Chapter 6
SEREH
Sereh woke from her sleep cold without her usual furs to keep her warm, and still annoyed at Erann.
He’d barely said another word, other than pleasantries, not even when presented with a cupful of soup she’d prepared.
Her irritation had simmered during the painfully slow evening until she could, in good conscience, say it was time to sleep.
Erann seemed so consumed with his own concerns she didn’t think he’d even noticed her annoyance, which only made it worse.
Sleepily, she turned and reached across to touch where he’d lain.
All three of them had slept close together.
As exasperated with him as she was, it had made good sense to stay close to share their body heat.
But the stone floor where he’d lain was cold.
Wherever he was, he’d been gone for some time.
Scrambling to her feet, she became tangled in the myriad assortment of furs and cloaks which she’d flung over him to warm him.
On her feet, her eyes immediately alighted on his backpack propped against the cave wall where she’d hastily repacked it yesterday having removed the remaining food and the heatstone.
Its presence surely meant he couldn’t have gone too far.
She couldn’t believe he was well enough to be up and about as it was.
‘Erann,’ she called, thinking he’d appear immediately. He wouldn’t have left without his backpack, or without saying goodbye. Not when she still hadn’t found a way to beg him not to tell anyone of her survival.
‘Erann,’ she called again, also wondering where Arrow had gone. Perhaps the two were together.
‘Wonderful,’ she huffed, her annoyance from the previous evening returning.
With a violent shiver, she pulled her fur cloak from the pile of furs and tugged her arms inside.
It was a bitterly cold morning. Last night’s storm had lashed the glacier.
The fire was little more than embers, and her breath puffed in front of her face.
She shivered again. It was colder inside than she remembered from yesterday.
She stumbled to the mouth of the cave, grimacing at the sudden burst of sunlight. From behind, she heard a scuffle and turned back to see Arrow emerging from the gloomiest part of the cave, some new prize clamped in her teeth.
‘Oh, so you’re not with Erann?’ Sereh commented. ‘Good morning, Arrow.’
The wolf-dog came to her side. With a hand on the wolf-dog’s head, they both stepped out of the cave.
The view before her was mist-shrouded and luminescent. Her eyes teared after the dark of the cave, and she busied herself with tying on her snowshoes. The sun shone bravely through the low-lying clouds, muting the vista before her.
‘Erann,’ she called again when she couldn’t see him nearby. Her voice echoed back to her in the chill air and the only response was an ominous creak from nearby. She darted clear from the cave entrance, eyeing the fresh overhang of snow with disquiet. There was no response from Erann, however.
‘Where is he?’ she seethed. She glanced back inside the cave but she was sure Erann hadn’t been with Arrow in the furthest reaches of the cave.
She looked down and met Arrow’s keen, glowing, yellow eyes.
She wished the wolf-dog could talk. Sereh had the distinct feeling Arrow knew exactly where Erann had gone but had no way of telling her.
Sereh hurried further onto the glacier, pulling herself upwards on a sharp-looking peak of ice, looking for Erann’s footprints in the snow that had fallen during the night.
She wasn’t the most skilled tracker, but even the best from Rankil’s steading would struggle to find Erann’s marks in the tangle of prints from where she and Arrow had rushed in and out of the cave when rescuing him yesterday.
The wind had been bitter, but must have been blowing from Snaefell towards the south, leaving the foot and paw prints exposed.
Her expertise had always been in deciphering text, not in hunting and fending for herself.
Although, she supposed she wasn’t doing badly, all things considered.
Rankil had valued her ability to read, and nothing else.
That was the only reason he’d taken her in after her parents’ death, after he’d taken her family’s wealth and left her with nothing.
Further from the cave’s entrance, any footprints seemed to disappear, as though swept away by the wind, as she looked that way, hands on her hips.
‘Erann, where are you?’ she said again. Abruptly, the sun broke through the low-lying clouds, highlighting a trail of depressions in the snow, a few wolf lengths away, leading back the way Sereh had come yesterday.
She picked her way across the packed drift to examine them. Erann, surely. She sighed loudly in frustration. It seemed he had left her, after all. What an ungrateful arse. The boy she’d known would never have done something like this.
‘Where have you gone? Why leave your backpack? Are you coming back?’ she called.
