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“So you will live out all the rest of your years as Tom Badgerlock. ”
“It seems likely to me. ” I tried to keep the bitterness out of my voice and failed.
“Do you feel that?” Web asked me suddenly.
“I feel it's the wisest thing to do, if not the easiest,” I replied reluctantly.
“No, no. Open your Wit, man. Do you feel something, something more immense than you've ever felt before?”
I halted and stood silent. The Wit is like any other sense. One becomes so accustomed to the sounds of the day or the smells of the cook fires that one ceases to pay full attention to them. Now I stood still, as if listening, but actually unfolding my awareness of the life-net around me. There was Web, warm and hearty and near. Farther up the trail, I sensed the others, a confused string of beings emanating various degrees of fatigue and discomfort. My sensation of those who were Witted was slightly sharper and clearer than for the ordinary folk of the party. I could not feel Web's bird; I suspected she was out over the water, feeding. “Only the ordinary—” I began to say, and then stopped. Had I felt something? A very large, subtle swelling of the Wit? It was as if a door had opened briefly and then closed again. I grew more still, and closed my eyes. No. “Nothing,” I commented, opening them again.
He had been watching my face. “You felt it,” he told me. “And I feel it still. Next time you sense it, hook on to it. ”
“Hook on to it?”
He shook his head regretfully. “Never mind. That is one of those things that ‘one day' you'll have time to learn from me. ”
It was the closest he had come to a rebuke, and I was surprised by how much it stung. I knew I deserved it. I found the strength to be humble and asked, “Do you think you could explain it to me as we walk?”
He turned his head and lifted his eyebrows in gentle mock surprise. “Why, yes, Fitz. I could do that, now that you ask me to. Choose someone in the party ahead of us, someone unWitted, and I'll try to explain to you how it is done. Some Old Bloods theorize that it is how pack hunters settle on one animal in a herd and mark it out as their prey. Perhaps you've seen young wolves or other predators that fail to make that first step in hunting. Instead of selecting a single animal to hunt, they charge the entire herd or flock, and all prey evades them. That is, of course, one of the strengths of a herd. Prey animals cloak their individuality from the hunters, and hide in plain sight of them. ”
And so, very belatedly, began my lessons with Web. By the time we had caught up with the others, I had been able to single out Chade and be aware of him, even at the moments when he was not in my line of sight. I had also felt, twice more, that immense heave of presence in my Wit-sense. But unlike Web, I had felt such a sensation before. I kept that piece of knowledge to myself, though it made my heart sink to do so. I knew a dragon when I felt one. I expected the wide shadow of wings to sweep over me, for I knew of no other way to explain how I could sense so large a creature, and then feel no trace of it. But the skies above me remained blue, clear and empty.
When we reached the others, they were standing in the scant shelter of an outcropping of rock. Outislander runes were cut into the surface of it in a wavering line that wandered back beneath the ice level. The Hetgurd witnesses stood near the rock, and their displeasure at being here was writ large on their faces. Yet most of them looked sourly amused, too. I wondered why. One of their men was on his knees, doggedly digging at the ice that had pushed up against the rock. His tool was his belt knife, and he clashed the iron blade against the stubborn ice as if he were stabbing someone. He'd make a dozen strokes and then brush away a negligible amount of chipped ice. It seemed a futile task, but he was intent on it.
Longwick's men had brought their tools up with them. They carried shovels and picks and pry bars, but as yet they had not put any of them to work. They stood at the ready, bored and uninterested as any good soldiers usually are, and waited to be assigned their task. I did not wonder long why they had not yet begun. As we approached, Chade and Dutiful were face-to-face with the Narcheska and Peottre. The other members of the Wit coterie stood idly nearby. Thick had sat down in the snow behind them and was humming aloud to himself, nodding his head in a rhythmic counterpoint.
“Yes, but where?” Chade demanded, and from his tone, I knew it was not the first time he had asked his question.
