“All things considered,” Duncan said, “it would be best to take shelter, if there’s any to be had. The far bank of this river is fairly rocky. There might be some break along the way. Keep your eyes open. And tell Danny to do the same.”
“I’ll tell him.” Fitzcairn sighed. “But I make no guarantee he’ll hear me. If there’s such a thing as snow-deafness, then he’s been suffering from it since we left the cabin.”
MacLeod saw the cave first, an area of blackness that stood out in the snow-covered riverbank even in the general darkness of the day.
“A den?” Fitz wondered. “And how are we to know if someone’s to home?”
“We’ll know,” MacLeod replied, “because I’ll go and knock on the door.”
Fitz held his breath—and the end of the rope coiled around MacLeod’s waist—as the Highlander made his way across the frozen river. If the seemingly solid ice broke, they could pull him out quickly, at the least.
And then they could stand around and watch him freeze to death from the wet and the cold. Not an interruption to the journey that he cared to consider. So he raised a weak cheer when MacLeod made it to the other shore.
In the ever-present twilight, Fitz could see him cautiously approach the cave. The lantern he carried flickered and dimmed as it was blocked by his body. Then he turned and held it aloft, a signal that the cave was empty.
Splendid! Poppa, Momma and Baby Bear were occupied elsewhere. Was it too much to hope that they had left their porridge behind? He giggled, then sighed.
Get a grip, laddie. Only a bit of a way to go, and we’ll reach what passes for civilization in this blasted land.
He and Danny followed MacLeod to the opposite shore, one at a time. Fitz led Vixen, harnessed to the sled. At first, she whined and balked at the entrance to the cave. She stood, legs wide, nostrils flaring, checking the situation out thoroughly in her own way. Finally, she gave a short yip and was content to join the humans inside. As Fitz worked to loosen her traces, he saw a few flakes of white melting on her fur.
The threatening storm had begun.
Hear the wind blow, Danny, hear the wind blow,
the blue-eyed angel sang. The quiet one hovered behind her, swaying in the mouth of the cave.
An animal had once lived in this shelter they had found. There was a hollow of earth dug out in the farthest corner. Clumps of fur covered the earthen floor. Bits of bones, gnawed at the ends, lay scattered about.
There were small skulls among the bones, rabbits most likely, and here and there some larger that Danny could not quite put a name to. They gleamed oh so white in the darkness, staring at him out of the empty hollows that had held their eyes.
Bone,
they whispered in voices so tiny.
Beneath your flesh, you’re just like us. When you die, you’ll rot away to bone.
He shook his head, but the words would not stop.
Bone, Danny. Naught but bone.
“Danny?” It was MacLeod’s voice. “Danny, come on. You’ve got to eat.”
“I can’t die,” he whispered. “I—can’t—”
“No,” MacLeod said, “but you have to keep your strength up. We all have to. We may be Immortal,” he added, an edge in his voice, “but we’re not invulnerable.”
“If you prick us, do we not bleed?” Hugh murmured in a sleepy voice.
If you cut off our heads, do we not DIE?
the brown-eyed angel fairly shouted in his ear.
AND ROT, ROT, ROT AWAY
the mocking voices chanted.
Danny rose. “I’m going to live forever!” he shouted. He’d deal with them, he would. Small bones crunched beneath his feet, one larger skull he hurled into the swirling whiteness outside.
“Easy, lad.” His teacher was there, pinning his arms to his side. Danny looked at the familiar face, pressed close to his. He blinked, and the skin, ruddy from the wind and cold, melted away, the bright blue eyes, sharp with worry, sank and vanished. A grinning skull it was that confronted him, mouthing words of concern.
He felt a great fear then, one he’d not known since Lucas Desirée had told him what he was.
It was a lie, what MacLeod said. They
could
die, their heads could fall on this frozen earth. And rot away, like discarded bits of meat.
There were swords here, there were knives here. And there was death, lurking in the shadows.
Over the shoulder of the thing that wore Hugh’s bony face, he saw the green-eyed angel, beckoning him from just outside the cave. He shoved with all of his might, breaking free.