Suddenly, an insidious fear took root. What if he was going to Rankil’s right now? He’d admitted last night that he was heading there. What if he got to the steading and mentioned he’d seen her?
She’d wanted to tell him the truth of her newfound freedom, only he’d been so aloof and caught up with his own concerns. What she’d told him had been so very vague, and he’d not pressed her for more details. She’d welcomed it at the time. But not now.
She couldn’t stand it if he told Rankil she lived.
She’d have no peace from Rankil until he hauled her back to his steading.
She was his servant and he owned her in exchange for providing her with food and a roof over her head.
She couldn’t run forever. Fear spiked within her, making her gasp.
She’d only had a few days of unexpected freedom, but the taste of it was enough to reinforce her desire to escape from the odious man.
‘What should we do?’ she spoke aloud, her voice sounding small and filled with uncertainty.
‘Should I leave and hope he doesn’t mention me, or should I try to find him and persuade him to keep my secret?
He owes me nothing. Apart from his life, admittedly.
Is that enough to buy his silence?’ Arrow was again beneath her hand, sensing her uncertainty and unease.
‘I wish I knew him better, Arrow. Then I’d know how to predict his next move. His sister’s married to bloody Rankil, but he and the rest of his family have always hated Rankil, for what he did to Ramon. So, why is he going there? Oh, I wish I knew what to do.’
‘What do you think?’ she asked Arrow a few heartbeats later.
The wolf-dog looked at her with her glowing eyes and then walked a short distance away, nose down to scent Erann’s tracks, but made no move to follow them.
Instead, Arrow turned back and headed into the cave.
Sereh didn’t follow. She continued to look towards the north, back along the path they’d travelled only yesterday.
Arrow appeared moments later, with Erann’s backpack firmly in her teeth, dragging the heavy load towards the south, her intent obvious.
She wanted Sereh to carry on their journey.
Sereh laughed with a rush of relief. Arrow had spoken, in her own way.
They’d head onwards and trust their secret to Erann.
Sereh wasn’t sure he was worthy of the secret.
Arrow obviously did. Again, she found herself capitulating to the wolf-dog. Arrow had kept her alive so far.
She reached for Erann’s backpack, gently prising it from Arrow’s jaws. As she did so, a wrapped bundle fell onto the churned snow. Sereh bent to retrieve it.
She unfolded the layers of fur and cloth. ‘Oh.’
Inside was not more food, but the hide journal Erann had been clutching yesterday. Sereh inspected the cover. Age had dulled the once fine leather and while originally it might have been dyed a much brighter hue, visible beneath the stitched spine, it was now no more than a muddy brown colour.
Sereh removed her hare-skin gloves and flicked through the pages, carefully; they were smooth to the touch.
She found nothing but list after list of numbers.
She couldn’t make head nor tail of what they represented.
After some time, with Arrow watching her expectantly, she carefully rewrapped the parcel and laid it to one side, to return after she’d checked for more food, wondering why Erann prized it so much.
With her questing hand, she found yet more peat cakes in a hidden compartment she hadn’t encountered before, as well as a variety of sealed pots. Hungrily, she took some of the peat cakes and cracked the lid on one of the pots.
Curdled sheep blood.
The rank smell made her stomach clench. However, she was starving and could hardly afford to say no to a free meal. With a final look northwards, as though Erann still might suddenly reappear, she walked back to the cave, removing her snowshoes before walking inside.
‘Come on, Arrow. We’ll eat and then head off to Estrith’s steading.’ Sereh placed the pot in the ashes of the fire in the hope they’d be enough to heat it through.
Arrow looked at her expectantly from the mouth of the cave.
‘Come on, girl.’ Sereh patted the ground to encourage the wolf-dog closer because the food wasn’t yet warm enough to smell.
‘I know, girl. But it’ll fill our bellies for now.
Maybe today you’ll find another animal. Till then, we’ll just have to wait, until we can feast with Estrith and her new family.
Her husband is rich. I’m sure they’ll have lots of leftover food from the Long Night and won’t mind sharing with us.
She was my best friend when we were young, and our families were always close. Until what happened to my parents.’
Sereh pushed that thought away and as she mopped the blood up with the peat cakes, she smiled to herself. Forget Erann. She didn’t need to worry about him, only about what the future held for her and Arrow.