A Fortress of Grey Ice (Book 2) Read online

  Table of Contents

  Title Page

  Copyright Page

  Dedication

  ONE - The Ice Fog Rises

  TWO - The Widows’ Wall

  THREE - In the Tomb of the Dhoone Princes

  FOUR - The Beast Beneath the Ice

  FIVE - Into the Fire

  SIX - Becoming Sull

  SEVEN - An Arrow With a Name

  EIGHT - The Thorn King

  NINE - A Broken Stone

  TEN - Condemned Men

  ELEVEN - The Forsworn

  TWELVE - Fair Trade

  THIRTEEN - Blue Dhoone Lake

  FOURTEEN - Awakening

  FIFTEEN - Stillborn

  SIXTEEN - Leaving Blackhail

  SEVENTEEN - Maimed Men

  EIGHTEEN - The Tower on the Milk

  NINETEEN - City on the Edge of an Abyss

  TWENTY - A Test of Arrows

  TWENTY-ONE - The Nine Safe Steps

  TWENTY-TWO - Treason

  TWENTY-THREE - Hauling Stones

  TWENTY-FOUR - A Surlord’s Progress

  TWENTY-FIVE - Spilling Sand

  TWENTY-SIX - Spire Vanis

  TWENTY-SEVEN - The Rift

  TWENTY-EIGHT - Dealing in the Milkhouse

  TWENTY-NINE - The Robber Chief

  THIRTY - Pursuit

  THIRTY-ONE - A Storm Building

  THIRTY-TWO - The Game Room

  THIRTY-THREE - A Walk on the Edge

  THIRTY-FOUR - At the Sign of the Blind Crow

  THIRTY-FIVE - Harlequins

  THIRTY-SIX - The Racklands

  THIRTY-SEVEN - Chief-in-Exile

  THIRTY-EIGHT - Raid on the Shanty

  THIRTY-NINE - Black Hole

  FORTY - Fighting One-Handed

  FORTY-ONE - Desertion

  FORTY-TWO - Into the Want

  FORTY-THREE - A Severed Head

  FORTY-FOUR - To Catch a Fish

  FORTY-FIVE - Fixing Things

  FORTY-SIX - A Fortress of Grey Ice

  FORTY-SEVEN - A Bolt-Hole

  FORTY-EIGHT - The Stand At Floating Bridge

  FORTY-NINE - The Gates To Hell

  EPILOGUE

  By J.V. Jones

  The Book of Words

  The Baker’s Boy

  A Man Betrayed

  Master and Fool

  Sword of Shadows

  A Cavern of Black Ice

  A Fortress of Grey Ice

  The Barbed Coil

  A Fortress of Grey Ice

  J V JONES

  Hachette Digital

  www.littlebrown.co.uk

  Published by Hachette Digital 2010

  Copyright © J.V. Jones 2002

  The moral right of the author has been asserted.

  All characters and events in this publication are fictitious and any resemblance to real persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental.

  All rights reserved.

  No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a

  retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means,

  without the prior permission in writing of the publisher,

  nor be otherwise circulated in any form of binding or cover

  other than that in which it is published and without a similar

  condition, including this condition, being imposed on the

  subsequent purchaser.

  A CIP catalogue record for this book is available from the

  British Library.

  eISBN : 978 0 7481 2097 0

  This ebook produced by JOUVE, FRANCE

  Hachette Digital

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  Little, Brown Book Group

  100 Victoria Embankment

  London EC4Y 0DY

  An Hachette Livre UK Company

  For Russ

  SWORD OF SHADOWS:

  The Story So Far

  Raif Sevrance of Clan Blackhail was ravenborn, chosen to wear the raven lore by Blackhail’s clan guide. One morning, while he and his older brother Drey were away from the clan’s winter camp, shooting ice hares, their father Tem and their Chief Dagro were slain by agents of the surlord Penthero Iss. Dagro’s son Mace Blackhail was also present, but survived and went on to claim the chiefship of Clan Blackhail. From the very beginning, Raif questioned Mace’s story of how he escaped the raiders, accusing the new chief of having foreknowledge of the attack. A few weeks later, during a savage ambush on the Bluddroad where Mace ordered the slaying of innocent women and children, Raif realized he had no choice but to leave his clan. Mace had turned Clan Blackhail into something Raif no longer recognized.

