Tottering to his feet, he felt the gale pushing at him. He scooped up the precious stars, which had again fallen from his grasp. Then he fought his way to Jup and Coilla, who were just making their first dizzy attempts at standing. Holding on to each other, they all began speaking at once.
“Where are we?”
and
“Where are the others?”
were the main questions.
Soon the other warband members staggered into view. They gathered in a slight depression nearby and it kept off the worst of the blast. Drifting snow blew in skeins over their heads and they had to bellow to make themselves heard.
“What the
fuck’s
happening?” Haskeer yelled.
“I figure we’re in the ice cap.” Stryke’s teeth were rattling with the cold.
“
What?
How?”
Coilla, arms folded across her body in a futile attempt to keep warm, said, “Never mind the philosophical debate. The real question is, how do we keep from freezing to death?”
Several of the warband had managed to snatch up packs or bedrolls as they fled from the Manis. Some, however, like Stryke and Coilla, had been too busy fending off the humans’ attack. Even sharing their blankets and spare clothes there wasn’t enough to go round.
“Jup,” Stryke managed to say, through lips that were rapidly numbing with cold, “are you up to trying to find a high point? To get some idea of where we are?”
“Right, Chief!” The dwarf stumbled off into the teeth of the wind.
Huddling together for warmth, the rest of the orcs tried to work out what had happened.
“It’s those bloody stars,” Coilla muttered.
“If it was, they saved us from being cut to pieces,” Alfray pointed out.
“Yeah, so we can freeze to death out here,” Haskeer put in bitterly. “Wherever
here
is.”
Stryke said, “It’s got to be the northern glacier field. The sun was almost due south of us, but I don’t know whether it’s morning or evening now.”
With stiff blue fingers he fumbled at his pouch, then remembered that Coilla had slashed it. Instead, he stuffed the stars inside his jerkin, just hoping he didn’t fall on them if he tripped. At least he found his gloves tucked under his belt.
“We’ll find out soon enough,” said Alfray. “If we live that long.” A gloomy thought struck him. “What if this is Jennesta getting her own back? It’s just the sort of trick she’d play.”
“No.” Coilla’s firm tone was marred by her shudders of cold. “If she could do this, why didn’t she just bring us all back to her camp so she could get her hands on us? And the stars?”
“This is pointless,” Stryke decided. “We don’t have enough to go on.” He pulled his fur jerkin tighter around him. It seemed utterly inadequate in this place. “What provisions do we have?”
A short rummage amongst their salvaged possessions brought a few strips of dried meat to light, along with some crumbling trail bread and a couple of flasks of liquor. Not much to go around twenty-four hungry beings.
Trying to hide his disappointment, Stryke pointed to one of the grunts with a blanket. “Go up and see if you can make out what’s happened to Jup, Calthmon.”
Reluctantly the grunt waded up through the snowdrifts. He was almost knocked flying by the wind when he got above the rim of the depression. It wasn’t that much longer before he returned with Jup following in his footsteps.
The dwarf hunkered down, rubbing his arms, then sticking his numb hands under his armpits.
“There’s lots of crevasses,” he managed through chattering teeth. “Some of them have got bridges of snow across them that won’t bear an orc’s weight. But I think I can see a way down over yonder.” He nodded towards what Stryke thought was the southeast. “We’re quite high up too.” As he spoke, his misty breath crystallised on his beard.
“Anything else out there?” Stryke asked.
“Not that I can see. No smoke. No signs of any houses. I did think I saw something moving. But whatever it was, it kept well away.”
“The sight of you would frighten anything with brains,” Haskeer told him.
Jup didn’t bother responding to the jibe. That in itself told Stryke how badly the devastating cold was affecting them.
“Right,” he said. “First order of business is to get the hell off this damned ice sheet and find shelter.”
In twos and threes they set off, with Jup trailblazing.
Within a short time the utter glaring whiteness had them seeing spots before their eyes. Limping, plunging through frozen crusts into snowdrifts as deep as an orc, they made their way east by south. It seemed like hours before they reached a bluff from which they could see quite a way around them.
