Fire & Ice

Chapter 2

Chapter 2

ONTANE CROSSED his arms over his chest. He leaned back against the shed door, which he had just closed after dragging the sled out into the yard. “I tell ye, she be not for sale. Here in Bordertown we do the women’s things different from how they do in the City of Glass.”

“How much do you want then?” Tandor asked, while casually dumping his travel chest on the luggage rack of the sled. The white bear in the harness gave an annoyed snort. Ruko leaned forward over the driver’s seat and patted the animal’s furry rump while giving Tandor an impatient glance. Yes, Ruko wanted to get going. He had been waiting outside the inn at daybreak. That in itself was worrying enough. Ruko should not have been able to break those bonds Tandor had put on him yesterday.

“Ye never give up, do ye?” Ontane growled.

“No. A hundred silver gulls?”

“My daughter be not for sale!”

“I don’t want to buy her. I want her to come with me to the City of Glass. I’ll take her there, and I’ll bring her back. Two hundred silver gulls?”

Ontane shrugged. He cast a shifty-eyed look at the shed doors, as if wondering if his wife or daughter were listening. “The Knights thought it too risky to take her a few days back, why should I think different now? She’ll be needing another mother to be with her when she . . .” He spread his hands.

“My lady friend is one of the best midwives in the City of Glass. She has delivered hundreds of children and birthed nine of her own. Do you want a more experienced woman?” Or would you rather I take your wife off your hands as well? “Two hundred and fifty silver gulls?”

Ontane tightened his arms over his chest. “Bain’t up to me to agree to something like this. Dara be sure to kill me if I do anything to the girl.”

Tandor had only met the girl’s mother once, a dumpy, unattractive woman with a permanent scowl on her face.

“Your wife will be glad you have the money to buy her a new carpet.”

“There be nothing wrong with my carpet!” A blush rose to Ontane’s cheeks. He snorted and looked down. “Although it be not exactly new . . .”

“Precisely. Women notice these things, take it from me.”

“Hmph. What d’ye know about women?”

“Enough to know that I’m right.”

Ontane sniffed and raked hair away from his face. “I mislike it. Why ye be wanting her anyway? I thought ye be hiding her here with us.”

“I was, but your stupidity of bringing the Knights down on Bordertown has changed everything—”

“I tell ye again: it weren’t my fault.”

“Whoever’s fault it was, I need to go into the City of Glass to get the children back. Including, I presume, your grandson’s father. Don’t tell me none of the other families in Bordertown question why you got to keep your daughter.”

Ontane’s face went red. “I told ye: the Knights didn’t want to take her like . . .” He waved his hand toward the house. “. . . like that.”

“I’ve not known the Knights to show such compassion. Maybe there was a bribe involved?”

“Hmph.” Ontane scuffed his feet in the snow. “I want three hundred silver gulls.”

“That’s robbery!” But Tandor knew that, now Ontane had started negotiating, he’d won.

“It may be, but I’m the one that be happy with my daughter staying put.”

“And with an old carpet on your floor. Two hundred and sixty.”

“What do ye think I be? I want two-ninety.”

“A man with a nose for business. I could just walk away from this deal and you’d get nothing. In fact, I’m in a hurry, so I best get going.” Tandor picked up another of his packs and set it on top of the chest, then went about lashing both items to the luggage rack.

Ruko was jiggling his leg and fiddling with the reins.

“No, no. It bain’t as easy as that, mister. Two-eighty.”

“Da, what’s going on?” The shed door had opened and the girl poked her head out.

“Go back inside, Myra,” Ontane said.

“You’re talking about me.”

“We bain’t.”

“You can’t fool me, Da. I heard you. What’s it about?”

“The sorcerer wants that ye go with him.”

The girl squeaked. “Go with him? Like this?”

She spread her arms. She was a thin, mousey thing with a fine-featured face, narrow shoulders and slender arms. One of her sleeves flapped empty below the wrist. While there might have been an element of beauty to her, Tandor’s gaze was drawn to her swollen belly. It was hard to believe a female belly could stretch that much and still be part of her.

Tandor repressed feelings of discomfort. “My lady friend in the City of Glass is a very good midwife. She will look after you. Certainly a girl like yourself would like to see the marvels of the City of Glass again? You would like to buy some nice dresses from the city’s best merchants, and go to the Newlight celebrations?”

The girl’s eyes widened. “The Newlight celebrations? In the City of Glass? See the games? People competing from all over the land?”

“That’s what I think I said, yes.”

“Oh Da, it doesn’t sound so bad. Can I go?”

Ontane snorted, and then shrugged. “I suppose your mother . . .” He shrugged again and met Tandor’s eyes. “This, um, lady friend of yours . . .”

“Mistress Loriane, one of the city’s midwives.”

“And what if she . . . if it happens on the way, then? I be guessing he don’t have any experience.” Ontane nodded at Ruko.

Tandor repressed a shudder. “Look at it this way: the Knights will be back. If they find her here, you will never see her again. If she comes with us, there’s a good chance that you’ll see your grandchild. Anyway, my lady friend tells me that such . . . women’s things have a habit of happening safely by themselves.” He was groping for words. By the skylights, every word spoken delayed him further, with the chance that this dreaded thing would indeed happen before he got to Loriane’s house. He’d heard a woman’s birth screams once, while he stood, powerless, hidden between stuffy clothing in a dressing room. Oh my love, if I’d known I’d do that to you.

“It’s all about your daughter’s safety,” he said, pushing away those memories.

“Hmph! Safety. It may be ye think it ‘safe’ to turn her blue and cold, like that ghost over there.” Ontane pointed, his fingernail chipped and blackened from work.

Tandor met his piercing eyes. Ontane wasn’t stupid. He knew that Tandor would have to turn Myra into a servitor if she was to be useful to him.

“She will be back here as you know her.” Once he had control of the City of Glass, all the power of its Heart would be his, and he could return her in the original state. “Are we agreed then?”

Ontane fixed his gaze on his daughter, who smiled at him. “Please, Da?”

“Right then,” Ontane muttered.

“Oh, thank you.” She gave him an awkward hug.

Over his daughter’s shoulder, Ontane mouthed, two-seventy.

Two-sixty, Tandor mouthed back.

Ontane’s face twisted into a snarl, but he didn’t protest. “Ye’ll be the ruin of me.” He hawked and spat in the snow to seal the deal. “Go get your things then, girl.”

Tandor put his attention to securing his luggage to the sled.

Promises, promises. His life hung together with promises. Once he had established himself in the City of Glass, there would be no more promises. He raised his eyes to the sky. Not even to you, Mother.