“Here,” Peottre replied patiently. “Here. ” He swept one arm wide, indicating the small plateau we stood on. “As the runes on the rock say, ‘Here sleeps the dragon Icefyre. ' I have brought you to him, as we agreed we would do, and the Narcheska has accompanied us to witness your task. Now, it is up to you. You are the ones who must unearth him and take his head. Is not that the task the Prince agreed to, within his own mothershouse?”
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“Yes, but I didn't think he'd have to chip a whole glacier into shards to do it! I thought there would be some indication of where he was. There's nothing here, just ice and snow and rock. Where do we begin?”
Peottre lifted his shoulders in a heavy shrug. “Anywhere you like, I suppose. ” One of the Hetgurd witnesses gave a bitter chuckle at his words. Chade glanced about almost wildly. His brief look acknowledged that I was finally present but he seemed to think I would not be of much use. He tried again with Peottre.
“The last time you were here and could see the dragon, where was he?”
Peottre shook his head slowly. “I've only been here twice before, with my aunt, when I was a boy. She brought me here to teach me the way. But we never saw the dragon, only the writing that marks his place. It has been at least a generation since the dragon was visible through the ice. ”
This seemed to spark something in the Owl clanmember, for he suddenly stepped forward from the huddle of Hetgurd witnesses. He smiled slightly when he spoke, nodding to himself. “My grandmother saw him, when she was a girl. I shall tell you what she told me, and perhaps you will gain wisdom from it. She came here with her own mother's mother, to leave a gift for Icefyre and ask for greater fertility amongst our sheep. When they got here, her mother's mother showed her a dark shadow, just visible through the ice when the day's sun was strongest. ‘There he is,' she told my grandmother. ‘He used to be much easier to see, but every year the ice grows and he sinks farther away. Now he is only a shadow, and there will come a time when people will doubt he ever existed. So look well, and make sure that no descendant of ours shames us by doubting the wisdom of their own people. ' ” The bard ceased his telling as abruptly as he had begun it. He stood, his cheeks reddened by the wind that blew his long hair, and nodded to himself, pleased.
“And would you know, then, where we would begin to look for the dragon?”
The Owl laughed. “I do not know. And I would not tell you if I did. ”
“I am curious,” the Prince said more gently. “What was the offering made to the dragon, and how did he accept it?”
“Blood,” Owl replied promptly. “They cut a sheep's throat and let it bleed out on the ice. The mothers studied the shape of the puddle it made and where it sank in and where it pooled on the surface. They judged that they had pleased Icefyre with their gift. Then they left the sheep's carcass here for the Black Man, and went home. The next spring, many of our sheep dropped two lambs instead of just one, and none of them were touched by the flux. We had a good year. ” Owl glanced sourly around at us. “That is the sort of luck we used to receive for honoring Icefyre. Dishonor and doubt him, and I dread to think of the misfortune that will befall your houses. ”
“And our houses too, like as not, for being present,” Seal observed sullenly.
Peottre did not look at them as he reminded them, “Our mothershouse has accepted all that may come from this. It will not fall upon you. ”
“So you say!” Owl snorted disdainfully. “Yet I doubt you speak for Icefyre, you who would destroy him for a woman's whim!”
 
; “Where is the dragon?” Chade broke in, his exasperation complete. His answer came from an unexpected source.
“He's here,” Swift said quietly. “Oh, yes, he is. His presence ebbs and surges like a wild tide, but there's no denying he's here. ” The boy swayed as he spoke and his voice was far away. Cockle set his hand to the young man's shoulder, and Web left me to hasten to Swift's side.
“Look at me!” he commanded the boy, and when Swift was slow to comply, he gave the lad a shake. “Look at me!” he urgently ordered him again. “Swift! You are young and never-bonded. You may not understand what I'm telling you, but keep yourself to yourself. Do not go to him, and do not let him come into you. This is a powerful presence that we feel, splendid and awe-inspiring. But do not become absorbed in that. I feel in this creature the charm of a great cat, the beckoning wile that can bond a youngster whether he would or no. ”
“You can feel the dragon? He is definitely here, and alive?” Chade was incredulous.