  When Angus Lok, Raif’s uncle and a member of the mysterious and secretive Phage, offered to take Raif with him on a journey to Spire Vanis, Raif accepted with a heavy heart. On the way they visited Duff’s Stovehouse, where Raif admitted being present on the Bluddroad the day women and children from Clan Bludd were murdered in cold blood. A fight broke out between Blackhail and Bludd, and Raif slew three Bluddsmen defending the actions of his clan. Yet no one ever thanked him for it. By speaking out in his clan’s defence, Raif had not only confirmed the details of the massacre but also admitted to being part of it. There was no going back for him now.

  When Raif and Angus arrived at the little-used southern gate of Spire Vanis, they spotted a girl being chased down by red cloaks. For reasons Angus Lok refused to divulge, he immediately set about saving the girl. Raif saw no choice but to aid his uncle, and when the gate was dropped, trapping Angus inside the city, Raif shot his uncle’s attackers through the grille.

  Raif heart-killed four men that day, his arrows expertly sighted on their hearts. Ever since the morning his father died, Raif had realized he had a talent for shooting game. And now, following the events at Duff’s and at Spire Vanis’s southern gate, he learned that same talent extended to the shooting of men. For Raif it was as much a burden as it was a gift, this ability to kill so surely, and he became increasingly uncertain how to live with it.

  The girl he and Angus had saved was Ash March, a foundling fostered by the surlord Penthero Iss. Ash had run away from Mask Fortress, fearing that her foster-father wanted to use her in ways she barely understood. Some kind of power was awakening within her - a darkness that demanded release - and she had begun to suspect that this was the only reason Iss had fostered her. He never called her daughter without using the word almost first.

  Angus, Raif and Ash headed north toward Ille Glaive, pursued by the surlord’s men. By the time they arrived at the city, Ash’s health had begun to deteriorate. The darkness inside her had grown more powerful, causing her to lapse into unconsciousness. Heritas Cant, a toll collector in Ille Glaive and Angus Lok’s contact in the Phage, explained the nature of Ash’s illness. She was being overtaken by forces of evil that had been sealed away for a thousand years. Ash March was the Reach, born to release the Unmade from their dark, hellish prison known as the Blind. Heritas Cant warded Ash against the darkness, but warned that he could only do so much and that she must not overreach herself. The dread beasts of the Blind and the Endlords that ruled them craved freedom, and Ash March was their sole means to secure it. Ash must release her power or die, and the only way she could do this, without causing a break in the Blindwall, was to find the Cavern of Black Ice and release her power there.

  Sobered, Ash, Raif and Angus travelled east to Angus Lok’s farm, where Ash met Angus’s wife Darra and their three daughters. Darra Lok could not hide her disquiet at seeing Ash, and Ash was left wondering why her presence upset Angus’s wife so deeply.

  On the journey north from Angus’s farm, the small party of three was captured by Cluff Drybannock, the Dog Lord’s rightha
nd man. The Dog Lord was chief of Clan Bludd, and it was his grandchildren and daughters-in-law who had been slain by Blackhail forces on the Bluddroad. The Dog Lord had seven sons and loved none of them, but he loved his grandchildren with all his heart. Upon learning that Raif Sevrance was present that day on the Bluddroad, the Dog Lord had become obsessed with capturing Raif - someone must pay for the Dog Lord’s losses. Raif was taken to the Ganmiddich Tower and tortured. When he came within a hair’s breadth of losing his life, Death refused to take him. Kill an army for me, Raif Sevrance she had whispered, any less and I just might call you back.

  The Dog Lord had sought to make himself Lord of the Clans. With Penthero Iss’s aid he had taken the Dhoonehouse, and had then gone on to annex Ganmiddich and Withy. He was a man who had always prided himself in his jaw, and the methods he’d employed for capturing the Dhoonehouse had begun to worry him. There was no jaw in taking a roundhouse by underhand dealings and foul magic, and he had come to regret his actions. When Ash March fell into his hands, he saw a way of ending his association with Penthero Iss by sending the girl back to her foster-father: payment in full for Iss’s aid with the taking of the Dhoonehouse. So the Dog Lord released the girl into the custody of two of Penthero Iss’s men; Marafice Eye, Protector General of Spire Vanis, and Sarga Veys, magic-user.