The wind outside was howling, fair like the banshees were said to do. It drowned out all other sounds. He stumbled through the darkness, snow cutting at his cheeks like a shattering of glass.
He was safe. He would not be a prize this day for what waited in the cave. He need only keep on, and it could not touch him.
Haven’t you forgotten something, Danny-boy?
the brown-eyed angel murmured softly.
Something important?
He stopped. The bag of gold—
his
bag of gold. His insides twisted at the thought of leaving it amid the bones.
And then from out of the blackness, two figures fell upon him, shouting his name, dragging him back into the dangerous light.
The lantern, a pale illumination that barely penetrated the gloom, flickered and went out.
“MacLeod?”
“What, Fitz?”
“How long ago was it that I said we’d seen the worst of the weather in this land?”
A sigh in the darkness. “Two days?”
What firewood they’d had when they first took shelter was long gone. There had been no break in the still-raging storm, no chance to gather more.
“Ah, well. I never claimed to be one that could tell the future.”
Fitz could feel MacLeod shifting. Without a fire, the cave was bitter cold. They all were wrapped in blankets, huddled together. Vixen lay on his left, MacLeod next to her.
“No one of us can. Immortal or not.”
“When I was younger—before I died—the tinkers came through my village,” Fitz said. “Had my fortune told by a dark-eyed beauty that I’d taken a fancy to.” He laughed. “She said I had an amazingly long life line.”
“I traveled a while with the gypsies,” MacLeod said, reflectively. “It’s true that there were some among them who seemed to have—powers.”
There was something in his tone that caught Fitz’s attention. Under ordinary circumstances, he’d be inclined to ask a sharp question or two, to find out more about MacLeod’s life among the tinkers. And the girl, for there must have been a girl.
But these were not ordinary circumstances. Asking questions took energy, and energy was a thing in short supply.
Firewood. Energy.
Food.
They’d left the cabin expecting to be at Fort McPherson in three days’ time. The food they’d taken with them was enough to last them on the way.
If MacLeod’s guess was right, they’d been two days already in this blasted den, which smelled more and more of dead animal the longer they stayed.
Two days here and two days before on the trail.
They were stretching what they had as much as was possible. But put plainly, if the storm did not soon abate, they would have to finish the journey on a diet of sugar water.
Danny, lying to his right, moaned in his sleep. Fitz pulled the fur robe farther over him.
“He’s calmer today,” MacLeod said. It was half a question.
“Aye. But he still won’t say what it is he thought he saw that drove him out, though. The look on his face …”
“You said before that you had some notion of where his mind was when it wasn’t with us?”
“So I did. But since that day he lost his sight—I’m not so sure.”
“He’s keen enough still when talk turns to the gold,” MacLeod stated. “Other times, though, he seems to be somehow—
listening
.”
Fitz nodded, although he knew the Highlander couldn’t see him in the darkness.
“It might just be the bloody wind. Or the silence, when it isn’t blowing.” He sighed, and rested his head against the cave wall. “The silence is worse, I think.”
MacLeod made a noise that he took as agreement.
Time passed. It was difficult to tell how long in the total darkness.
“MacLeod?”
“Yes, Fitz?”
“The rules we live by—do you think they cover the subject of a teacher who drags his student thousands of miles across a frozen wasteland, so that he can have the delightful experience of freezing to death while starving? Or is it starving to death while freezing?”
“I dinna notice ye having to do any dragging,” MacLeod replied. “He’ll survive.”
“We’ll all survive, MacLeod, none the worse for the wear,” Fitz said. “But will Danny be thanking me for this adventure, I wonder? Even when his pockets are filled with gold?”
“Being a teacher—it’s na about protecting him, is it?” MacLeod asked. “Or fighting his fights? When he felt confident that I would na lose my head the first time I was challenged, my cousin Connor never tried to keep me out of harm’s way.”
“A point well taken,” Fitz said. “I do recall that Henry Fitz once volunteered us both to travel to England with messages for the young king from his mother. Isabella the Fair, they called her. And rightly so, I might add.” He smiled at the memory.