“Oh, yes,” Dutiful replied unwillingly. For the first time, I realized how pale he was. The rest of us were ruddy-cheeked with the cold. Dutiful stood very still and slightly apart from us. He looked at the Narcheska as he spoke. “The dragon Icefyre is indeed here. And he is alive, though I do not understand how that can be so. ” He paused as if thinking deeply, his eyes going afar. “I can just brush my mind against his. I reach for him, but he ignores me. Nor do I grasp how I can be aware of him one moment, and then feel him fade beyond my reach the next. ”
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I tried not to gape as the Prince carelessly revealed that he was Witted. I was also surprised that he seemed to be sensing the dragon with his Wit when I could barely perceive him. Some time ago, I had realized that the Prince's Wit ability was not as strong as my own. Had his lessons with Web sharpened it? Then an alternative shocked me. Did he speak of the Wit, or of the Skill? In my dreams, the dragon Tintaglia had touched me with the Skill. I suspected that she had used the Skill Magic to find Nettle, as well. I transferred my gaze to Chade. The old man looked deeply thoughtful, and frustrated. It was Thick who decided me. He seemed completely absorbed in his humming, nodding his head in time. I wished that I could hear his Skill-music, and wished even more that I could provoke him to raise his Skill-walls. I had never seen the little man so enraptured.
“Do not go groping after him!” Web gave the command without regard for the Prince's rank. “There are legends, very old Wit tales, of the fascination of dragons. It is said they can infatuate the unguarded mind, inspiring a nearly slavish devotion. The oldest songs warn of breathing of the exhaled breath of a dragon. ” He turned suddenly, putting me in mind of a commander ordering his troops as he said to Cockle, “You know the song I speak of, do you not? Tonight, it would be a good song for all to hear. In my youth, I gave little thought to such old songs, but in my older years, I have learned that much truth can be hidden in the old poetry. I would hear it again. ”
“As would I,” Chade unexpectedly agreed. “And any other songs you know that may have to do with dragons. But for now, if our prince's Wit coterie can sense this dragon, perhaps they can guide us in where we should begin our digging. ”
“Tell you where he is, so you can dig down to kill him? No! I, for one, won't do it!” Swift uttered the words with sudden, wild passion. He looked more distressed than I had ever seen him. Chade rounded on him immediately.
“Do you so quickly forget your vow to your prince?”
“I—” The boy could find no words. His face flushed and then paled. I watched him struggle to find his loyalty, and wished I could help him. But I knew, possibly better than anyone there, how torn he might be.
“Stop this,” Web said quietly as the old assassin fixed Swift with his stern stare.
“It is nothing to do with you,” Chade said quietly, and for the first time, I saw Web's anger. It came as a physical bunching of his muscles and a swelling of his chest. He contained himself, but I saw how difficult it was for him. So did my prince.
“Stop this,” Dutiful echoed Web's words, but he gave them the inflection of royal command. “Swift, be calm. I do not doubt your loyalty to me. I will not test it this way, setting one of my men to decide between what his heart says is right and what he has vowed to do. I do not judge that I can honorably lay that burden upon him. Nor is my own will certain in this. ” He swung his gaze suddenly to the Narcheska. She did not meet his gaze but looked out over the snowy plain below us. He surprised me by going to her and standing before her. Peottre took a step as if to intervene, but Dutiful did not offer to touch her. Instead, he said quietly, “Will you look at me, please?”
She turned her head and lifted her chin to meet his eyes. Her face was still, save for one brief flash of defiance in her eyes. For a moment, Dutiful said nothing, as if hoping she would speak to him. All was silent save for the shushing of the wind as it stirred the old ice crystals on the glacier's face and the crunching of snow underfoot as the men-at-arms shifted their weight in readiness. Even Thick's humming had ceased. I spared him a glance. He looked perplexed, as if he were trying to recall something. When the Narcheska held her silence, Dutiful sighed.
“You know more of this dragon than you have ever revealed to me. And I have never mistaken this task you have given me for a maiden's challenge to her suitor. There is no woman's whim in what you ask me to do, is there? Will not you tell me the greater import of this task you have laid upon me, so that I may judge what best to do?”
