My legs burned. I realized, suddenly, that Tem and I were climbing. The dragons’ lights were off to the left, now, and we were moving up a steep incline. How had that happened?
“Wait,” I cried, confused. I pulled Tem to a stop, but as I did, I felt his footing slip.
“Tem!” I shouted, grabbing at his arm. But I couldn’t find my footing on the icy rock. Tem’s weight propelled me after him, into the void.
I fell face-first into a mound of snow, and surfaced coughing but unhurt. We had fallen into the lee side of an enormous granite slab, which had been half-submerged in snow. We must have been climbing up the snow-covered side without even realizing it.
I helped Tem to his feet. “All right?”
He nodded, coughing. He fumbled around in the snow, finally unearthing the kinnika.
“River!” I shouted. The wind took my voice and tossed it away. I squinted into the darkness. The dragons’ lights were gone.
I pushed my hood back, feeling for the direction of the wind. But it was constantly shifting, and I couldn’t be certain which direction we were facing now. Or in which direction the others had gone.
“River!” I shouted again. “Norbu! Dargye!”
There was no response save for the howl of the storm.
How had I not noticed we were climbing up the side of a boulder? How had the others advanced so far ahead of us? I shook my head as if to clear it. The storm was fierce, disorienting. But there was more going on than that, I was certain of it.
“This is just how it happened before,” I murmured.
One by one, we had been separated from each other. One by one, the others had faded into the storm, until only my mother and Lusha were left.
Oh, Spirits.
“We should wait here,” Tem said, raising his voice to be heard. “They’ll double back once they realize we’re missing.”
“No,” I said. No, I wasn’t going to wait there like a sitting duck. Surveying the vague terrain, I took Tem’s arm and began to walk.
“Kamzin,” he protested, “you don’t know where you’re going.”
“Oh yes, I do.” I had not spent hours poring over the maps of this part of the Aryas for nothing. I had been counting every boulder we passed, as well as every step I took. I knew where we were, roughly, in spite of the wind’s games. I just needed confirmation.
A moment later, I had it. A towering pinnacle of rock, eroding into a mound of broken stone shaped like jagged teeth, loomed before us. I let out a whoop. I had my bearings now. Gripping Tem’s hand, I led him slowly but confidently in the right direction, the direction that—I hoped—the others had also taken.
And then—something began to chime. Not the bell in Tem’s hand, which he used to battle the storm.
The small, black one that hung next to his heart.
We froze, staring at each other. The bell was silent for a long moment.
Then it jangled again. A small, shrill sound that cut through the moan of the wind.
“Are you moving it?” I said.
“It wouldn’t matter if I was.” In spite of the cold, Tem’s face was dewed with sweat. “That’s not how it works.”
Tem and I stood still, breathless, waiting. The black bell did not sound again.
“Let’s keep going,” I said, pushing against the rising panic. We began walking again, clutching each other’s arms. The black bell gave a shiver of a chime every now and again, but that was all.
Something moved out of the corner of my eye. I turned my head, blinking against the snowflakes. And screamed.
It was a human figure, tall and skeletal. But in place of a human head, it had that of a bird, with the curved beak of a vulture. Its shoulders hunched, and below the rags it wore its bony legs bent the wrong way.
And then it was gone, as if it had never been. But I knew the truth—I knew what I had seen, knew it with a certainty that chilled me to the marrow of my bones.
“What is it?” Tem gripped my shoulders. The black bell began to chime loudly—a sharp, dolorous sound. “What did you see?”
“They’re here,” I cried. “They’ve come for us!”
“What? What’s come for us?”
The fiangul. My mouth formed the words, but I couldn’t get them out. I seized Tem’s hand and began to run.
“River!” I shouted. “Norbu! Dargye!”
I was running so fast, my head lowered against the snow and wind, that I didn’t see the shape looming before me.
“Ah!” I cried, as my head hit something warm and soft. I bounced and fell backward into a snowdrift. The yak let out a startled grunt, turning to look at what had collided with her rear end.
Tem helped me to my feet. Aimo was close behind. She brushed the snow from my hood and back, and then wrapped me in a hug.
“Thank you,” I gasped. Aimo’s lips moved, but I couldn’t make out her reply amidst the chaos of the storm. She rested her hand on my arm, an absently sympathetic gesture. I was so relieved to see them that I could have cried.
“What happened to you two?” Dargye said. “I thought you were right behind me.”
“Where’s River?” Norbu said. “He went to search for you.”
“Oh no.” It was possible that we had passed River in the blizzard—likely, in fact, given the chaos around us.
I seized one of the dragons, which were huddled beneath a blanket for warmth. “I’ll find him.”
“Kamzin.” Tem’s grip on my hand was suddenly very firm. Ching, ching, ching, went the black bell.
I turned. Looming out of the swirling darkness were three figures—tall, painfully thin. Little else about them could be made out. But there was clearly a wrongness there, something that chilled me deep inside, as if a frost was creeping over my heart.
Norbu held up his hand. In the other he grasped one of his talismans. He took a step toward the creatures, muttering an incantation.
“Norbu, don’t.” I lunged after him, but Tem dragged me back. He fumbled with one of the bells, a small one with intricate carvings, and sounded it slowly. He began to chant, and a warmth emanated from the place where he stood. The snow falling around us turned to gentle rain.
Norbu was still moving toward the creatures, his arm outstretched as if to banish them back. His outline blurred as the snow grew thicker. The incantation became garbled and broken, and I thought I heard a cry. The snow swirled between us, and Norbu and the creatures were gone.
“Norbu!” I shouted. Suddenly, something passed through the air overhead with a terrible scream, half human and half other. Tem and I dove, but the creature circled back, its beak clicking hungrily. Its eyes were the round, black dots of a bird, shimmering white with reflected snow.
Tem raised his hand, and something like heat haze pulsed toward the creature. It jerked back as if struck, and screamed again.
“Stay down,” Tem said, shoving me to the ground.
“Let me help you!” I struggled to my feet. Tem did not look at me; he muttered a word, and some invisible force knocked me back again.