"Hard to..." he murmured, then stopped as if frozen himself, facing the northeast. "It's warmer around here.

Only a little, and the wind's dropping."

They all froze and looked at each other. "Storm! Teik, storm out of Zibr coming fast. Worst I've ever felt, Teik, it's the Dark Lord's own and it's hungry." His voice was rising, an expert's panic at a known terror that he meets with no time to make preparation. "How could I not have felt it? It's as if it was hiding. Teik! There's a grievouswind riding in like a mad Ryadn on her Ri.

Soon, soon!"

"Annike!" Rilla called sharply. "Temuchin! Call off the digging."

Megan steadied Cerwyn. "Tents, pull the animals in!"

She shouted. "We need all the warmth we can get. Stake everything down to the ice, stake it hard. Half the tents, everyone pile in on each other. Throw some snow over-no, the wind will do it. Jump!" She wheeled and started yanking at the lashings on the nearest sled.

"Shyll, we'll use the lee of the drift."

Shkai'ra shook her head as if clearing it. "I'll get the woodcutters, " she shouted, already running back toward the bank and south, to where a team was chopping at fallen timber. "Sova! Pull in the ice-fishers, over there behind the curve of the drift. Run, girl, run!"

A horn began to sound, urgent flat, blatting sounds.

The leather screens were pulled down, people moving as fast as the cold allowed, staked down between snow and close-hauled sleds. Shouts and neighing and barking were lost in a rising whistle; frantic arms shovelled snow on the loose edges of the leather windshields and the tents, darkening the long rectangle along the edge of the drift where the poniesand dogs were made to lie down, crowding it close.

Sledges ran on steel spikes, as the hook-ends were pinned down over the runners of the sleds to nail them to the surface.

"Hurry!" Cerwyn called. "Hurry!" Hands made brutal by necessity threw the ponies down, hobbled them and tossed their horse blankets across. Wiser, the sled dogs were burrowing under snow or anything else available, whining, huddling together in masses of fur and fear-snarled teeth, burying noses under tails in circles of protection.

"Inside. Leave the fires! Everyone in!" Megan and Rilla yelled, listening to be sure that everyone answered, slapping at arms and shoulders as they ran past. Even then the cousins had time to feel a brief surge of pride at how little panic there was, no heedless flailing. Northeast, the light had vanished; low cloud and a white-roiling ground haze of fallen snow pushed before the wind hid what was coming, but the eyes of the mind could see it, like a great wall toppling with ponderous acceleration. The woodcutters came gasping up, streams of white pluming through their scarves, and crawled into already crowded tents.

The wind was rising again as the edge of the blizzard came closer, and suddenly snow was flicking at them like a thousand, thousand miniature knives, the tiny crystals of a deep-winter storm. The light faded, as if a dark blanket had been thrown on top of the clouds to dim the sun. Then the wind struck with force enough to throw everyone left standing to their knees; the circle of visibility shrank like a puddle of water in the bottom of a sink when the plug was pulled. The roar of the storm sucked in every other sound; a woven bullhide rope parted noiselessly in the deathbird shrieking, the plucked-string note vibrating through the ice under their feet.

"Sova!" Shkai'ra called, running back in thewoodcutters' wake. A bison pelt blew into her, the thirty pounds of leather and hair flicked along like a paper scrap, and almost knocked her down once more; she gripped the weight of it.

I didn't see her come back with the fishers. Twenty seconds more and she's dead... Glitch, is that the tents?

"Sova, answer!"

"Shkai'ra!" Megan, blocked by the press of people getting into the tent, saw her disappear in the swirl of snow as the wind hit, shouted over their heads, gasping at the knife-like pain in her lungs from cold. "No..." But the Kommanza was already gone.

Shkai'ra stumbled to the edge of the drift-too Glitch-taken cold-the fishers and Sova must have gotten back- She turned around. The air went still as glass. Cold falling. She half-heard Megan, frantic, calling her. The shelter was a hundred yards away. I've been very stupid, she thought. The visibility had dropped to arm's length, and the wind sang in her skull, she could feel it sucking warmth through the layered thickness of her clothes. Sova's either under cover or she's going to die, and so may I.

The drift was near, an almost vertical wall with the wind keening along it. Then there was a moment's silence, with the snow coming straight down, drifting.

