The Cradle of Ice (Moonfall #2)

Chapter 78

78

D AAL STRUGGLED OFF the boulder, still weak, feeling a century older. He was the last to get down, but Shiya waited below and helped him. To the side, Nyx spoke animatedly with Graylin and Vikas.

Despite his exhaustion, fear pounded his heart.

Moments ago, he had shared some of Nyx’s journey among the raash’ke, but he had faded in and out, spent and drained. He had caught only glimpses through those other eyes, but he had been too weak to follow her all the way to the Crèche.

Still, Nyx had been clear about the threat. They all knew the urgency, the imperative.

We must get home.

He stared up at the sky, where giant wings still circled, gliding under those sparkling stars. Clusters of smaller raash’ke sped in ragged groups, still agitated, expressing their edginess. Nyx had warned them how fragile they were and would likely remain so for some time.

As he gazed above, he wondered if this was the Dreamers’ purpose in sharing the Crèche’s memories, why they had instilled that harmonious past into the two of them.

Was this the Oshkapeers ’ intent all along? To preserve those memories until a time when they could be used to break the raash’ke free?

Daal had no way of knowing.

Jace called out, “I’ll start unloading the skiff.”

Daal returned his attention to the others as Jace headed down the rocky slope toward the river. It reminded Daal of who else was down there.

He followed Jace, anxious to check on Neffa and Mattis. The two orksos had a hard haul back to the Crèche. He wanted to check their harnesses for chafing and examine their burns from those fiery worms. But more than anything, he wanted to comfort them.

From the top of the slope, he recognized their nervousness. They had noted the circling raash’ke, too. The pair kept close to the shelter of the skiff, father and daughter, their horns knocking together, reassuring each other.

He glanced to the skiff’s fish pen and its icy storage of eels and minwins. A small meal would help return the orksos’ good natures. But he knew he shouldn’t overfeed them before—

“What’s that?” Jace asked, stopping ahead.

The thunderous blast threw Jace into Daal. They both rolled in a tangle. A flash of flames and a wave of blistering heat swept over them. Then parts of the skiff rained and crashed all around them.

Daal shoved away from Jace, panic returning his strength.

No, no…

He crawled through the burning wreckage, over broken crates. Once close enough, he denied what his eyes were seeing. He shook his head, trying to wish it away.

Mattis lay on the rocky slope, thrown out of the river by the blast. One wing fluttered. His horn had snapped off near its base. Blood pooled under his bulk.

Deafened by the blast, choked by his heart, Daal slid down the slope to reach the orkso. He ran a palm over his slick flank. Mattis’s nostrils heaved with misty exhalation. An eye swiveled to look at Daal, then over to the river, expressing his worry.

Neffa…

Daal scooted through the blood. Out in the water, Neffa rolled amidst the wreckage, piping in distress for her father. She struggled to claw and hump her way onto shore. The water around her was dark with the blood flowing into it.

Daal slid into the river, shying past her horn.

“I’ve got you,” he said, reaching for her.

She rolled, showing him why she struggled, why she couldn’t reach her father. Blood sprayed from where her foreleg and wing had been ripped away. Each beat of her huge hearts pumped the life out of her.

No, no, no…

He cried out in a wracking sob and hugged her huge head. Still, she beat her tail, fighting to push out of the river, to get to her father.

The others crowded behind him, unsure what to do, but Daal knew there was nothing. Her wound was fatal. From the bank, Mattis tried to lift his head with a whistling wail, calling to his daughter.

Daal recognized the one thing he could do.

He shoved out of the water and crawled, stumbling and shaking, up to Mattis. “Help me,” he cried out.

He shifted to Mattis’s head and tried to shoulder the orkso’s bulk back into the river, to his dying daughter. The others closed to help. They would’ve failed if not for Shiya’s strength. They slid Mattis through his own blood and into the river.

Daal slipped in with them, between them, hugging both. Neffa rubbed her father, nuzzled Daal, whistling as she bled away, flowing her life down the river. Mattis rolled and lifted a comforting wing over his daughter’s flank, but Mattis was weakening, too.

Daal sat waist-deep in the cold water. He sobbed and leaned his brow to each, inhaling their fishy musk, the salt of their last exhalation. Their piping and whistling faded into the air. He didn’t know who died first, but he stayed with them both to the end and beyond.

He hung over them, running a palm along the spiral of Neffa’s horn. The others tried to coax him out of the river, but he refused.

Nyx whispered to Graylin, “What happened?”

His answer was dull with despair. “The crate of armaments in the stern. One of the hand-bombs must have exploded.”

Vikas stepped into view, looking out at the wreckage, gesturing in her language.

Nyx’s reaction was sharp. “Sabotage? Like back on the Hawk ? Why?”

Daal tried to block them out, closing his eyes.

“They wanted to make sure we never returned,” Graylin said dourly. “They must have used a long-wicked stykler. Like the one planted in the Hawk ’s forge. Delayed to explode until we were far enough away, leaving us dead or stranded.”

“Who put it there?” Nyx asked.

Jace spoke up, his voice small and shocked. “The bomb. It wasn’t in the armament crate at the stern. When I was headed back to the skiff, I saw a curl of smoke rising at the bow, from under the bench. Where I was seated.”

“What was under there?” Graylin asked.

Jace gulped, trying to get his next words out. “It was Fenn’s pack, the one with the compass and the navigational tools.”

Despite Daal’s grief, he turned to face Jace. His voice was hoarse, fueled by fury. “Are you certain?”

Jace backed a step from whatever showed on Daal’s face. “Y… Yes.”

Daal shoved around, slid deeper into the water, and rounded the bulk of Neffa.

“What are you doing?” Nyx asked softly.

Through clenched jaws, he answered, “We need to get back to the Crèche.”

Nyx stepped closer. “How—?”

“You know as well as I do. We’ve done it before.”

Daal removed Neffa’s harness—and freed the saddle from her back.