Sky in the Deep(53)
The horses knew the way, though I could still make no sense of it. I was used to navigating by landmarks, but with everything covered in snow, it was impossible. Fiske’s eyes were on the treetops and the angle of the mountain, not on the ground. The sun rose up higher and the land grew steeper. The horses slid, their legs shaking, sending rocks rolling on the patches of ground that were bare. Fiske leaned back, compensating for the shift in weight, and I did the same as we made our way down the most treacherous parts of the trail. When we reached the bottom, the view widened to the valley far below where a distant stretch of green lay beyond the white expanse.
As the day warmed and the snow began to melt, the ground grew slicker. We walked the horses when the trail turned steep again and then stopped to let them rest. I walked to the ledge of a drop-off, looking out over the trees. The canopy of the forest looked like the churned froth on top of seawater, fluffy and thick with snowfall.
“What do you think will happen when the Riki go after the Herja?”
Fiske tightened the saddle on the horse. “I think we will be defeated.” There was nothing in his voice to indicate fear.
“But you’ll still fight?”
He looked up at me with disapproval. “Of course we will.”
I watched an eagle glide out over the trees, tipping left then right. “But if you can’t win…”
“If we don’t fight, the Herja will kill us anyway. We die fighting or we die hiding. Which would you choose?”
He knew my answer as well as I did. I’d never wait, hunkered down in a half-burned village, for the Herja to come back for me, even if it meant death. But I didn’t like the idea of Iri going into a hopeless fight. I couldn’t stomach the idea of Inge and Halvard cut down by the Herja. Fiske, eyes open and empty, staring into the sky as his soul left his body. A chill ran over my skin.
“The Riki could resettle.” I pointed out over the horizon, past the fjord. “Beyond the valley.”
“In Aska territory?” He tilted his head to one side.
I shrugged. “The Herja change things. Either way, the Aska and the Riki won’t fight each other if they’re in the valley. They are the bigger enemy.”
“They are the common enemy,” he corrected.
I crossed my arms in front of me. I had been thinking the same thing, but I couldn’t picture it. I couldn’t imagine a world where the Aska and Riki were on the same side. The age-old tangle of brown and red leathers, bronze and iron on the battlefield. But fighting together.
“And if we won? Then what?” I asked, watching as the eagle turned, tilting its wings to the side as it made its way back toward us.
He let go of the saddle, scratching at the horse’s mane. “I don’t know.”
We started again, taking a more level decline and slowing our progress so the horses didn’t tire. My body shook from the tension of controlling the animal, my jaw sore from biting down as I focused on preventing a slide. Once we were back on the slope, I looked behind us, up the towering face of the mountain piled with heavy snow. I could feel the power of it, hovering like it was waiting for the chance to come rolling down over us. And I imagined, for just a moment, what it would be like to be buried in it. To slowly give way to the cold and close my eyes in surrender to death. Like the night Thorpe left me in the forest. Like the days Iri spent lying in the trench, dying. But now, something about the idea was almost comforting. It meant no more wondering. Wondering if the Aska had survived. If I’d get home or what would happen to Iri. Wondering about the thread that seemed to be tied between Fiske and me, slowly tightening.
The sun sunk lower in the sky, making the world blue and cold again as we headed into the trees. The forest was quiet, the horses’ breaths and hooves the only sound. When we met a break in the thicket, the light was almost gone.
Fiske moved out from under the trees ahead of me and the white moonlight spilled down on him as he slid off the horse. I tried not to stare at the way his form looked against the frigid night.
I came through the trees and my horse stopped at the gravel edge of a large frozen lake. The surface stretched out in both directions like frosted black glass. “How do we go around it?” I dismounted, walking to the edge and tapping the heel of my boot on the thick ice.
“We don’t.” He pulled the bag from the saddle and dropped it over his head to hang across his shoulder. “We walk across.”
“Across?” I stared at him.
“Across.”
The mountain stood over us, watching. “There’s no way to go around?”
“There is, but it will take another full day to go that way.” He worked on my saddlebag, pulling at the riggings.
I stared at the lake. “What if we fall in?”
“We won’t.” He smiled, and I looked away when I felt heat painting across my skin again.
He tossed me the bag and I hung it over me as he turned the horses back toward the mountain and slapped them above their hind legs. They took off, their galloping steps like distant thunder in the dark forest.
“They know the way back.” He stepped out onto the ice.
It groaned beneath his feet, making my heart twist up on itself. I gulped down a chest full of air, lifting my eyes to the other side, invisible in the dark. I started behind him, walking at an angle like my father had taught me to keep too much weight off of the ice. The powdery snow slid under my boots as we got farther on the surface, and then dissipated, leaving the ice smooth and polished.