The killer was above her, dropping with the inevitability of age. She wrapped the bison cloak around herself and dove into the side of the snow, burrowing desperately and heedless of the danger of smothering. It was light-packed for all its size, each tiny bubble of trapped air another ounce of insulation. The grauhalm was like a hammer pounding darkness into her eyes and ears. Dark.

Rilla caught Megan just as she was about to go after Shkai'ra. "No, coz, no, no." Megan squirmed, freed a hand to claw and froze as the cold fell."Shkai'ra," she whispered. The darkness in the tent was barely more tolerable then outside, a huddled clot of warmth knotted tight against the graukalm.

Shyll and Rilla wrapped their arms around her and she clutched at them as if they were storm anchors.

They were lying crouched together in the dark, across other legs and bodies. She couldn't go out there physically. One deep, even breath in the cold darkness.

Another. She reached for the manrauq, plunged into power like a swimmer into cold water. Shkai'ra. Behind her eyes the world burned brilliant orange, flickered to yellow for a second, steadied. Yellow? Where's my familiar red? She dismissed the thought. Shkai'ra.

Her mind reached out for the familiar shape nonshape of the Kommanza's mind.

The knot of minds curled warmly around her. The pattern of winds and pressures of the storm curled around them. The shape of the mind curled around the storm, spiderweb through the half-living, natural energy-web, holding it hunkered down over them like a vulture tearing at a half-living victim.

A blue-violet haze of a mind. Cold. Cultured. Intent to kill. Not the Wizard but someone almost as powerful. The Blue Mage.

As she recognized the mind forcing the storm down on them, he found her. In the sea of the manrauq, a whirlwind swept around her, eddied to catch four minds near, and dragged them all down; falling, falling... Megan strained against the mental hand cramming her down into herself, felt edges peel away as she was forced back into what she had been...

Nightmare.

She opened her eyes in the half-gloom of the old River Lady's cabin, knew that he was coming. His heavy tread made the board outside the door crack, like it always did. Thunder rumbled. She was twelve.Rilla hung onto Megan and Shyll, felt the leather bow over their heads from the wind, felt a crackle like the edge of lightning bolt and... Nightmare.

Mam's due home soon. She took Megan away. Rilla huddled by the drug-still, listening to it bubble. I didn't steal anything today and she won't have anything to drink. She'll be sober enough to hit me. The front door creaked. I've got to hide. "Rillan!" Mam's voice from the front room. Rilla scrambled under the bed, watched the door open and Mam's muddy shoes cross the floor.

Shkai'ra tried to shake her head as she woke up. The snow pressed around her from all sides. It was dark and the wind howled like a snowtiger, clawing away at her hiding place. Dark and close... Nightmare.

Zoweitzum, the little crawlers are right behind me.

Zaik damn these walls . . . She was in the sewers under Fehinna.

Megan had been here a moment ago, had wiggled around on her back and down into the water. I'm alone with all the weight of the city on me, pressing down in the dark-the walls shift, smear me into the dark, close, close and it's coming behind me. One thing, no.

Hundreds, the sewer crawlers following the blood trail, green eyes... There was a shivering rumble and the walls moved closer.

Shyll pulled the soaking wet scarf away from his face, put his arm around Megan, felt her tremble...

Nightmare.

I can't fail. I might die if I fail. If I succeed I'll be a Ryadn, riding the most splendid of creatures. Not teRyadn, outcast. My Ri. Terrifying. Beautiful. It was out there, somewhere. His Ri. To bond with him, or kill him.

It reared up from the spring grass, struck out at him, not bonding, refusing him. It nipped his arm, drovehim staggering to the right.-In the tent, under his parka, a crescent-shaped bruise sprang up, started seeping blood.-It's playing with me. Mad green eyes glittering. It'll play with me, tear me apart. He ran.

Rilla looked up at Marte's face, at the smile. "I'm not going to beat you dear." She's drunk already. "I got rid of an ungrateful brat. Megan isn't going to bother you any more dear." She hiccupped, fell onto the bed and laughed and laughed. "I sold her bond to a River Captain. He'll take good care of the little fiend, devil me with my brother's shade, will she!"

I'm alone. My bigger cousin gone. I'm alone with her. I'm... I'm... This can't be true.

