“We’re going to lose them if we don’t hurry. What’s your problem, Pie? You’ve talked with spirits before.”
“Not like these,” Pie said. “The Goddesses weren’t all forgiving mothers, you know. And their rites weren’t all milk and honey. Some of them were cruel. They sacrificed men.”
“You think that’s why they want us?”
“It’s possible.”
“So we weigh that possibility against the absolute certainty of freezing to death where we stand,” Gentle said.
“It’s your decision.”
“No, this one we make together. You’ve got fifty percent of the vote and fifty percent of the responsibility.”
“What do you want to do?”
“There you go again. Make up your own mind for once.”
Pie looked at the departing women, their forms already disappearing behind a veil of snow. Then at Gentle. Then at the doeki. Then back at Gentle. “I heard they eat men’s balls.”
“So what are you worried about?”
“AH right!” the mystif growled, “I vote we go.”
“Then it’s unanimous.”
Pie started to haul the doeki to its feet. It didn’t want to move, but the mystif had a fine,turn of threat when pressed, and began to berate it ripely.
“Quick, or we’ll lose them!” Gentle said.
The beast was up now, and tugging on its bridle Pie led it in pursuit of Gentle, who was forging ahead to keep their guides in sight. The snow obliterated the women completely at times, but he saw the beckoner glance back several times, and knew that she’d not let her foundlings get lost again. After a time, their destination came in sight. A rock face, slate-gray and sheer, loomed from the murk, its summit lost in mist.
“If they want us to climb, they can think again,” Pie yelled through the wind.
“No, there’s a door,” Gentle shouted over his shoulder. “See it?”
The word rather flattered what was no more than a jagged crack, like a bolt of black lightning burned into the face of the cliff. But it represented some hope of shelter, if nothing else.
Gentle turned back to Pie. “Do you see it, Pie?”
“I see it,” came the response. “But I don’t see the women.”
One sweeping glance along the rock face confirmed the mystifs observation. They’d either entered the cliff or
floated up its face into the clouds. Whichever, they’d removed themselves quickly.
“Phantoms,” Pie said, fretfully.
“What if they are?” Gentle replied. “They brought us to shelter.”
He took the doeki’s rein from Pie’s hands and coaxed the animal on, saying, “See that hole in the wall? It’s going to be warm inside. Remember warm?”
The snow thickened as they covered the last hundred yards, until it was almost waist deep again. But all three— man, animal, and mystif—made the crack alive. There was more than shelter inside; there was light. A narrow passageway presented itself, its black walls encased in ice, with a fire flickering somewhere out of sight in the cavern’s depths.
Gentle had let slip the doeki’s reins, and the wise animal was already heading away down the passage, the sound of its hooves echoing against the glittering walls. By the time Gentle and Pie caught up with it, a slight bend in the passage had revealed the source of the light and warmth it was heading towards. A broad but shallow bowl of beaten brass was set in a place where the passage widened, and the fire was burning vigorously in its center. There were two curiosities, however: one, that the flame was not gold but blue; two, that it burned without fuel, the flames hovering six inches above the bottom of the bowl. But oh, it was warm. The cobs of ice in Gentle’s beard melted and dropped off; the snowflakes became beads on Pie’s smooth brow and cheek. The warmth brought a whoop of pure pleasure to Gentle’s lips, and he opened his aching arms to Pie ‘oh’ pah.
“We’re not going to die!” he said. “Didn’t I tell you? We’re not going to die!”
The mystif hugged him in return, its lips first pressed to Gentle’s neck, then to his face.
“All right, I was wrong,” it said. “There! I admit it!”
“So we go on and find the women, yes?”