“We’d joined her guard when she returned to France after old John finally died. She was not at all on good terms with the Council, so what we were about was risky business indeed. But when I complained of the danger, he assured me that we were safe, since only those born gentlemen need worry about the headsman’s ax.”
“Fitzcairn, I canna believe it—do ye realize that ye just agreed with me?”
“No doubt it’s the severe cold, laddie. It’s affected my reasoning—and your speech.”
“And what might that mean?”
“If ye dinna know, I canna tell you,” Fitz replied.
MacLeod fussed at that a bit, but soon fell silent.
What a fine state of affairs,
Fitz thought.
Here we are, lacking even strength enough for a good argument!
He sighed and checked on Danny, who slept still. Vixen stirred, and he pulled her closer. Outside, the wind screamed on.
Oh, how he longed for a pipe!
My dearest Claire,
Duncan thought,
at the moment we are still some forty miles from Fort McPherson. We are dying, but you needn’t worry, since the condition will prove to be temporary.
Not a letter that would ever be sent, of course. Still, it did describe the situation fairly.
The storm had finally stopped midafternoon on the third day. They pushed their way out through the foot of new snow that had filled the cave entrance. To find a fairy-tale landscape of crystalline purity, unsullied white extending as far as could be seen in any direction.
By then, their store of food, except for a few scant mouthfuls, was completely depleted. Fitz agreed that there was nothing to do but to let the dog go free to forage for herself. Duncan doubted they would see her again.
Once more they divided what gear they had and shouldered the packs. They left a few odds and ends behind to lighten the loads as much as possible, taking with them only the minimum of what they would need.
And they left the gold, except for a small pouch.
That had been an ugly scene.
Danny had shouted, then wept, then gone dead silent. But this time, even Fitzcairn could not deny the need to carry as little as possible. If they had any hope of reaching McPherson before their strength failed, they had to travel quickly.
It was not starvation that Duncan feared. Though they were weak from hunger, they were days away from being at the point where vital systems shut down for lack of sustenance.
Duncan had starved to death—he knew the signs.
No, what would more likely happen was that they would simply collapse in the snow, falling into the stupor that precedes death by freezing.
Sam had warned Duncan of those signs. In the spring, they would thaw and wake. And if they were found before then, there would be difficult questions to answer.
They were so close—he would not let them fail.
So, here they were, worn to exhaustion already, exhausting themselves still further breaking trail through the fresh snow. They were on the frozen river. It had been Duncan’s decision to take the risk of the ice breaking as a trade-off for the clear path that the river provided.
Yes, it was easier, but there were still places where the drifts were waist-high. And the banks didn’t break the wind—they seemed instead to channel it directly toward them.
The way was arduous and they were all tired beyond thought when Duncan called a halt.
So you see Claire, we won’t actually die. But we may come to wish we had.
“Danny, we needn’t even wait for spring to go back, you know?”
Come ye back when all the roses falling,
the blue-eyed angel sang.
“We can rest a bit at the fort, then take a team of dogs back to the cave.”
And you are dead, as dead you well may be.
“Danny.” The man put his hand on Danny’s shoulder. It was shaking, Danny noticed. “We’re so close.”
Danny pulled away. He lay on his back, feeling the life ebb out of him minute by minute. He closed his eyes and heard a voice with a soft Southern accent.
It’s who we are,
the voice said.
It’s what you must do,
the brown-eyed angel finished.
Fitz was mightily concerned. The morning after they left the cave, Vixen had re-appeared, sliding down the riverbank in a cloud of white. She leaped through the snow to join them, her tail held high. He was sure that Danny would want to go back now for the sled—and the gold.
But the lad seemed to take no notice of the dog nor of his surroundings, beyond what was needed to keep on the trail. He could not be engaged in conversation. His dark blue eyes were somehow vacant, his mouth slack.
Fitz had seen such reactions in the mortally wounded, just before they died. A shock set in, and their minds went somewhere else, somewhere safer.
Ah well. Fitz raised a cup of warm, sweet water to his lips and drank slowly. In truth they were all on that edge.
He had to believe that a full belly and a warm bed would bring Danny back. Then he could get the lad to talk, to speak about the fancies and fears that were plaguing him. Given time, he knew that he could set things right