Kell's Legend Read Free

soul.
    “Some of my friends are going to explore the Black Pikes this summer; when they finish their studies, of course.”
    “Fools,” snapped Kell. “The Pikes are more dangerous than anything you could ever imagine.”
    “You’ve been there?”
    “Three times. And three times I believed I was never coming back.” His voice grew quiet, drifting, lost. “I knew I would die, up there. On those dark rocky slopes. It is a miracle I still live, girl!”
    “Was that when you were in the army?” She was fishing for stories, again, and he waved her away.
    “Go on! Get to your friends; go, enjoy your university tour. And make sure you sing for them! Show them your angel’s voice! They will have never heard anything like it.”
    “I will, Grandpa.” Nienna tugged on her coat, and brushed out her long brown hair. “Grandpa?”
    “Yes, monkey?”
    “I…I nearly told mam, about you, this morning. About coming here, I mean. I do so want to tell her…I hate keeping secrets.”
    Kell shook his head, face stern. “If you tell her, girl, she will make doubly sure you never see me again. She hates me. Can you understand that?” Nienna nodded, but Kell could see in her eyes she did not have the life experience to truly comprehend the hatehis daughter carried for him—like a bad egg in her womb. But one day, he thought savagely, one day she’ll learn. We all do.
    “Yes, Grandpa. I’ll try my best.” She opened the door, and a bitter chill swept in on a tide of fresh, tumbling snow. She stepped forward, then paused, and gave a half-turn so he couldn’t quite see her face. “Kell?”
    “Yes, granddaughter?” He blinked, unused to her calling him by name.
    “Thanks for paying my university fees.” She leant back, and kissed his cheek, and was gone in a whirl of coat and scarf leaving him standing blushing at the top of the steps. He shook his head, watching her footprints crunch through a fresh fall towards a gentle mist drifting in off the Selenau River.
    How had she guessed? he thought. He closed the door, which struggled to fit the frame. He thumped it shut with a bear’s fist, and absently slid the heavy bar into place. He moved back to the fireplace, reclaiming his abandoned resin-liquor and taking a heavy slug. Alcohol eased into his veins like an old friend, and wrapped his brain in honey. Kell took a deep breath, moving back to the wide window and sitting on a low bench to watch the bartering traders across a field of flapping stalls. The mist was creeping into the market now, swirling around boots and timber stanchions. Kell gazed at the mountains, the Black Pike Mountains, his eyes distant, remembering the hunt there; as he did, many times in a day.
    “Join the army—ha!” he muttered, scowling, and refilled his mug from a clay jug.
    Kell awoke, senses tingling, mouth sour, head fuzzy, and wondered not just what had awoken him, but how in Hell’s Teeth he’d fallen asleep? “Damn the grog,” he muttered, cursing himself for his weakness and age, and swearing he’d stop the liquor; though knowing, deep in his heart, it was a vow he’d never uphold.
    Kell sat up from the window-bench, rubbing his eyes and yawning. He glanced right, but all he saw through the long, low window was mist, thick and white, swirling and coalescing through the streets. He could determine a few muffled stone walls, some snow-slick cobbles, but that was all. A terrible white had expanded to fill the world.
    Kell moved to his water barrel and gulped three full flagons, with streams running through his grey beard and staining his cotton shirt. He rubbed his eyes again, head spinning, and turned to watch the mist creeping under his door. Odd, he thought. He glanced up to Ilanna, his axe, hanging over the fireplace. She gleamed, dull black reflecting firelight. Kell turned again, and with a crack the window, nearly the width of the entire room, sheared with a metallic crackling as if it had been placed under great pressure.