Something about that sounded right. Little girl Rilla opened her mouth to cry, to wail loss and loneliness, stopped. This can't be true. The nightmare froze.

Megan. Megan's gone. No. Megan's... Megan's b- It was like lifting a boulder, granite ridges gouging into her... Megan's BACK. The dream broke, sending her tumbling into another. She was on the deck of a ship, holystoning the deck, preparing to finish because of the thunderstorm brewing. She cringed aside as the Captain, the Arkan Sarngeld, stamped by.

The walls were closing in. Shkai'ra whimpered, turned her head, bit into the leather of her sleeve and bruised the arm underneath, slammed a fist across six inches of space into the rock of the wall. The water stank, and the walls were barely more than chest-width apart. The multiple click of claws and hungry jaws behind. Darkness ahead, the small spaces, crushing, confining. Control. It's coming. No, control. Move.

Move now... It's coming. Fear welled up to clot in her throat. Mad green eyes. This isn't. Real. A dream. It was a dream.

She was dicing on deck as the Captain came aboard.She looked up, then away as he went below, going to play with his new toy. She shrugged. Poor kid, glad it's not me.

Shyll ran. His lungs were burning. Run. Run. The Ri was right behind him, nip marks burned all across his back. It bit him again to make him turn. He tripped, fell in the dirt, rolling. It reared over him ready to stamp him into bloody slush.

No. Inu howled. Inu. Inu. The dog leaped over him with snow scattering. Snow? This isn't spring. Inu hit the Ri neck-high, and both of them vanished.

He got up from the deck, grabbed the burlap bag of roots and hoisted it to his shoulder to take it down to Piatr. A thunderstorm brewing. Rilla putting the stone away, Shkai'ra dicing with Tze... Captain going below to ride the F'talezonian girl. Poor little brat. She was too young, too small.

Run in snow. Hotblood kill fear. Run. Close Redcoat.

Close. Tastebite fear.

Sarngeld pulled the door open. Twelve-year-old Megan cringed back on the bunk. "Come here, my little one," he said in Arkan. She stared, wide-eyed, and didn't move. "You understand well enough. Come here, or I'll have to get you." He walked over, sat down on the edge of the bunk, pulled off his boots and breeches.

She tried to get past him, running for the door. His hand shot out, clamped around her upper arm, whirled her around. "That's my girl, that's my good little slut."

He clamped his legs around her, let her struggle while he pulled his shirt off, rubbing himself against her. No.

No. Don't. Papa, Mama, Rilla, Shkai'ra...

The dream wavered and a blue thread pulled her back in the Arkan's hands. He picked her up like a doll, held her down on the bunk with his weight, letting her struggle^ excite him. When he pulled her tunic off, she started to scream.At the first scream everyone on deck jumped. Shyll put down the bag of roots.

"Cold," he said.

Shkai'ra dropped the dice. "Megan," she murmured.

"I know that sound, she's having the dream again."

Rilla stood up from where she knelt. Tze and Piatr came up on deck, blinking.

"I can't speak," Tze said. "I'm doing something I should have this time before."

A yellow flare lit the sky as the thunderstorm broke, drowning another scream. A yellow of magic.

Piatr, in the real world, in the tent, warm, with the storm outside, remembered Sova's whisper. "Why didn't you help her?"

Inu was barking, howling in the storm, Fishhook hissing at something that most of the other Zak couldn't see.

They broke the door down. Sarngeld was laughing, rising between the opened knees of the child on the bed; her feet kicked in futile protest. He turned a startled indignant face to his crew as they interrupted his pleasure, opened his mouth. They pulled him off, hurled him against the wall, driving their fists into him.

Little Megan, on the bunk, rolled over, looked at them wide-eyed. Then they stopped, held the huge blubbery man against the boards of the cabin, sweat shining through the thinning blond hair on his scalp, blood and tears on his face.

Megan, white lock of hair gleaming yellow in the light from her eyes, steel claws glinting, stepped through the door. She walked over to Sarngeld, his real name is Atzathratzas, put up a hand, hooked her claws into his throat. He choked, dying, shrivelled into nothing andblew away. Megan turned to her younger self on the bunk, gathered her in her arms, rocking her. "This can't be real," young Megan whispered, looking up into her own eyes. "I'm dreaming."