  By this time the wards set by Heritas Cant had grown thin, and when Marafice Eye and his men attempted to rape Ash March in the Bitter Hills, Ash lost control and lashed out with her power. Too late she realized her mistake and tried to pull the power back. But the damage had already been done; a hairline crack had opened in the Blindwall.

  As a weary and frightened Ash March headed west from the Bitter Hills, the magic-user Sarga Veys killed the man who he believed to be his only fellow survivor. Veys had glimpsed the darkness called forth by Ash, and immediately recognized it was his destiny to serve it. Leaving his old life behind, Sarga Veys went in search of a dark and glorious future.

  Back at the Ganmiddich Tower, Raif awaited his execution at the hands of the Dog Lord. The night before he was due to die, Ganmiddich was attacked by Blackhail. The Dog Lord and his forces were forced to flee north to the Dhoonehouse, taking the prisoner Angus Lok with them. Raif was saved by his brother Drey. When Raif had taken his yearman’s oath at Blackhail, it was Drey who had acted as Raif’s second; Drey who kept Raif’s swearstone safe until that day. Both brothers knew that Raif could no longer return to his clan - Raif Sevrance had been branded an oathbreaker and a traitor - and Drey let his brother go, wounding himself in the process so that it looked as if Raif had overpowered him. It was a hard parting for the sons of Tem Sevrance: both knew they would never see each other again.

  A day later, Raif met up with Ash on the banks of the Wolf, and they headed west toward the Storm Margin and the Cavern of Black Ice.

  Blackhail’s storming of Ganmiddich had plunged the clanholds into deeper conflict. The three northern giants - Blackhail, Dhoone and Bludd - were now engaged in a messy and unclear war. Bludd vowed vengeance on Blackhail for the slaughter on the Bluddroad; Blackhail blamed Bludd for the murder of its chief; and dispossessed Dhoone desperately needed to retake their roundhouse. The architect of all this unrest was the surlord, Penthero Iss, who had been working to destabilize the clanholds for many months. Iss planned to invade the clanholds, and to this end had offered Marafice Eye a mutually beneficial deal. In return for Marafice Eye raising an army and leading it north to crush the clans, Iss would name Eye as his successor.

  Meanwhile, Mace Blackhail was working to consolidate his position as Blackhail’s chief. To strengthen his hold on the chiefship, Mace had coerced his father’s widow into marrying him by raping her and then claiming the union had been consensual. Raina Blackhail was a proud woman, and rather than admit she had been raped by Mace, she preferred to keep her silence and retain her standing in the clan. Only one other person besides Raina and Mace knew the truth of what had happened that day in the Oldwood. Effie Sevrance, Raif’s and Drey’s younger sister, had witnessed the rape, and for that reason Mace Blackhail determined he must be rid of her.

  Effie Sevrance was bearer of the stone lore: the little chunk of rock she wore around her neck warned her of dangers by moving against her skin. When it went missing one day, she knew to be afraid: without it she felt naked and exposed. A few days later Effie was attacked outside the roundhouse by the luntwoman Nellie Moss and her son. It was the shankshounds - the dogs belonging to the wealthy clan overlord Orwin Shank - that saved Effie, by breaking free from their kennel and ripping her attackers to shreds. The rescue only served to isolate Effie Sevrance, for now people began whispering that she had enchanted the shankshounds and was a witch. Mace Blackhail, sensing an advantage, let the rumors go unchecked. The next time he moved to rid himself of Effie Sevrance, fewer people would speak up in her defence.

  On the journey along the Storm Margin, Ash’s condition had grown worse. The bone-chilling cold pierced her and the wards set by Heritas Cant had been blasted away, leaving her vulnerable to the creatures of the Blind. When she lapsed into a coma at the end of a long, freezing day, Raif picked her up in his arms and carried her. Raif had forsaken his clan, his yearman’s oath, and his family: Ash March was all he had. When wolves attacked he was forced to set Ash down to defend himself. Although he heart-killed the pack leader and scattered the other wolves, Raif could not save Ash. She had begun to hemorrhage during the attack, and he did not possess the power to help her. Drawing a guide circle in the snow, he had called upon the clan gods.