I thought he had won her, until he added that last phrase. I could almost feel her distress that he might flinch from doing what he had said he would. I saw her retreat from the honesty that had tempted her into a pique worthy of any court-bred young noblewoman. “Is it thus that you fulfill your pledges, Prince? You said you would do this thing. If it daunts you now, speak so plainly, so all may know the moment at which your courage slipped. ”
She did not have her heart in the challenge. I saw that and so did Dutiful. I think it hurt him all the more that she flogged his pride with such a merciless dare and it did not even come from her heart. He took a deep breath and squared his shoulders. “I keep my word. No. That is not the exact truth of it. I have given my word to you, and you choose to keep it. You could give it back to me and release me from this task. But you do not. So, by the honors of both my mother's and my father's houses, I will do what I have sworn to do. ”
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Web spoke. “This is not a stag you hunt for meat, my prince. It is not even a wolf that you slay to protect your flocks. This is a creature, as intelligent as yourself if the legends be true, that has given you no provocation to kill it. You must know—” And then Web halted his words. Even as provoked as he was, he would not betray his prince's secret Wit. “You must know what I shall now tell you. He lives, this Icefyre. How he does, I do not know, nor can I say how robust the spark that lingers in him. He flickers in and out of my awareness like a flame dying on a final coal. It may be that we have come all this way and arrived only in time to witness his passing from the world. There would be no dishonor in that. And I have traveled far enough at your side that I think it is not in you to slay any creature that lies defenseless at your feet. Perhaps you shall prove me wrong. I hope not. But”—and here he turned to his Witted companions—“if we do not fulfill our prince's request to help him locate the dragon, if we do not unearth Icefyre from this ice that grips him, I believe he will die just as surely as if our prince took his head. The rest of you may do as you will in this. But I shall not hesitate to use what magic Eda has blessed me with to discover the dragon's prison and free him from it. ” He lowered his voice. “It would, of course, be much easier if you all helped me. ”
During all of this, the Hetgurd contingent had held themselves apart. I stole a glance at them, and was only mildly surprised to see the Fool standing, not with them, but beside them, as if to show plainly where his loyalties lay.
The Owl, their bard, had that listening look so familiar to me from my days with Starling. Every word uttered here would be fixed in his memory, to be later set in the swinging, lurching rhymes of the Outislander bard's tongue. Speculation and dread played over the faces of the others. Then Bear, their leader, thudded a fist on his chest to draw everyone's attention to him.
“Do not forget us, nor forget why we are here. If it is as your wizards say, if the dragon lives but only feebly and you unearth him, we will witness that. And if this Six Duchies farmer-prince kills our dragon when he is in sickness and unwarlike, then all the wrath of every clan will fall, not just on Narwhal and Boar clans for condoning such a cowardly act, but upon the Six Duchies. If the young Prince does this to make an alliance and stave off further war with the God's Runes folk, then he must be sure that he does it in the manner agreed upon. He was to meet our dragon in fair combat, not ignobly take his head as he lies ailing. There is no honor in taking a battle token from a warrior who is already dying and not by your own hand. ”
The Fool stood silent through the Bear's declaration, and yet something in his stance made it seem the man was his spokesman. He did not have his arms crossed on his chest, nor did he scowl forbiddingly. Instead he looked deeply at Dutiful, the White Prophet pondering the man who might be his antagonist in his quest to set the world on a better path. The look sent a chill up my back.
As if aware of my gaze on him, he suddenly turned his eyes to mine. The question in them was plain. What would I do, how did I choose? I looked away from him. I could not choose, not yet. When I saw the dragon, I thought to myself, then I would know. And a cowardly part of myself muttered, “If he dies before we chip him out of the ice, then all is solved, and I need never stand in opposition to Chade or the Fool. ” It was no comfort that I suspected they were both aware of that secret hope.
Peottre spoke in reply to the Bear. He said, in the weary way of a man who explains something for the hundredth time to a stubborn child, “The Narwhal mothershouse accepts all consequences of this act to our own. Be it so, if the dragon rises against us and curses our descendants. If our kin and fellows turn against us, be it so. We accept that we have brought it upon ourselves. ”