Behind, to the north, towered the glacier, menacing in its vast solidity. It stretched from one side of the horizon to the other, a monument to the humans’ stupidity in killing the magic of Maras-Dantia. Even at this distance it seemed to loom above them, threatening to crush them at any moment. As they watched, a segment of it fell away with a sound like thunder. Clouds of snow swirled into the air, and some of the heavier blocks must have bounced for half a mile.
Hastily they began to clamber down the southern face of the bluff. Not all of it was compacted snow. A huge granite boulder seemed to have been trapped in the ice. That made for solid footing, but the rock was slick with hoar-frost. Slithering and sliding, they cursed their way down to a plateau that couldn’t have been more than a hundred and fifty feet above the frozen tundra.
They stopped to catch their breath. Here the rock kept the biting north wind off them. It also hid the intimidating bulk of the ice wall from view. That in itself was a blessing.
Below, in a curve between two thrusting glaciers, the land was flatter, pressed down, it seemed, by the weight of the advancing ice. It was grey with lichen and cut here and there by dark nets of streams that seemed threadlike at this range. Black against the horizon, there was a thin line that might or might not have been a forest. It was hard to tell with the sunlight glaring in their eyes.
“If we can make it down there,” Stryke said, slapping his gloved hands to bring back the circulation, “we might find shelter. Fuel. Whatever.”
“
If
’s the right word,” grumbled Haskeer. “I’m an orc, not a fucking mountain goat.”
But the trail down from the bluff wasn’t as easy as it looked. Time and again they came up against a dead end, a drop so sheer they’d never make it.
“Is it me,” said Coilla as they stared at yet another barrier, “or have you got that feeling there’s somebody following us?”
“Yeah.” Jup rubbed the back of his neck.
Stryke, when consulted, said he felt it too.
“Maybe it’s one of those abominable snowmen,” Coilla said, trying for levity.
“They’re just myths,” Alfray stated flatly. “What you’ve got to watch out for is snow leopards. Teeth the size of daggers.”
“Thanks. I really needed to know that.”
They trudged along in silence for a while.
“I see Jup’s scouting is up to its usual standard,” Haskeer muttered as they backtracked yet again.
The way was narrow, crowded with orcs changing direction. Even so, Jup managed to press himself back against the cliff, letting the others pass until Haskeer reached him. Jup’s hand shot out to grasp the orc by the neck. “Think you can do any better, scumpouch?”
Haskeer shrugged Jup off. “A blind man on a lame horse could do better,” he growled.
“Be my guest.”
Haskeer leading, they set off again. It still seemed to take forever to get down to the barren plain. A grunt slipped, only his mate’s grip on his jerkin saving him from certain death. After that they stumbled along holding on to each other’s clothing.
The sun rolled low along the skyline, rather than falling from its zenith. Whether they had been travelling all day or only half of it was moot. What was certain was that night was now falling, and with it came a bank of cloud. It blotted out the sun, dimming the long twilight as it raced overhead. A fine, stinging snow began to fall.
“That’s all we need,” Jup muttered.
At last they were off the bluff. Haskeer jumped the final few feet and landed hard, grunting at the impact. Soon they were all milling on the level, staying in the lee of the glacier in the forlorn hope it might keep the rising wind off them.
“Did you see that?” Jup said. “That light over there?” He pointed south towards the edge of the ice tongue.
“Nothing there now,” Haskeer said. “Maybe you imagined it.”
The dwarf squared up to him. “I didn’t
imagine
it. It was there!”
Before a fight could develop Stryke stepped between them. “Just a reflection, maybe? But it wouldn’t hurt to find out. I’m not too keen on the idea of camping out if we don’t have to. We’ll give it half an hour. I want us to be settled before nightfall.”
Without warning, the glacier gave a mighty crack. A block of ice the size of a house began to fall away at their heels. The orcs fled out across the tundra, slipping and staggering. At last, safely out of range, they puffed to a halt. Alfray, almost exhausted, was some way behind the rest.
“We’re safe,” Haskeer panted.
“No, we’re not,” Alfray contradicted. “Look!”
They followed his pointing finger. Racing towards them came a pack of creatures the size of lions. With their white coats they were almost invisible in the twilight.
“Form up!” Stryke yelled and pelted off towards Alfray.
Seeing Stryke dashing towards him, Alfray turned. The sight was enough to make anybody quail. With fangs like ivory sabres, five beasts were almost upon him.