  Raif’s cry was heard leagues away by two Sull Far Riders, Ark Veinsplitter and Mal Naysayer. The Far Riders had been called north to a parley with Sadaluk, the Listener of the Ice Trapper Tribe. The Listener could hear things that other men could not, and he knew that a Reach had been born and that the Blindwall was in danger of collapsing. The Far Riders saved Ash’s life, and later escorted Ash and Raif onto the ice of the Hollow River, beneath which lay the Cavern of Black Ice.

  Ash March discharged her Reach-power in the cavern lined with black, ensorcelled ice. But it was too late. The hairpin crack she’d caused earlier could not be mended, and even as she and Raif left the cavern, someone, somewhere, was working upon the flaw.

  Penthero Iss’s bound sorcerer, the Nameless One, had made a deal with the Endlords. Push against the crack, they had said, and in return we will give you your name. And so the Nameless One had pushed and the Blindwall was breached, and the first Unmade rode through.

  PROLOGUE

  Diamonds and Ice

  The diamond pipe was hot and stinking, and when the water hit the walls the rock exploded, spraying the diggers with a cloud of dust and steam. Scurvy Pine swore with venom. Fierce blisters of sweat rose on his forehead and he wiped them away with a greasy rag. “Fires have only been out an hour. What do those bastards think we are? Crabs to be steamed for the pot?”

  Crope made no reply. He and Scurvy had been working the pipes together for eight years, and they’d been scalded worse in their times. A lot worse. Besides, speaking took up space for remembering, and Crope had important things to remember today. “Don’t you go forgetting, giant man. You be ready when I give the word.”

  Placing the empty bucket down on the blue mud of the pipe floor, Crope watched the rock wall as it continued to crack and pop. The fire set by the free miners heated the rock, making it split and break. Water hauled up from the Drowned Lake cooled the walls so quickly, boulders the size of war carts shattered to dust. “Softening”, the free miners called it, making the pipe ready for the diggers’ picks. Crope could see nothing soft about it. Mannie Dun had broken his back pickaxing a seam last spring. Crope remembered carrying the old digger away, Mannie’s legs jerking against his belly as the free miners called Red Watch and sealed the area off. The sealing wasn’t for safety’s sake—Crope didn’t know much but he knew that. The sealing was to keep the diggers away. Before Mannie’s spine had twisted and popped, the tip of his ax had lod
ged in a rock wall speckled with flecks of red stone. Red Eyes, the miners called them. Red Eyes meant diamonds . . . and diamonds were the business of free men, not slaves.

  “Pick to the wall, giant man. Don’t go giving me good reason to spread my whip.”

  Crope knew better than to look at the man who spoke. The guards in the pipe were known as Bull Hands, on account of their oiled and flame-hardened whips. Scurvy said they could take the hands off a man before he even heard the sound of bullhide moving through air. Crope dreamed of that sometimes; of hands not attached to any living man, clutching his neck and face.

  Diamond rock split and crumbled to nothing as Crope took his pick to the wall. Water still warm from contact with the heated stone ran through the cracks at his feet. Above, the pipe twisted up and up, its walls gashed by stairs and pathways hewn from the live rock. Tunnels and caves pitted the sides, marking seams long run dry or walls overmined to the point of collapse. The entrances to the older tunnels had been plugged with a makeshift mortar of horsehair and clay, for there were some in the pipe who feared shadow things rising from the depths.

  Rope bridges spanned the pipe’s breadth, their wooden treads warped by steam, their fibers ticking as the wind moved a thousand feet above. The sky seemed far away, and the sun farther still, and even on a clear day in midwinter, little light found its way into the pipe.

  Down below, in the lowest tier of the pipe, where a ring of pitch lamps burned with white-hot flames, the hags were at work with their baskets and claws. Scratch, scratch, scratch, as they raked the new-broke ground for the hard clear stone that was valued above gold. The hags were slaves too, but they were old and weak, bent-backed and stiff-fingered, and the Bull Hands did not fear to let them near the lode.