CHAPTER SEVEN

The Sky Peak Passes

L ister stood with Eleanon, Bingaleal, and Inardle on a snowy platform high in a narrow gorge within the northern FarReach Mountains.

Below them the last ten thousand or so of the Skraelings swarmed southward.

Millions had passed by in the last day or so, desperate to reach DarkGlass Mountain. They were now moving supernaturally fast, almost flowing over the ground, pulled by Kanubai’s power. By now, Lister reckoned, the first waves of Skraelings would be seething almost to the gates of DarkGlass Mountain.

He could hardly bear to think of what might be happening to northwestern Isembaard as the Skraeling nation swept through.

Above them, snowflakes drifted gently down from heavy clouds, settling on rocks and clinging to crevices.

As they settled, very slowly they transformed into ice-covered lumps.

The Lealfast nation. Hundreds of thousands of them covering the FarReach Mountains. This was as far south as they, or Lister, would come. Isembaard might have a few more weeks, but then it would be Kanubai’s and DarkGlass Mountain’s entirely.

Lister sighed. “It comes to pass then. The Skraelings hurry to their true lord.”

“Pity the Isembaardians,” said Eleanon, watching the Skraelings. “They can have no idea of what is about to descend on them.”

“Isaiah and I could not warn them,” Lister said quietly. “Isaiah did what he could to get as many of his people out of the area as possible. The Salamaan Pass will remain open for a week or so for refugees, but then…”

“Then the Lealfast will do what they have to in order to keep these northern plains free, for as long as possible, from the armies of Kanubai,” said Eleanon.

“Kanubai will do everything he can to get to Elcho Falling,” said Lister. “He’ll need to attack before the Lord of Elcho Falling attains his full strength.”

“We will do everything we have to,” said Eleanon, “but we pray to all gods above, and to the Star Dance that runs through our souls, that the Lord of Elcho Falling rises soon. Without him we are all doomed.”

“Lister!” said Inardle. “What is that?”

At her alarmed voice, everyone looked to where she pointed.

A black shape climbed up the steep slope of the gorge on which they all stood. From this distance it looked half bat, half spider, and it certainly moved with the speed and agility one might expect from a creature bred from those parents, but as it grew closer the figure resolved itself into that of a man wrapped in a black cloak (albeit still climbing with the speed and agility of some creature of the night), a satchel slung over his back.

Lister laughed, and relaxed.

“It is one of my comrades,” he said. “You have not met him, for he has been in Escator these many years past.”

Within minutes the man had climbed to join them. Tall and spare with thick dark hair over lively eyes, the man embraced Lister, then shook the hands of the Lealfast present as Lister introduced them. “This is Vorstus,” said Lister. “He has been ‘minding’ Maximilian.”

“I have watched the Skraelings pass by,” said Vorstus. “It is all happening, then.”

“You seem somewhat delighted at the notion,” said Inardle.

“You haven’t been stuck in Escator these past thirty odd years,” said Vorstus. “I’m dying for a bit of excitement.”

Inardle gave him a strange look, then raised an eyebrow at Eleanon.

“Maximilian will need you soon,” said Lister. “It is difficult to imagine that Isaiah has not yet broached the subject of Elcho Falling with him.”

“Elcho Falling,” Vorstus said. “I cannot wait.”

“As he said,” Lister remarked drily, “he’s the one who has been stuck in Escator all these years while we have had the delightful company of the cursed Skraelings.”

“Where is Isaiah now?” said Vorstus.

“Somewhere close to the Sky Peaks Pass,” said Lister. He rubbed his hands together, as if suddenly tired of the cold, windy vantage point they occupied. “Shall we join him, then?”

Northwestern Isembaard, from the western banks of the Lhyl to the far western branch of the FarReach Mountains, was a roiling nightmare. Skraelings—or what had once been Skraelings—had seethed out of the FarReach Mountains and washed down over the northern plains of Isembaard like a rotting inundation of death. Many people had died under the sudden, unexpected onslaught, although some managed to escape west into the mountains, but within a day of the creatures emerging from the FarReach Mountains, northwest Isembaard was utterly lost.

The first wave of dog-headed creatures had reached DarkGlass Mountain a week or so after they’d crossed into Isembaard. They seethed over the glass pyramid, climbing over each other in order to reach its capstone, then sliding down the far side. Within moments the entire pyramid was covered with a writhing mass of gray, partly transparent creatures, their dog muzzles slavering in excitement.

Deep inside DarkGlass Mountain, Kanubai raised his own muzzle and howled.

The mass of Skraelings covering the pyramid screamed at the sound echoing beneath their bodies, and they tore off thousands of the plates of glass in their desperation to find the shafts that led directly into the Infinity Chamber.

Where waited Kanubai.

When the first creatures arrived in the chamber, they abased themselves before Kanubai, rolling over on the floor and presenting their bellies to him, that he could suckle from them all their life’s blood.

By morning, when Kanubai would have had the opportunity to suckle lifeless a few thousand of the creatures, a devil-sun would rise over Isembaard, and it would emerge, not from the east, but from DarkGlass Mountain.