-struck flame could match.
    Still. He felt some easing in his chest when the
kindling finally took and the red glow of a smokepile seeded with
iron filings lit the room. Yet even as he took his first deep breath
since waking he became aware of the presence of the guidestone.
    The great turning-wheel of its awareness, the
sense of seeing and knowing, was gone. What was left was something
forceless, an ember flickering after a fire. A year ago Inigar could
not lay a hand upon the monolith without feeling a jolt of life. Now
the stone would rip off his skin if he touched it without the
protection of padded gloves. Ice had spread through the guidestone
like cancer; cumulating crystal upon crystal, sparkling, sharp and
irreversibly cold, gnawing away at the rock. Two weeks ago the
guidestone might have sent out a flare, a feeble attempt at
communion, a weak assertion of power. Touch it tonight and Inigar
knew what he would feel: something dying beneath the surface.
    Reaching for the bellows, Inigar returned his
attention to the fire. The first thing he had been taught as an
apprentice was how to tend a smokefire. The old clan guide Beardy
Hail had been uncle to Dagro Blackhail, the chief. Beardy never
explained things more than once and never gave praise for a job well
done. Every morning when he took possession of the guidehouse he
would inspect the smokefire for flames. A flame of any sort was not
permitted. The smokepile had to smolder, not burn. Inigar had spent
most of those early days attending the fire; chopping green wood,
breaking coal, filing iron. Too much fuel and flames would ignite,
too little and the fire would die. For years Inigar had wondered why
it mattered—smoke resulted either way—yet one day, when
Beardy was laid up with the gout and unable to check the smokepile,
Inigar had come to an understanding.
    Any fool could build a fire; stack logs, lay
kindling, strike a flint and blow. Once lit, the fire would burn hot
and die out in its own time. But a smoke fire was never done. You
could not walk away and leave it unattended. A smokefire had to be
fueled and doused, stacked and banked, raked and poked and pumped.
Most of all it must be watched.
    It was, Inigar decided, the most important lesson
Beardy had ever taught him. A clan guide must be vigilant. He could
not afford to turn his back and let his clan burn or die. A smolder
must be maintained. And the watch never cease.
    Inigar's dry old lips cracked a smile. Beardy had
been, without a doubt, the most foul-smelling clansman in Blackhail.
He kept pigs for a reason Inigar had never fathomed and took a bath
only once a year. The smile turned into a wheezing cough, and Inigar
slapped a palm against the floor to steady himself. Fifty years of
inhaling smoke did that to a man, addled the lungs. As he crouched by
the glowing smokepile and waited for the hacking to stop, an impulse
he didn't understand made him reach for more wood.
    Tonight he wanted light, not smoke.
    Aahooooooooo.
    The skin on Inigar's hands tightened so quickly
with gooseflesh his fingers jumped. A wolf howl, close and to the
north. Yet the wolves had long since abandoned the territory around
the Hailhouse and its man-smelling forests and fields. What did it
mean?
    Inigar held his swollen hands over the flames,
glad to feel the