Cold Fire

We rolled on as night poured over the sea and blinded me.



13



I did not sleep. I could not sleep. I closed my eyes, but my thoughts tumbled in time to the rhythm of hooves and the rattle of the turning wheels. As the wheel turns, we rise and we fall. So say the Romans, who rose and fell and rose again, even if their second empire was smaller than the first.



Take Beatrice with you, the headmaster had said. Bee had walked unchanged through the tide of dreaming when everything around her was altered. She had known where to find the nest because her dreams had told her, and she had drawn the landmarks and the actual spot. The hatchlings that survived had crossed back to the mortal world, and through water Bee had shepherded them home.



I could not rest, and I had no one else to talk to. I looked down at the latch.



“Is that what it means to walk the dreams of dragons? That you aren’t changed by the tide?”



The gremlin face snickered.



“You remind me of my young cousin Astraea.” I folded my arms on my chest.



After a long pause, it said, sulkily, “Why?”



“I’d like to tell you, but we haven’t been formally introduced. What can I call you?”



“What can you call me? A good question. Names, like blood, can be eaten in this country. Do not spill names lightly. I have no name. What can I call you?”



“You already know my name.”



It added a smirk to its repertory of unpleasant smiles. “True. The cold mage called you Catherine.”



A sudden inquisitive urge overtook me to learn more about the man I’d been forced to marry. “Did the cold mage talk to you?”



Light glinted where its eyes should have been, like lantern light picking up the sheen of polished brass. “Why should he? If he didn’t know I could talk? He doesn’t know as much as he thinks he does.”



“No, so I’ve discovered. What else do you know about him?”



“He weaves threads of magic into images. That was nice. It is a bit boring, you know.”



“Is it? Can’t you see outside?”



It sighed, with a squinched grimace. “No. That’s the other latch. We never talk.”



“Did the cold mage do anything else?”



“Not until you got into the coach. And I must say, except for looking at you a lot when you were asleep, he sat very still, not like you, shifting about and rubbing the cushions and snoring when you sleep.”



“I do not snore!”



“You do! So did the dreamer.”



I realized that every word Bee and I had said, in the privacy of this coach, the gremlin had overheard and could repeat.



It spoke as gleefully as that little beast Astraea when she had been thwarted of something she wanted and felt her only leverage to sway you was just being mean. “The Wild Hunt knows she exists. Her scent is on me, on you, on these cushions, on the wind. When next the gate opens to the Deathlands, they’ll ride through, hunt her down, and kill her.”



I riposted with an attack. “Are you glad of it?”



“Oh, I don’t care,” said the gremlin, mouth flat as if hiding another emotion. “Why should I care? She would have hacked me to pieces.”



“No, because I would have hacked you to pieces first. No offense intended. We just wanted to run away. Can you blame me?”



The gremlin shut its burning eyes and remained silent for so long that I bent closer, my breath visible as a shimmering glamour on its brass face.



“Remember one thing, little cat.” Its voice altered, as if someone else were speaking through its mouth. “You must have his permission to ask questions. Do not ask questions.”



A gust of wind sprinkled salt spray over my face, and I blinked. When I looked again, the latch was just a smooth brass latch. Cautiously, I touched it, but it did not bite.



“Hey, there,” I whispered.



It did not answer.



On we rolled through the restless sea-swept night. Every time a big swell struck the causeway and splashed, I flinched as droplets spattered my face. Yet I could not bring myself to close the shutters, for then I would truly feel I was in a cage.



Bee had crossed. She would find Rory. They were safe. That belief I clung to.



On we rolled, and I did not sleep.



After forever, night lightened to day. The wind-washed sea spread to a horizon so gray it was impossible to tell where the sea ended and the sky began. At first I took the pale shapes rising and falling along the swells for boats, and then I realized they were rafts of ice. I shivered and drew my coat tighter around me as the coach slowed to a halt.



The horses stamped.