Stryke cried out and whirled his sword. The lead snow leopard, startled, missed his spring. He rolled head over heels, his claws giving him purchase as he sprang to his feet.
Not taking his eyes off the monster, Stryke shouted, “This way!”
He had no time for more, because two of the leopards were now prowling around him, looking for an opening. The rest had swung round to herd the warband.
Stryke and Alfray backed away but one of the creatures bounded swiftly behind them. The smaller one feinted. At the same moment the dominant male leaped again. Distracted, Stryke almost fell to the raking claws but he got his sword up just in time. Blood sprayed from the beast’s foreleg and with a savage scream the animal retreated.
For the moment the snow leopards circled just out of range of the orcs’ blades.
In the meantime, Coilla was urging the rest of the orcs to shuffle closer in a body. Three of the leopard pack oozed sinuously around the defensive ring. The beasts faced a bristling wall of metal, but they blocked any attempt at rescuing Stryke and Alfray.
Again the pack leader came in at Alfray. Its claws spiked into his sleeve, knocking the old orc from his feet. But Stryke was there, his sword slashing out. The tip of his blade scored the beast’s flank. A line of crimson darkened the creamy fur and the snow leopard bounded out of reach.
Stryke risked a glance. The rest of the warband were too far away to do him and Alfray any good. “You all right, old-timer?” he panted.
“Yeah. But enough of the
old-timer!
Keep ’em off a moment, will you?”
Stryke didn’t have time to argue. Again and again the snow leopards darted in, playing a deadly game. One after the other, they feigned attack. He knew he couldn’t hold them off forever, but dared not look away to discover what Alfray was doing.
Cursing his cold, stiff fingers, Alfray fumbled with the buckles on his healer’s bag. At last, desperate, he managed to find a large stone bottle. Splashing the contents onto the wet snow, he pulled back just in time. Turquoise flames
whoomp
ed up, singeing his eyebrows. The cats sprang back, dazzled and disorientated.
“What’s that?” Stryke gasped.
Alfray didn’t reply. Instead he hacked through a roll of bandages, spearing the cloth on his sword then dipping it into the pungent blaze. He flicked his wrist and the fireball whisked through the air, landing on the younger leopard’s back. Gouts of fire sizzled through its pelt to the fatty layer beneath.
Then the whole creature went up in flames. It gave an unearthly scream and hurtled out of sight across the darkling plain. Meantime the strange blue fire dwindled until it went out in a pool of slush at Alfray’s knees.
Warily the other cat circled then sprang at the squatting corporal. Stryke dropped, holding his blade upright. As the beast passed over him he stabbed upwards with all his might. The razor-sharp metal sliced right through the leopard’s belly. Stinking guts spilled out on the orc below. Hastily wiping his eyes on his sleeve, Stryke saw the pack leader collapse just beyond him in a heap of tangled limbs.
He drew a deep breath and coughed as the stench hit his lungs.
Alfray got upwind of him and managed to gasp, “Thanks, Stryke.”
“Can you do that again?”
Alfray shook the bottle. Liquid sloshed in it. “Once or twice, maybe.”
“Then let’s go.”
With no idea that salvation was trotting towards the warband, Coilla snapped, “Give me that!” and grabbed a grunt’s sword.
She stepped free of the sheltering mass of bodies and pitched it at the nearest leopard. The blade ripped through its spine, leaving the beast running on its front legs for a moment before it realised its hind legs were paralysed. Coilla came up on it from the rear and thrust her sword through the back of its neck. Blood pumped out onto the snow.
Two to go. With Stryke covering Alfray, the healer mixed his fire-brew again. They took out one of the leopards but the last drops of potion weren’t enough to ignite.
The remaining beast panicked. It leaped away from the blazing body of its companion and found itself almost on top of Stryke. It had no time to lower its bony skull. Head up, it left its throat exposed.
It ran straight onto his blade, its momentum driving its body almost up to the hilt. The monstrous teeth were just a hair’s breadth from Stryke’s face. With a look of surprise in its green eyes it keeled over, bloody froth bubbling from its neck.
Its fall twisted Stryke’s sword from his grasp. Swearing, he drew back, groping for his knife, but all the leopards were dead. He sat on the flank of the one who’d taken his blade and said tiredly, “Butcher the damn things and take the fur. We might need it.”