"I'm dreaming," she whispered in the real world. The storm hammered at the shelter, at the snowdrift, at the tiny shape running up the river in the wind, fangs bared.

Shkai'ra saw the rage pull her away from the nightmare; it shredded like old wet felt as her fists beat gleefully Sarngeld's ugly Arkan face, crumbling of bones and teeth... Daydream, this I've daydreamed, no time, not now.

Reality. She had been lying in the snowdrift, dreaming. (Why?) The wind had scoured away most of the snow around her. She could hear the hiss as the ice crystals whirled away, dragging precious protection.

The grievouswind was gone, over, but her body had begun to shake uncontrollably, and the blizzard was almost as bad. A few minutes exposed to the violence of it would suck the life heat away, the crucial areas around heart and lungs chilled past the point where they could recover.

A scream. At first she thought it was part of the storm, then a clawed paw broke through the crust by her face. It vanished as the Ri reared, letting an icy blast of air into her face. The beast from Aenir'sfbrd, the hallucination... no, real. It was here.

Redcoat sister. Hotblood kill for you. Who kill?

No one. A communication without knowing how or why; not words, but the meaning that words were made of. It snorted, then lay down next to her, snow piling on both of them. Redcoat sister warm. Hot. Stay. She burrowed close, pulled the bisonskin robe over them both, laid her cheek on its lowered neck, feeling the warm pulse of the vein. It was hotter than a horse, big,smelling carnivore-rank, but warm, warm; she curled up against its belly and their weight sank them deeper.

A rumble, and the undercut drift slid down on them again. Pain in hands and feet, stinging welcome pain, overwhelming drowsiness. The Ri began to purr. They slept.

Megan gathered her will, felt her friends and followers break free, add their strength to hers, raised her sight to the vaguely outlined blue eyes in the storm.

"You've lost. Cease."

"Yellow witch," a cool voice answered her. "You cannot defeat me."

"I already have." She drew on the strength around her, hurled it into the netting holding the storm on them. It whirled out yellow, trailing the wills of those who would help her, grew, grew and cracked the blue web of power across. Faintly, in F'talezon, she felt/heard a cry of pain. (A gilded mirror began to bleed.) The manrauq shifted and the storm ceased to be the unnatural monster. Wind still struck the felt-lined leather with buffeting fists, a roar of white noise too much for ears to bear; the cold still drew. But it was simply a storm now, the thread of purpose withdrawn from the fabric of it, the living will to harm.

Enough. I was paid to kill, not suffer. I will remember. He withdrew, leaving only the threat of future revenge behind.

She shivered, opened her eyes, sensing more than seeing Rilla on one side, Shyll on the other, close in the chill vibrating darkness. Pain between her ears, but no sign of overstrain. She embraced them both, shakily, opened her mouth to try and say something, shook her head, fighting to stay awake. "Shkai'ra's still alive out there somewhere," she whispered, pulling them close.

Hurt and weariness were good; they tasted of victory.

Somewhere deep in her mind, scar-tissue had pulled open, and that hurt too, an ache that seeped acrossmemory and will, but the pus beneath was draining, she could feel it trickle away.

Chapter Twenty.

ONE WEEK NORTH OF AENIR'SFORD.

TWELFTH IRON CYCLE, SEVENTEENTH DAY.

Megan woke hungry. For a moment the sensation overwhelmed her; hunger for sweets, a humans reaction to extreme cold. Another hunger, this time for meat. Raw, red, torn from still-moving bones; bolting gulping lumps down a muzzle thrown back and working, working, blood running into her fur (fur?)...

She sat up, bumping her head on the taut leather above, shaking off the alien sensation. Must be a dream.

The others were waking around her; she could feel them in the close darkness of the crowded tent. A flicker that was closer than touch, sealed off, locked away, forgotten. The hunger, from some creature, was coming from a little further away.

Megan clamped down, the touches fading to the background of her mind; time enough to explore them later. They did seem permanent... and they had all experienced the dream... her attention shied away from that, became aware enough to hear a sound conspicuous by its absence.

"The wind!" she said. There was a muttering stir, and Shyll knelt up to press his ear against the tent-roof above.

"It's gone," he said. "Gone, not just muffled."

For a moment they all whooped and babbled. Five days, Megan thought. Four days. Now we can find her.